© KRIS MUKAI
An unfortunate story has become all too common: a researcher is suspected of having manipulated data, an investigation is launched, the paper is retracted by a scientific journal, and the offending scientist is punished. But while cases of misconduct and subsequent retractions headline a growing reproducibility problem in the sciences, they actually represent a relatively small number of the flawed studies out there. The vast majority of publications that reported inaccurate results, used impure cell cultures, relied on faulty antibodies, or analyzed contaminated DNA are not the result of wrongdoing, but of honest mistakes, and many such papers persist in the scientific literature uncorrected.
“I think there is a continuum between fraud and errors, and I think people are all too willing to go easy ...
