… happen. But it’s rare that universities acknowledge the event right at the top of their home page.
Switzerland’s excellent Federal Institute of Technology [ETH] announces in this forthright way the bogus results of a set of experiments that involved “the properties of reactive hydrocarbon free radicals using a technique called zero kinetic-energy photoelectron spectroscopy.” Results couldn’t be reproduced. A university committee “found identical background noise in purportedly independent spectra reported in the two papers, but it could not find a key lab notebook that should have held the raw data.”
The person overseeing experimental work in that lab has resigned from his position as head of research for the institute, though he remains a professor. He seems not to have been involved in the project at all, though he acknowledges responsibility as head of the lab.
September 23rd, 2009 at 7:26AM
This is a remarkable story.
It seems quite likely that Professor Chen was not directly involved in this misrepresentation, however as head of the lab, he has acknowledged his responsibility for these events. From the second article on the website it appears that he has been a very positive influence at the ETH.
Some senior US scientists have been in the same situation and basically claimed that it was not their fault or responsibility…
By the way, you might want to put ETH in the body of this report, since most scientists recognize it by these initials rather than the title used.
September 23rd, 2009 at 7:47AM
Thanks, Bill. Done.
September 24th, 2009 at 7:45PM
Geesh, what would happen if this caught on? No ghostwriting, people doing their own research, actually earning their degrees, the mind boggles.
September 30th, 2009 at 11:04AM
"He seems not to have been involved in the project at all, though he acknowledges responsibility as head of the lab."
How delightfully quaint.