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University of Alabama Hemorrhaging Research Fraud

Two cases this year, both stunners.

The University of Ala­bama at Birmingham has asked that nine research papers by former UAB sci­entist H.M. Krishna Murthy be retracted because his ex­perimental findings appear to be false or fabricated.

One has already been re­tracted by the prestigious Journal of Biological Chem­­istry.

… UAB launched a probe of Murthy’s research in Janu­ary 2007 after the interna­tional scientific community began questioning the val­idity of molecular struc­tures he had published in respected scientific jour­nals such as Nature and the Journal of Molecular Bi­ology. A committee of ex­perts who had no conflicts of interest examined all the data and did a re-analysis of each molecular structure that was alleged to have been fabricated.

UAB found a preponder­ance of evidence that 11 protein structures “were more likely than not falsi­fied and/or fabricated…

… This is the second case of research misconduct at UAB reported this year. In July, two UAB scientists, Dr. Juan R. Contreras and Judith M. Thomas were barred by the U.S. Office of Research Integrity from re­ceiving grants and con­tracts after falsifying ani­mal study results. They no longer work at UAB.

… Murthy’s JBC work involved discovery of the molecular structure of a se­rine protease enzyme for the virus that causes the Dengue and Dengue hem­orrhagic fevers. The work was important — Dengue fever strikes about 100 mil­lion people each year and kills thousands…

Margaret Soltan, December 11, 2009 1:23PM
Posted in: hoax

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One Response to “University of Alabama Hemorrhaging Research Fraud”

  1. Shane Street Says:

    A) As I understand it, none of the principals here are still at UAB.

    B) Please be careful–this is UAB, NOT The University of Alabama (you know, the one that is about to win the national championship)

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