home

U.S. Office of Research Integrity Update - 1/2014

Funding Opportunity Announcement for Research on Research Integrity
The Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) for research on research integrity grants was published on December 2, 2013.  ORI intends to support up to four awards with a maximum budget of $150,000 per year. Second-year funding may be available depending on successful completion of the first year and available funds in FY 2014.  The applications must be received by  5:00 P.M. on April 14, 2014.
 
ORI plans on holding a webinar for those interested in applying on January 16, 2014, from 2:30 P.M. until 4:00 P.M.  To receive instructions on how to register for the seminar, send an email to ORIWebinars@hhs.gov with "Grant Webinar Registration" in the subject line.  
 
Quarterly ORI Newsletter Now Available
The latest quarterly ORI Newsletter features commentaries from invited writers about research on the responsible conduct of research. Below are the headlines:
  • "Scientific Work in a Changing Environment"
  • "Essential Questions for Research on Research Integrity"
  • "What Research Should Be Addressed? or Moving Research Forward in RCR: Do We Dare to Study Ourselves?"
  • "What Don’t We Know about RCR Education?"
  • "Some Thoughts about Directions for Research on Research Integrity"
  • "Future Directions in Research on Research Integrity"
 
ORI Seeks Peer Reviewers
ORI is seeking peer reviewers for grant applications. Peer reviewers should have a strong understanding of the responsible conduct of research and research on research integrity. The review process for the 2014 granting round will be held in April or May 2014. Please contact Sandra.Titus@hhs.gov if you are interested in being considered.
 
The Annual Report on Possible Research Misconduct (ARPRM, Form PHS-6349) was updated on December 31, 2013. The new form now requires institutions that receive PHS funding to include the contact information for the Research Integrity Officer (RIO) and the Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) Coordinator.  
 
Research Misconduct Finding: Dong-Pyou Han
Dong-Pyou, Ph.D., former Research Assistant Professor at Iowa State University of Science and Technology, falsified results in research to develop a vaccine against human immunodeficiency virus-1 (HIV-1) by intentionally spiking samples of rabbit sera with antibodies to provide the desired results.
 
Research Misconduct Finding: Baoyan Xu 
Baoyan Xu, M.D., Ph.D., former Postdoctoral Fellow at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), National Institutes of Health (NIH), engaged in research misconduct by falsifying data in reserach involving Western blot analysis of IgM and IgG antibodies.
 
Research Misconduct Finding: Timothy Sheehy 
Timothy Sheehy, B.A., B.Sc.,  former manager at SAIC-Frederick, Inc., engaged in research misconduct by fabricating  quantitative and qualitative data for RNA and DNA purportedly extracted from 900 formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded (FFPE) colorectal tissue samples, and falsely reported successful methodology to simultaneously recover nucleic acids from FFPE tissue specimens.
 
Research Misconduct Finding: Wang Hao
Hao Wang, M.D., Ph.D, former Associate Professor at Western University-Canada,  falsified the status of two animals as successfully treated renal allograft recipients in a 2011 American Transplant Congress abstract and meeting presentation and in false representations to the project principal investigators and colleagues. The respondent falsely claimed long term survival, normal serum creatinine concentrations, and lack of adverse effects in two Cynomolgus monkeys treated with chimeric antibodies following bilateral nephrectomies and receipt of renal allografts, when in fact the transplant surgery had failed and the animals' survival was due to a native kidney that was left in place in each animal. Dr. Wang also falsified or failed to correct known falsifications (identifying the two monkeys as transplant recipients) in numerous clinical records, including anesthesia records, progress, notes, treatment records, and clinical laboratory reports.
 
Research Misconduct Finding: Nitin Aggarwal
Nitin Aggarwal, Ph.D., former graduate student at Medical College of Wisconsin and former associate scientist at University of Wisconsin-Madison engaged in research misconduct by falsifying Western blot loading control data by inverting, duplicating, and cropping source blot films and/or using films from unrelated experiments to construct five (5) false Western blot figures. In the absence of valid blot images, Respondent falsified and/or fabricated the corresponding quantitative data for summary bar graphs and the data statistics in related text. Respondent admitted to falsely reporting the number of mice reported for an experiment reported in Figure 4 in grant application HL113518-01 to support the hypothesis of the research.
 
What would you do? Olga has been scooped by a reviewer. 
Olga submits a proposal with a novel research design.  She is disappointed when one of the peer reviewers argues that her research and design is trivial.  Months later, Olga discovers that the person who she suspects gave her a poor review published a study using her proposed design.  What should Olga do?
 
 
Follow Us on Twitter
https://twitter.com/HHS_ORI
 
 

Source URL: https://ori.hhs.gov/us-office-research-integrity-update-12014