Errors and Misconduct in Biomedical Research

Embark on an eye-opening journey with image forensics detective Elisabeth Bik as she uncovers the startling prevalence of duplicated images and research misconduct in scientific papers. Discover what drives scientists to research misconduct and learn how to report and combat these issues within journals and institutions.

In this webinar, you will learn:

• Why some scientists are driven towards research misconduct;
• The different types of image duplications that can be found in biomedical publications;
• How can you report images-of-concern to journals or institutions.

Science builds upon science. Even after peer review and publication, science papers can still contain images or other data of concern. If not addressed post-publication, papers containing incorrect or even falsified data can waste time and money spent by other researchers trying to reproduce those results. Several high-profile science misconduct cases have been described, but many more remain undetected. 

Elisabeth Bik is an image forensics detective who left her paid job in industry to search for and report biomedical articles that contain errors or data of concern. She has systematically scanned 20,000 papers in 40 journals and found that about 4% of these contained inappropriately duplicated images. 

In her talk, she will present her work and show several types of inappropriately duplicated images and other examples of research misconduct. In addition, she will show how to report scientific papers of concern, and how journals and institutions handle such allegations.