University Administration of Scientific Ethics

Abstract

The hexagon case illustrates the full range of ethical conflicts. The discovery of a collaborator’s misrepresentations was a disconcerting event. When the collaborators engaged in a cover-up to try to hide the discrepancies, it became clear that the misrepresentations were falsifications. When the collaborators attempted to block publication of any of the research by threats of legal action and claims that all of the samples were intellectual property, University 1 forbade me from publishing. Under current federal research misconduct regulation there was only one course of action remaining; to make an allegation of research misconduct. After winning the battle to have the right to publish, the respondents made allegations of sample theft and other claims to journal editors. The hexagon case revealed the extent to which financial interests were of paramount importance to the public universities involved. The two universities involved acted exclusively in their own financial interest. One had interests in maintaining intellectual property, equity stakes, and protection the investment in new faculty members (and their grants) and the other university wished to avoid a lawsuit, which seemed a credible enough threat once a binder full of legal letters had been received. The research misconduct regulation apparently did not foresee the ways that legal interference could force delays and change the trajectory of an investigation.

“Be not ashamed of mistakes and thus make them crimes.”

Confucius