干细胞领域的科学家正在互相拆台？

marrowstem

Are stem cell scientists sabotaging rivals' work?
- k( R0 p/ L' s! E+ \) P5 K! TAndy Coghlan2 J" f( T" D2 W! A& u
《新科学家》2010年2月2日17:06报道5 x9 j6 t) q- f. z) ^

4 g! w; R% J+ \" F      难道世界一流的科学家会自甘下贱、以至于为了防止竞争对手胜出，而把对手的研究成果捂着盖着不让发表吗？5 S3 r9 Q5 r& ]6 i; [- r
        虽然证据不足，一群资深干细胞研究者警告说这可能正在发生。他们呼吁杂志编辑对推荐人提高警惕，因为推荐人可能在同行评审过程中滥用职权，贬低或阻碍对手研究成果的发表。3 `1 }# y% w* @. H8 y8 Z
        “完全是背后捅刀子，所以想收集相关信息非常困难。”位于伦敦的国立医学研究所的Robin Lovell-Badge如此说。: ?+ r" {% F' t: u! }
         他与日本京都大学山中伸教授（在将普通细胞转化为胚胎干细胞研究方面领先）以及其他十二名科学家联合签名给包括《Nature》和《Science》在内的所有重量级科学杂志写了一封信，反应了这一问题。但让他们失望的是，此信如泥牛入海，于是在本周，他们决定将该信内容在更广泛的范围内公开发表。1 T! K4 `% X2 C& x2 {
        此信呼吁各科学杂志将来自推荐人的匿名评论随着发表的论文一起发表，这样所有人都可以就评论的公正性与科学有效性进行判断。欧洲分子生物学组织（EMBO）杂志就已经这么做了。
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        联署人之一、剑桥大学的Austin Smith说：“在获取有关评审者作出过分要求的举动的证据方面，除轶事证据之外难有进展。”他通过剑桥大学在本周也发表了这封信。他说：“更严重的问题是：在同一杂志，漏洞百出、或者数据与解释牛头不对马嘴的论文也正在得以通过评审。”
/ @& v! M! F) k2 @  ~# h        “因为所有的点评都将发表，那么带有偏见的或马虎大意的推荐就会大为减少；并且，如果人们能够发现带偏见或愚蠢的点评的话，相关杂志不免难堪。”Lovell-Badge说。& S; R3 a6 J. l- m0 s
         他补充说，此信联署人中只有两位来自美国，这说明最清醒的人来自其它地方， “针对来自世界上其它地方的研究小组，偏见确实存在。”
# c; d" f6 F6 P! K5 p2 M       《Nature》总编辑Philip Campbell指出， EMBO杂志的模式“仍被搁置”。但他说，应该由杂志编辑来决定推荐人对论文作者提出的增加额外实验的要求是否正当，如果推荐人这种做法造成论文发表延迟，编辑应该揪出他们的“尾巴”。
! t/ s& [$ x( z2 k' u8 e: K       （转载Docofsoul 译于 2010-02-06）

marrowstem

Are stem cell scientists sabotaging rivals' work? 8 [6 p# F8 K3 f' H0 ?! H
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          Would top-flight scientists stoop so low as to sabotage disclosure of rival research that threatens to scoop their own?
" z6 d: x' ]4 z: k- P) Z            Although short of proof, a group of senior stem cell researchers warn that it may be happening. They are calling for journal editors to be alert to referees who might abuse their position in the peer-review process to discredit or block rival research.
& l* k  M8 C3 L7 K2 j          "It's all done in secret, so it's very hard to gather information on this," says Robin Lovell-Badge of the National Institute for Medical Research in London.. V0 q0 Y* B6 x3 x; w
            He and Shinya Yamanaka of Kyoto University, Japan, who famously reprogrammed ordinary cells to become similar to embryonic stem cells, are among 14 signatories to a letter of complaint sent in July 2009 to major scientific journals, including Nature and Science. Frustrated by the lack of response, some signatories decided to publicise the letter's content more widely this week.: @# W/ |  G; C' I3 B4 {
            The letter called on journals to publish anonymised comments from referees alongside published papers, so that the fairness and scientific validity of the comments can be judged by all, a practice already adopted by The EMBO Journal.
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           "It is hard to get beyond anecdotal evidence of reviewers making extravagant demands," says co-signatory Austin Smith at the University of Cambridge, also publicising the letter this week. "The more serious issue is that papers are getting through review in the same journals with serious holes, or interpretations that go way beyond the data," he says.
1 t2 K" [$ T  Z! G$ v* \7 L1 W# e          "Because all comments would be published, it would hopefully make biased or careless refereeing less common, and it would embarrass journals if people could spot biased or stupid comments," says Lovell-Badge.7 i/ M3 [8 B$ V) [5 ]- N7 _* J) [
          The fact that only two signatories were from the US hinted that most disenchantment lies elsewhere, he adds. "There does seem to be this bias against groups from the rest of the world."" L" f, X9 @* z3 P" \3 G
          Philip Campbell, editor-in-chief at Nature, says The EMBO Journal model "is still on the table", but says it's up to journal editors to decide if referees' demands for extra experiments are justified, and to spot referees who appear to be causing delays.

marrowstem

Journal stem cell work 'blocked' 7 G+ n# D, ^1 ]$ ]" v
By Pallab Ghosh
7 J1 s  v2 F+ i# U BBC News 4 ]* h9 Z  S& [1 W
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           Billions of pounds of public money is spent on stem cell research ! j: e# W/ \/ S6 {
Stem cell experts say they believe a small group of scientists is effectively vetoing high quality science from publication in journals.
! F* r- E5 H2 w! T* `- s3 Y          In some cases they say it might be done to deliberately stifle research that is in competition with their own. % @+ ?1 S" j! x* v
          It has also emerged that 14 leading stem cell researchers have written an open letter to journal editors in order to highlight their dissatisfaction.
( \" E2 ^1 \3 X          Billions of pounds of public money is spent on funding stem cell research. 3 j) b( a, O7 S6 W
          The open letter to the major scientific journals claims that "papers that are scientifically flawed or comprise only modest technical increments often attract undue profile. At the same time publication of truly original findings may be delayed or rejected". * r, `' N# t: a+ ?* f4 b
          Two internationally-renowned researchers have spoken to *** News about their concerns.
- F/ v9 G9 [* D8 B, \! R* f; @1 e           They are Robin Lovell-Badge, who is speaking in a personal capacity, and Austin Smith, from the University of Cambridge.
4 J* T' t# c6 P            Professor Lovell-Badge said: "It's turning things into a clique where only papers that satisfy this select group of a few reviewers who think of themselves as very important people in the field is published.
& I) K1 z) V, M7 M2 o- j           It's an editor's responsibility to ensure that delays are minimised, and we stop using any referee where a pattern of delays is apparent 4 {6 e, a, p& M5 o# z# T0 e
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Philip Campbell, Nature : A# {, P0 H" k* l1 Z( T
           "You can get a lot of hype over a paper published on stem cell research that's actually a minimal advance in knowledge whereas the poor person that is doing beautiful research that is not catching the eye of the editor, you don't get to hear about that, even though it could be the world changing piece of research." - [, R* w* a9 i4 D
            The issue is important because billions of pounds of public money are spent on funding stem cell research internationally. The funding is directed largely towards groups and individuals who have had their research published in the top journals. So if the journals are getting it wrong then public money is going to waste.
, @7 f9 D- x2 _! R3 h; }/ c           Dr Philip Campbell, the editor of Nature, which is one of the leading journals in the field, said: "Last year we used about 400 reviewers in stem cell and developmental biology, and we constantly recruit new referees. The idea that there's some privileged clique is utterly false." : @- q+ G3 w. ]9 D2 z  N( W
           It is a requirement of publicly funded research to publish in scientific journals.
% R% L% V1 L) y% `. w4 K          This process involves sending a report of the research to an editor at a journal. - C4 j" a+ L- y
         If the editor deems it sufficiently novel and interesting, they will ask two or three scientists who are experts in the field to review the research and send in comments.   k9 ^& Q% z& @1 H9 i3 k
          It is at this stage where scientists who may well be rivals of the person who submitted their research say whether the research is good or bad. They can also suggest to the journal editor that more experiments need to be carried out in order to justify the conclusions of the research. ( @. {5 g+ S* X4 ^
          'Extra experiments'# j7 q6 Z6 W' j$ U6 l4 F, E% Y
           The journal editor decides to publish the research paper usually when the majority of reviewers are satisfied. But professors Lovell-Badge and Smith believe that increasingly some reviewers are sending back negative comments or asking for unnecessary experiments to be carried out for spurious reasons.
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In some cases they say it is being done simply to delay or stop the publication of the research so that the reviewers or their close colleagues can be the first to have their own research published.
) J  A7 T/ J8 x% ]; t3 y" ?             "It's hard to believe except you know it's happened to you that papers have been held up for months and months by reviewers asking for experiments that are not fair or relevant," Professor Smith said. 3 u2 r+ W/ H& J/ T( y
              Dr Campbell denies this as far as his journals are concerned: "It's an editor's responsibility to ensure that delays are minimised, and we stop using any referee where a pattern of delays is apparent, whatever the reason might be." ' r2 ^6 ]* v$ E& T" }4 O( O6 n
             These kinds of allegations are not new and not confined to stem cell research. But professors Smith and Lovell-Badge believe that the problem has become particularly acute in their field of research recently for two reasons. 8 B5 h" m+ X8 j: [  }
             Firstly, research grants and career progression are now determined almost entirely by whether a scientist gets published in a major research journal. Secondly, in stem cell science, hundreds of millions of pounds are available for research - and so there is a greater temptation for those that want the money to behave unscrupulously.
1 |9 V- K4 e1 E          "The problem has become more common and more serious now," said Professor Smith. ! D- @9 ?& m; i# p, b5 e& l
             "The issue here is all about public funding because you have to get these papers published to be able to get your next grant. It could be worth half a million pounds. It can be difficult for people in that position to be objective."
2 E0 w- O) Y! N1 ^; O8 i' s9 X           Even if research is not being deliberately stifled, high quality work is being overlooked as an "accidental consequence of journal editors relying too much on the word of a small number of individuals", according to Professor Lovell-Badge. % t) R/ I! c& C8 J
             "You will have what looks like a very good paper by a very reputable scientist - but the journal takes the word of one particular reviewer too strongly. They have their favourite reviewers and what this means is that it distorts what gets published because that's going to be the view of one individual which may not reflect where the field should be going," he said.
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Practical obstacles?4 J$ s+ {/ A% U2 O/ Y
             Dr Campbell says that as far as his journals are concerned the charge is untrue: "Our editors, who frequently attend conferences and visit laboratories in order to keep abreast of the field and the people in it, have always used their own judgement in what we publish. We have not infrequently overruled two or even three sceptical referees and published a paper."- Y& e2 H0 |5 u. e; l2 C
         We are seeing the publication of a lot of papers in high profile journals with minimal scientific content or advance
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) a7 ?7 H' ^' B! RRobin Lovell-Badge : |6 S' K2 R* ]7 c
           But at a recent stem cell scientific meeting, 14 of the world's leading stem cell researchers said that journal editors hadn't seen through what they described as "unreasonable or obstructive" reviews. In an open letter to the journals, they proposed that if a paper was published, the accompanying reviews should be provided as supplementary material online. " H: |4 D2 `% r$ ?2 C6 N/ J
               Dr Campbell said that he was sympathetic to the idea although he envisaged practical obstacles. Professor Lovell-Badge believes that the journal editors could do more to identify bias in the review process.
$ T1 E+ F# q3 U# J2 f: y# X6 U            "Editors should be able to see when reviewers are asking for unnecessary experiments to be carried out and if it's the difference between an opinion of the referee and a factual problem. But what tends to happen is that the editor takes the opinion of an editor rather than the factual substance," he said.
2 b' x: c7 L/ ?+ P. B4 M           One of the main reasons for this, according to Professor Smith, is that journals are in competition. Editors have become dependent on favoured experts who both review other people's stem cell research and submit their own papers to the journal. If the editor offends these experts, they may lose future papers to a rival. % [( T; p! f! ], F. C. U7 Y) G1 O
         This is leading to the journals publishing mediocre science, according to Professor Lovell-Badge. + F: Q( A) S0 ~  s
            "We are seeing the publication of a lot of papers in high profile journals with minimal scientific content or advance, and this is partly because of these high-profile journals needing to keep their so called 'impact factors' as high as possible. That's determined by the number of citations that the papers have and they know that some of this trendy work is going to get cited and they seem not to care about whether its a real scientific advance or not," he said.   ?1 r% f; g: l2 l/ U3 R* X  q  ]- g
            Commenting on the allegations, Monica Bradford, executive editor of Science, another major journal, said: "Our current policy is to preserve the confidentiality of reviewers' names and comments. Some journals have tried experiments to test the impact of open review on the quality of the feedback received through peer review. * b6 P& {* _  c/ T5 t
               "We have not been convinced to switch to such a system, but we will continue to monitor such experiments. We also will discuss the pros/cons of our current process internally and with our senior editorial board.
3 q4 i( q9 a6 D; c            "We do recognise that human factors such as competition and potential financial gains can bias a reviewer's assessment of a paper and we expect our editors to consider these factors when evaluating the comments of the reviewers, particularly in cutting-edge areas of research."

zzc2211

有意思啊

huakaiwusheng

至于吗

luck56

追名逐利是人的本性。而背后的商业竞争则左右了人性。