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Published online 6 August 2008 | Nature 454, 682-685 (2008) | doi:10.1038/454682a
News Feature
Neuroscience: Standard model
Questions raised about the use of 'ALS mice' are prompting a broad reappraisal of the way that drugs are tested in animal models of neurodegenerative disease. Jim Schnabel reports.
Several years ago, clinical neurologist Michael Benatar set out to find a drug he could test on some of his patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). This condition is apt to strike otherwise healthy adults, slowly destroying the neurons that control their muscles.
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....so basically, what you are saying is that (like so many times before), Nature (and other top rank journals) are accomplices in over-selling data that at best should have been ignored and at worst has mislead other researchers.....as if the scientific community didn't know that before. Even worse, by making (or breaking) scientific careers (due to the publication pressure), you were pushing more diligent researchers that critically questioned their data (and end up not publishing at all because they realized their results didn't stand the test of scrutinky and time) to the sidelines. For that, you should be ashamed.
Well, that's one way of looking at it or, perhaps, we can encourage scientists to include failed trials into a database of sorts; they're not likely to get published. This would save labs and grants much coveted money that can be used toward novel research models. Also, this database could prove to be useful in discussing methodological errors or oversights, in order to improve experiments. Science should be more collaborative- despite competitive drives to 'publish first' or to 'publish big'. Frankly, such competition has proved detrimental to scieitific rigour.
Well, that's one way of looking at it or, perhaps, we can encourage scientists to include failed trials into a database of sorts; they're not likely to get published. This would save labs and grants much coveted money that can be used toward novel research models. Also, this database could prove to be useful in discussing methodological errors or oversights, in order to improve experiments. Science should be more collaborative- despite competitive drives to 'publish first' or to 'publish big'. Frankly, such competition has proved detrimental to scieitific rigour.
I agree that a lot of times data based on small sample and not replicated is published in high ranked journal just because it is new or comes from an established lab, and more diligent and cautious researchers that take time to confirm and replicate data end up with no publication or having to publish in a lower ranked journals. Besides, it is quite obvious that negative data does not get published at all and therefore it is almost impossible to critically assess all available data on any subject/theory without having a database or without revising current publication guidelines to enable researchers to publish both positive and negative findings.