Wednesday, July 22, 2015

B - An open research culture

Nosek BA, Alter G, Banks GC, et al. Promoting an open research culture. Science June 2015;348(6242):1422-1425
(doi: 10.1126/science.aab2374)

The Transparency and Openness Promotion (TOP) Committee met in November 2014 and developed guidelines consisting of eight shared standards for open practices across journals. These guidelines could help promote transparency, openness, an reproducibility of scientific research outputs. As the TOP Committee recognized that not all the standards are applicable to all journals or all disciplines, it defined three levels for each standard.
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/348/6242/1422.full

B - The erosion of research integrity

Ellis LM. The erosion of research integrity: the need for cultural change. The Lancet Oncology July 2015;16:752-754
(doi: 10.1016/S1470-2045(15)00085-6)

The success of drug development depends on robust and reproducible preclinical studies. Reports suggest that a high percentage of preclinical studies cannot be reliably reproduced. Causes could be sloppy research and data falsification or even fabrication. The author suggests approaches to improve data reproducibility, and fosters a complete cultural change.
http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanonc/article/PIIS1470-2045(15)00085-6/fulltext

B - Reasons for abandoning clinical trials

Couzin-Frankel J. Researchers seek clear reasons when clinical trials end early. Science July 2015;349(6245):222
(doi: 10.1126/science.349.6245.222)

About 12% of clinical trials are reported to shut down prematurely. Knowing why could help minimize the number of terminated trials going forward. A team of three computational biologists began exploring why clinical trials end prematurely. They looked at all 3122 terminated trials on the ClinicalTrials.gov registry at the time their study began, and divided the reasons for ending early into "buckets," such as funding, ethical reasons, or business decisions, so they could see the breakdown by category.  but those explanations were often hazy.
https://www.sciencemag.org/content/349/6245/222.full