[Insight-developers] SCIENTIFIC PUBLISHING: Why PEER-REVIEW MUST BE PUBLIC

[Luis Ibanez]

The following recent case of unilateral withdrawal of a paper
by the editors of the journal "Cell" is a clear illustration
of the flaws of the publishing system, and why Open Access and
an Open Review are needed for restoring scientific credibility.

It seems that in the journal Cell, the reviewers are exempt from
practicing the most basic principles of the scientific method:

  [ They can make claims without having to provide any proof. ]


On the other hand, at least Biologist can praise themselves on
having reviewers that "attempt" to reproduce the claims of a paper.
Something that we can not say of the medical image community.



     Luis


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http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/310/5745/34b?maxtoshow=&HITS=10&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT=&titleabstract=withdrawn+parasite+paper+stirs&searchid=1129549457447_54757&stored_search=&FIRSTINDEX=0&fdate=10/1/2005&tdate=10/31/2005

Science, Vol 310, Issue 5745, 34 , 7 October 2005
DOI: 10.1126/science.310.5745.34b

SCIENTIFIC PUBLISHING:
Withdrawn Parasite Paper Stirs Criticism of Cell
Constance Holden

Many biologists are protesting a decision by the editors of the journal
Cell to retract a paper without the authors' assent or any allegations
of misconduct.

In July 2004, a group at the University of Brasilia published a widely
noted paper claiming that experiments in chickens and rabbits showed
that the parasite (Trypanosoma cruzi) responsible for Chagas disease
actually transfers DNA to the host genome. They even reported that
parasitic DNA integrated into DNA of patients with heart damage from the
disease. The unexpected finding offered a possible wayto explain why the
disease, prevalent in Latin America, can damage a person's organs
decades after the parasite is gone.

In June, Cell editor Emilie Marcus wrote the research team, headed by
Antonio Teixeira of the Chagas Disease Multidisciplinary Research
Laboratory, that "subsequent re-analyses" by a reviewer she did not name
"do not support the claim" of DNA integration. Although the Brazilian
team offered detailed rebuttals, Cell published a one-paragraph
retraction in the 23 September issue. The retraction has generated a
flurry of indignant correspondence, including a protest letter from the
Brazilian Society of Protozoology. Cell editors so far have stayed mum.

Scientists agree that the paper, which was the first to claim
integration of parasite DNA into a host genome, is controversial, and
some doubted the finding from the start. Nonetheless, many biologists
are alarmed at the failure of the journal to supply the evidence on
which the retraction was based. "This is not the way science should be
done," says Roberto Docampo, a cellular biologist at the University of
Georgia, Athens. "I am very concerned with the editor's power to retract
papers based on opinions without publishing the basis for the
retraction. ... If an editor starts to do that, maybe half of the
literature will start to disappear."

Microbiologist David Engman of Northwestern University School of
Medicine in Chicago, Illinois, adds that he knows of "maybe a dozen"
people in parasitology alone who have written Cell editors to protest.
On the other hand, parasitologist Dmitri Maslov of the University of
California, Riverside, says he "was not surprised at all" that the
report's "extraordinary" claim had been retracted. Cell editors
"provided a compelling rationale, ... namely, that the integration
sites' sequences have not been properly characterized, and some other
data did not support the integration unequivocally," says Maslov.

Cell's action appears to fall within policies Marcus explained in
testimony submitted to the British House of Commons Committee on Science
and Technology in March 2004: "Editor-instigated retractions occur when
the Editor receives correspondence from a third party who cannot
reproduce the original data." In such a case, she wrote, "the authors
are invited to respond in writing, and both sets of data are then
evaluated by independent reviewers." Teixeira claims, however, that he
was never shown any experimental evidence to contradict his findings.

Teixeira says he's not going to let the matter drop: "I shall fight back
to show that the data in our paper is correct." But regardless of how
the matter is resolved, Cell may face repercussions. Engman says a
colleague asked by Cell to review a paper is now wondering if he should
bother because the paper "may be reversed postpublication."