STROBE Seminar: Prof. Markus Raschke, “Shades of Grey: Scientific Integrity and Research Misconduct”

Title: Shades of grey: scientific integrity and research misconduct

Abstract: Research misconduct refers to the fabrication, falsification, or plagiarism in proposing, performing, or reviewing research or in reporting research results. However, the situation is often much less clear than these formal definitions may imply. I will discuss the background and go over a range of case studies based on over 20 years of work in different ombuds and committee roles on this subject. We will discuss distinction from research error and everything in between from questionable research practices to outright misconduct. While the general rules are clear, many challenges abound in identifying, investigating, and prosecuting research misconduct. With limited resources and multi-level conflicts of interest between perpetrators, supervisors, institutions, journals, and sponsors, best practices and procedure are still poorly implemented at many institutions. I will discuss from the many shades of gray of the subject to new rules of data and record keeping. 

Bio: Markus Raschke is professor at the Department of Physics and JILA at the University of Colorado at Boulder. His research is on the development and application of nano-scale nonlinear and ultrafast spectroscopy to control the light-matter interaction on the nanoscale. These techniques allow for imaging structure and dynamics of molecular and quantum matter with nanometer spatial resolution. He received his PhD in 2000 from the Max-Planck Institute of Quantum Optics and the Technical University in Munich, Germany. Following research appointments at the University of California at Berkeley, and the Max-Born-Institute in Berlin, he became faculty member at the University of Washington in 2006, before moving to Boulder in 2010. He is fellow of the Optical Society of America, the American Physical Society, he American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the Explorers Club.