A leading brain researcher is said to be… Research by the specialist magazine Science manipulated images in publications on a large scale. Of the approximately 800 scientific articles published by Eliezer Masliah over the course of his career, at least 132 are said to contain fake images.
As early as 2023, irregularities were discovered in several publications by the widely cited scientist in the online forum PubPeer postedwhereupon Science prompted a larger investigation. The result, a 300-page report, called into question a remarkably large amount of scientific work, writes Science. After identifying hundreds of images as fakes, the authors called off the search, saying they had already collected more than enough evidence of wrongdoing. They are sure that further investigations would have uncovered even more fake images.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH), an agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, according to a Press release at the same time investigated the allegations. Only two publications are mentioned there in which images were manipulated. As a result, Masliah was released from his role as director of the Department of Neuroscience. Masliah himself could not be reached to comment on the allegations.
Dozens of companies are researching drugs based on fake research results
Falsification of publications is a well-known problem, but the current allegations against Masliah are of exceptional importance: He is one of the most cited researchers in his field and was able to speak loudly as director at the NIH Science Manage $2.6 billion. In doing so, he significantly influenced the scientific discourse. 238 active patents cited his work with fake images, and dozens of companies are currently developing drugs based on his research.
One of these drugs is prasinezumab. It is intended to act as an antibody to combat the cognitive and physical symptoms of Parkinson’s, according to Masliah’s studies Science had an influence on the approval of the drug for human trials. One in New England Journal of Medicine published study However, suggested that the drug cannot improve the course of the disease despite side effects. The Swiss pharmaceutical company Roche is nevertheless financing another study on almost 600 test subjects to re-evaluate the effectiveness of the drug. At the request of the South German newspaper The company said a number of studies suggested the drug’s effectiveness, not just those possibly manipulated by Masliah. That’s why they want to continue the ongoing investigation.
Masliah’s case points to a fundamental problem in research
“I almost fell off my chair,” said biochemist Christian Haass Science to the allegations. He researches the biological mechanisms behind Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich. He doubts whether other researchers were unaware of the forgeries. “I mean really, they must know something,” he told the magazine. Affected researchers have either died or have not commented on the allegations, writes Science.
Accusations of falsification of scientific publications are no longer uncommon. In 2023 alone according to an article in the trade magazine Nature Over 10,000 scientific publications have been withdrawn, often due to suspicion of targeted manipulation.
Researchers are often under pressure to produce extraordinary results, even if their studies do not actually show this. The attention that a research project generates determines how much money scientists receive for future projects. Whether the work was carried out properly may not be adequately checked, also because journal publishers have little incentive to do so. “The editors and the peer reviewers are not doing their jobs. And some are paid a lot of money,” said Alison Avenell from the University of Aberdeen opposite that Guardian. “This is extremely worrying.”