Ethics 2006 Practical Information for Northern Plains Area Employees

NPA Guiding Principle: DO THE RIGHT THING IN THE RIGHT WAY!!!!

Principles of Ethical Conduct Public Service is a public trust Employees shall put forth honest effort in performance of their duties Employees shall not use public office for private gain Employees shall protect and conserve Federal property Employees shall act impartially Employees shall not hold financial interests that conflict with performance of their duty Employees shall not engage in outside employment/activities that conflict with their duties Employees shall adhere to all laws and regulations that provide equal opportunity

Employees shall endeavor to avoid any actions creating the appearance that they are violating the law or the Principles of Ethical Conduct

Practical Guidance Gifts Outside Employment Travel Science Ethics Authorship Peer Review

Gifts Generally an employee may not accept gifts that are given because of their positions or that come from certain prohibited sources (person/organization that conducts business with the agency, conducts activities regulated by the agency, or has interests that can be affected by the employee). An employee can accept a gift valued at $20 or less from an entity ARS does business with, provided the total value of gifts from the same person/organization is not more than $50 in a calendar year. Gifts can be provided to supervisors if they are valued at no more than $10.

Outside Employment/Activities You may engage in outside employment/activities that requires the use of inherent expertise provided your work does not create a real or apparent conflict of interest by interfering with your official duties.

Things to Remember Employees who file a public or confidential financial disclosure report must seek and obtain approval to engage in outside employment/activities. You need to submit an REE-101 if the above pertains to you. Even if you are not required to seek approval you need to refrain from conflict of interest activities.

Travel ARS Policy - travel will be performed only when necessary to carry out authorized activities.

NPA Travel Technical support (including Cat 3s) & admin. staff travel generally limited to training and/or site visits to accomplish assigned tasks. Tech. support & admin. staff travel for other purposes is reviewed and approved when circumstances justify need. No guarantees!!!

NPA Travel – cont. Foreign travel requests need to be initiated a minimum of 60 days prior to departure and must be approved by the Area Director. You should not request excessive amounts of AL (more than 3 to 5 days) in conjunction with official travel. P&P Contributed travel requests should pose no conflicts of interest and are approved by the DAEA and Area Director.

Code of Scientific Ethics I dedicate myself to the pursuit and promotion of beneficial scientific investigation, consistent with the mission of ARS. I will never hinder the beneficial research of others. I will conduct, discuss, manage, judge and report science honestly, thoroughly, and without conflict of interest. I will encourage constructive critique of my personal science and that of my colleagues, in a manner that fosters harmony and quality amid scientific debate.

Code of Scientific Ethics – cont. I recognize past and present contributors to my science and will not accept unwarranted credit for the accomplishments of others. I will maintain and improve my professional skills and be a mentor to others. I will ensure safety and humane treatment of human and animal subjects and will prevent abuse of research resources entrusted to me.

Guidelines on Authorship The question of who should be an author is fundamentally an issue of scientific ethics.

Each author must have participated sufficiently in the work to take public responsibility for the content of the article.

An author should be involved in: Conception or design, or analysis and interpretation of data, or both; and, Drafting the article or revising it for critically important intellectual content; and, Final approval of the version to be published.

All elements of an article critical to the main conclusions must be attributable to at least one author. The order of names on a multi-authored article will be decided by the group responsible for the research.

Participation solely in the collection or summarization of data does not justify authorship.

All individuals to be listed as authors, regardless of the classification of their positions, or other affiliation, must meet the previous authorship guidelines.

Manuscript Peer Review Peer review generally only used since the middle of the 20 th century. In earlier times the decision to allow publication was generally made by editors. Did you know that Watson and Crick’s 1951 paper on the structure of DNA in “Nature” was not sent out for peer review??

Peer Review Definitions Scrutiny by ones peers. Review of an article to decide if it is authoritative enough to be published. Reviewed and approved by other experts in the authors field. A critical review by peers who are independent of the work being reviewed.

ARS Peer Review ARS defines peer review as the evaluation of the conceptual, relevance, and technical soundness of research by highly qualified scientists active in the same or closely related research fields.

Criticisms of Peer Review It’s slow! May suppress new ideas that contradict with reviewers own views. Conflict of interest!! Does not eliminate mediocre or inferior pieces of work. Little “scientific” scrutiny of what journals publish.

Recent Peer Review Issues Jan – J. Amer. Med. Assoc – published a correction on overestimate of the number of deaths attributed to obesity due to errors in computations. Feb – Lancet – retracted a paper reporting non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs reduced risk of oral cancer due to fabricated data. Mar – New England J. of Medicine published statement of concern about a paper on Vioxx. Accused researcher of excising data to play down heart risks.

Research Misbehavior or Fraud??

Dr. Hwang Woo Suk South Korean biomedical scientist at Seoul National University (he recently resigned). Published two papers in Science claiming to have created human stem cells via cloning. Both papers were retracted (including a June 2005 paper with Gerald Schatten and 23 other co-authors) after being found to contain a large amount of fabricated data. He has admitted to fabrication but maintains he was deceived by collaborators. He faces possible criminal charges??

Dr. Gerald Schatten Collaborated with Dr. Suk on the cloning experiments (Science Jan. 20, 2006). He has since halted the collaboration. Cleared of misconduct by the Univ. of Pittsburgh but reprimanded for taking credit for research in which he was hardly involved. Accused of “research misbehavior” since he shirked his responsibility in determining the veracity of data (peer review by a co-author). He signed a letter stating that he had read and approved of the manuscript. It was indicated his role was limited to the review and analysis of anonymized data and assistance in preparation of the manuscript.

What do you think? Was Dr. Schatten a victim or directly involved? Should he have spotted “fraud” in his colleague’s work and reported it prior to publication? Is trust an issue? Should he have signed the letter stating approval of the manuscript? Did peer review let him down??

Peer Review – What Can You Do to Improve the System! Use it appropriately whether you are an author or reviewer/referee. Be fair and open minded. Seek the most rigorous reviews you can obtain as you develop research plans and report results. Don’t be afraid to speak out when you believe something is “not right”. You are obliged to follow the ARS Code of Scientific Ethics.

You are encouraged to seek the advice of ARS/NPA ethics officials whenever you have questions or concerns.

REE Ethics Webpage

NPA Ethics Contacts Larry Chandler – Designated Area Ethics Advisor; ; Louise Dalton – ;