How? If they don't know what the answer is supposed to be, it's not clear how they can fake data. This can further be improved by universities contributing to a 'noise' fund, where requested experiments are expected to _not_ turn anything up.
Also, the main purpose of this is not to catch corruption, just prevent mostly honest researchers from fooling themselves (and then others), and increasing the base line for research.
I don't think most academic labs will pay for this. However, I can see it as being something that VC investors might like to see the next time someone presents with a wonder drug.
Bilal from Science Exchange here. The validations are blind in the sense that we match an investigator who has submitted a study to a provider who can validate it. The investigator doesn't have a choice of who validates their study though.
The fee-for-service actually helps to guard against biased results in two ways. Firstly, providers who validate studies are paid on completion, regardless of a reproducible or irreproducible outcome. Secondly, operating on a fee-for-service basis allows providers to operate outside academic incentives for publications, ensuring no incentive for biased-positive results.
Comments
"Validations are conducted blind, on a fee-for-service basis."
Seems like a potential conflict of interest there.
How? If they don't know what the answer is supposed to be, it's not clear how they can fake data. This can further be improved by universities contributing to a 'noise' fund, where requested experiments are expected to _not_ turn anything up.
Also, the main purpose of this is not to catch corruption, just prevent mostly honest researchers from fooling themselves (and then others), and increasing the base line for research.
I see it as something like the National Institute of Standards and Technology (http://www.nist.gov/index.html).
I don't think most academic labs will pay for this. However, I can see it as being something that VC investors might like to see the next time someone presents with a wonder drug.
Bilal from Science Exchange here. The validations are blind in the sense that we match an investigator who has submitted a study to a provider who can validate it. The investigator doesn't have a choice of who validates their study though.
The fee-for-service actually helps to guard against biased results in two ways. Firstly, providers who validate studies are paid on completion, regardless of a reproducible or irreproducible outcome. Secondly, operating on a fee-for-service basis allows providers to operate outside academic incentives for publications, ensuring no incentive for biased-positive results.