UVM grantee jailed for false research

Well, here’s something you don’t see often: a federal grantee has been thrown in the slammer for falsifying research in order to secure $3 million in federal funding! NIH’s own Dr. Sally Rockey said, ’ ”science itself is compromised” when a researcher falsifies data. She called such data “a break in the chain, and all the links that follow can be compromised.“ ‘ The chap in question, Eric Poehlman, claimed that he was driven to do it because federal funding is an important measure of academic worth. The difference being, of course, that most scientists get federal funding because they want to do science, not because they want to impress their lab-mates. [Via Slashdot]