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For six months running, the opinion article published in Nature by William G. Kaelin Jr, ‘Publish houses of brick, not mansions of straw’ was F1000Prime’s top recommended article. In his opinion piece, William Kaelin highlights a problematic trend that has crept into scientific publications, discussing the shift in biomedical research articles that tend to make numerous claims and broad assertions, while the focus should be on data quality and validation.

The article has been highly recommended by many of our Faculty Members, who agree on the need to improve the standard of scientific literature. To continue the discussion, we invited Faculty Members, Monte Gates (MG), Keele University, and Ferdinando Boero (FB), University of Salento, to share their views by answering a few questions.

“I fear the literature has developed from papers making a single major claim that is proved in multiple ways to papers having multiple claims, each with a single reed of support.” Dr. William Kaelin Jr

Why did you recommend the article?

MG: One important point made in the article is that the breadth of a piece of research is now deemed more important than the depth of the actual research. In essence, the scope of research is now considered more important than the quality of the research.

“Today, in-depth scientific endeavour is fading away in science, and what is emerging is the ability to sell the importance of a piece of science.” Monte Gates

A quote from the article summarises the current state of research, where it states that the excellence of a piece of science is measured more by “having a patina of clinical relevance” than providing clear, in-depth information. This not only applies to published papers, but also to funding streams. The going joke around my colleagues is that the title of our next grant proposal will be “The use of stem cells to cure cancer brought on by global warming”.

FB: The title immediately attracted my attention. I often use the metaphor of science as a pile of bricks (the single papers, on specific facts) that need to be assembled so as to build a mansion. The claim of this paper is a little different, but I like it anyway. In his paper, William Kaelin Jr discusses biomedical research, but I recognize the same tendencies denounced here in the ecological literature. All findings must be “general” and in so doing become a mansion, even with a single brick.

In the piece, William G. Kaelin Jr wrote, “The main question when reviewing a paper should be whether its conclusions are likely to be correct, not whether it would be important if it were true.”- what are your thoughts on this opinion?

MG: It appears necessary now for papers and proposals competing at the highest level to contain the right catch phrases; technology that sounds impressive; and some mentioning of clinical relevance. The strange thing is that this trend is almost in direct opposition to science (like Dr. Kaelin’s) that win the highest awards. Both the Lasker prize and the Nobel prize in Medicine, for example, commonly go to scientists whose work was fundamental in nature at the time they were conducted and did not rely on clinical relevance to realise the significance of the breakthrough.

“It is about dividing facts from speculations. The problem, today, is that there is a tendency to stretch results.” Ferdinando Boero

I have often said if you tried to submit a grant proposal telling a funding body that you wanted to test what happens when you put double-stranded RNA into cells, you’d likely get an immediate response that your proposal did not make it to the review process.

What is fading away in science today is fundamental, in-depth scientific endeavour. What appears to be emerging is the ability to sell the importance of a piece of science.

FB: An observation or an experiment might suggest a wonderful hypothesis that, if validated, might open new avenues of progress. It is about dividing facts from speculations. The problem, today, is that there is a tendency to stretch results. I like the claim that these papers are ‘large shallow bodies of water’. Width prevails over depth, and you cannot navigate in such waters.

What do you think should be done to change this trend and improve the future of scientific research?

MG: The bottom line is: we should get back to fundamental science, but go forward in our ability to communicate the importance of fundamental understanding to the public.

“Science should be the discovery of new things, not impressive things.” Monte Gates

Science should be the discovery of new things, not impressive things. We should be focussed on generating a very clear picture for each piece of a puzzle, until the pieces reveal the solution to a puzzle. We should not, in every experiment, pursue how to present a façade of the whole puzzle’s solution.

FB: Researchers are pressed to have sensational results. The sources of pressures are manifold, from a researcher’s funding body to demonstrate the impact of the research they are funding or your institute to raise their raise their profile by publishing in top tier journals. Some researchers might be keen to gain some news headlines as a way of doing this, so we end up with leading newspaper articles that speak about sensational discoveries that are soon forgotten.

“One possibility would be to flag the research that overstates its findings, this would be part of the the ‘Mansions of straw’ of research as mentioned in the article by William Kaelin Jr.” Ferdinano Boero

I think this also derives from the pressures we face as academics and researchers. The Nobel Prize is the highest accolade, but for researchers who don’t gain this award, our institutes are evaluated based on the performance of the researchers who work in them, on the number of citations, h -index and the Impact Factor of the journals in which the research was published, and this forms the basis of comparison.

One possibility would be to flag the research that overstates its findings, this would be part of the the ‘Mansions of straw’ of research as mentioned in the article by William Kaelin Jr., featuring articles with broad assumptions that promise too much.