Life Science and High Technology company Sigma-Aldrich Corporation, US, has issued the second annual State of Translational Research Survey Report, addressing challenges to the reproducibility of research within the academic translational research community. Sigma-Aldrich's report, based on a survey conducted in concert with the Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and the Academic Drug Discovery Consortium (ADDC), sheds light on practices that compromise the reproducibility of published research, underlines the translational research community's desire for experimental standards, and suggests multi-faceted strategies for improving the reproducibility of translational science.
The Sigma-Aldrich survey found only 22 percent of respondents had complete success in the last year reproducing other labs' published work. Respondents cited the primary suspected causes of experimental irreproducibility to be poor controls, the rush to publish, and insufficient samples sizes. Half of respondents also blamed the reproducing lab's failure to understand or follow experimental protocols.
Survey results indicate that several simple quality control practices could be performed more consistently. These practices include testing for mycoplasma, validating reagents for purity and identity, and screening for misidentified cell lines.
The 2014 State of Translational Research Survey Report chronicles additional viewpoints and practices within the academic translational research community, such as scientific journals' role in ensuring reproducibility, data or protocol documentation and study retractions. The Sigma-Aldrich report was first presented at the ADDC's 'Addressing Irreproducibility in Target Validation' Conference on October 23 at the Novartis Institute of Biomedical Research in Cambridge, MA.
