RE: Berkeley lab found research fabricated

["Strickert, Rick" <rstrickert@signaturescience.com>]

It's not clear from the SF Chronicle news story how "research data" was fabricated in such complex accelerator bombardment and measurement experiments.  Such experiments (there were two runs that allegedly discovered three particles identified as 118) produced mountainous amounts of raw data.

  

Also, the SF Chronicle news article noted "The research team was led by [Victor] Ninov", even though an initial 1999 LBL announcement noted it was "Ken Gregorich, a nuclear chemist who led the discovery team."  Other experimental duties of Ninov were not identified.



The Yahoo (AP) new article does provide an additional tidbit of information:



"The heavy element research fraud is a stinging embarrassment for the lab. [Lab Director Charles] Shank admitted that basic verifications necessary for such lofty scientific proclamations were not followed.  'In this case, the most elementary checks and data archiving were not done,' Shanks said."



In reporting on the retraction announcement last year the Sept. 2001 issue of Physics Today noted: "When subsequent

experiments failed to turn up evidence of the earlier decay chains, the group went back to the original data.  Analyzing the old data in several independent ways, they did not see the three chains.  They are now trying to figure out why the chains showed up in the earlier analysis."



Physics Today's original announcement in August 1999 of the Element 118 discovery also noted that prior to coming to LBL  Victor Ninov had spent 11 years at GSI in Darmstadt where similar experiments at discovering superheavy elements has been and is going on.



Rick Strickert

Austin, TX





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