Title: Selling Out? Making Deals with Other Institutions

Author: Anji Wall

Description: A university offers a post-doctoral student an opportunity to collaborate with them and offers him an incentive to leave his current position.

Keyword(s): collaborative research, conflict of interest, data-sharing, research misconduct, mentor-trainee relationship, patenting

Based On: (Shamoo & Resnik, 2003, p.3)

Case: Matthew is a postdoctoral student in computer science working on some computer programs to be used in information transfer of electronic medical records. If successful, the research will result in patents and monetary gains. There are two other graduate students in the lab working on the project with him, but Matthew is leading the project. He essentially serves as the graduate students’ mentor even though a faculty member is technically assigned as mentor. A group from another university is interested in collaboration on this work, and has asked for preliminary data and designs related to the project. They indicate that they would like to review his data in hopes of extending an offer for a faculty position with generous compensation package.

  1. What should Matthew do with respect to the proposed collaboration? Should he share data?
  2. What responsibilities does Matthew have toward the other graduate students? How should Matthew respond to an offer of employment?
  3. Does Matthew have any obligations to the faculty mentor responsible for the project? If so, what are they?

 

Source: Shamoo, A., & Resnik, D. (2003). Responsible Conduct of Research. New York: Oxford University Press.