[ti:Study Cannot Confirm Many Lab Results for Cancer Experiments] [by:www.51voa.com] [00:00.00]更多听力请访问51VOA.COM [00:00.04]Eight years ago, a team of researchers launched a project [00:04.60]to carefully repeat early and influential lab experiments [00:09.20]in cancer research. [00:11.84]The Reproducibility Project as it is called recreated 50 experiments. [00:19.12]Now, it reports that about half of the experiments [00:22.96]did not produce the results reported originally. [00:27.84]The reproducibility of experiments and confirmation of results [00:32.72]is central to wide acceptance of scientific claims. [00:38.52]"The truth is we fool ourselves. [00:41.60]Most of what we claim is novel or significant [00:45.20]is no such thing," said Dr. Vinay Prasad. [00:50.12]He is a cancer doctor and researcher [00:52.92]at the University of California, San Francisco [00:56.32]and was not involved in the project. [01:00.16]Most scientists believe that the strongest findings [01:04.36]come from experiments that can be repeated with similar results. [01:10.20]But there is little reason for researchers to share methods and data [01:15.12]so others can confirm the work, said Marcia McNutt. [01:20.48]She is president of the National Academy of Sciences. [01:26.00]Researchers lose respect in the scientific community [01:29.84]if their results do not hold up to careful study, she added. [01:36.04]For the project, the researchers tried to repeat experiments [01:40.64]from cancer biology papers. [01:44.32]The papers had appeared in major scientific publications, [01:48.76]including Nature and Cell, from 2010 to 2012. [01:55.88]Overall, 54 percent of the original findings [02:00.28]failed to meet conditions set by the Reproducibility Project. [02:06.28]The team's study appears in the journal eLife. [02:11.52]The nonprofit eLife receives support [02:14.84]from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, [02:17.44]which also supports The Associated Press Health and Science Department. [02:23.80]Among the studies that did not hold up [02:26.72]was one that claimed a link [02:28.44]between a stomach bacteria and colon cancer. [02:33.40]Another claimed a drug had shrunk tumors in mice. [02:38.60]And, a third was a mouse study of a possible prostate cancer drug. [02:44.68]This is the second major study by the Reproducibility Project. [02:49.96]In 2015, they found similar problems [02:53.84]when they tried to repeat experiments in psychology. [02:59.04]Study co-writer Brian Nosek of the Center for Open Science [03:03.60]said it can be wasteful to move forward [03:06.84]without first doing the work to repeat findings. [03:11.72]The researchers tried to limit differences [03:15.04]in how the cancer experiments were carried out. [03:18.96]Often, they could not get help from the scientists [03:22.44]who did the original work. [03:25.48]They could not get answers to questions [03:28.52]such as which kinds of mice to use [03:31.16]or where to find specially engineered tumor cells. [03:36.48]Michael Lauer is a deputy director of research [03:39.80]at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). [03:43.36]He said, "I wasn't surprised, but it is concerning [03:47.64]that about a third of scientists were not helpful, [03:51.40]and, in some cases, were beyond not helpful." [03:56.60]Lauer added that the NIH plans to require data-sharing [04:00.88]among organizations to which it provides support in 2023. [04:07.60]Dr. Glenn Begley is a bio-technology advisor [04:11.24]and former head of cancer research at drugmaker Amgen. [04:16.00]Ten years ago, he and other scientists at Amgen [04:21.08]reported even lower rates of confirmation [04:24.20]when they tried to repeat published cancer experiments. [04:28.80]Cancer research is difficult, Begley said. [04:32.28]He added that "it is very easy for researchers [04:36.76]to be attracted to results that look exciting and provocative, [04:41.32]results that appear to further support their favorite idea [04:45.16]as to how cancer should work, but that are just wrong." [04:50.00]I'm Jonathan Evans. 更多听力请访问51VOA.COM