The HHS Office of Research Integrity (ORI) recently announced the debarment of two investigators who are prohibited from receiving government funding and serving in advisory capacities for three-year periods.
Igor Dzhura, a former senior research associate in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Vanderbilt University, “engaged in research misconduct by providing falsified and/or fabricated data to his supervisor and colleagues” by “submitting and publishing multiple falsified and/or fabricated action potential traces and summary data in at least sixty-nine (69) images in twelve (12) different figures across seven (7) publications and three (3) grant applications by duplication and relabeling of traces; resizing, modifying, and splicing different traces; and modifying and/or duplicating bar graphs,” ORI said in a recent Federal Register notice. ORI said Dzhura had agreed to “retract or correct” seven papers published in various journals from 2000 to 2006. Under Dzhura’s voluntary settlement agreement, the debarment began Oct. 29.