Foreign News
Stanford University president resigns following research ethics probe
The president of Stanford University has stepped down in the wake of an independent investigation that found “substandard practices” in research papers he was involved in.
Marc Tessier-Lavigne, the leader of the prestigious California university, issued a statement on Wednesday (19 July) saying he would leave his post, effective August 31.
Media reports in the United States had raised questions about “falsified data” in research linked to Tessier-Lavigne, a prominent neuroscientist from Ontario, Canada.
But on Monday, a scientific panel commissioned by Stanford’s Board of Trustees cleared Tessier-Lavigne of participating in any misconduct, though it did find “serious flaws” in the research papers reviewed. “The Panel has identified evidence of manipulation of research data in at least four of the five primary papers at issue,” it wrote in a report. “But the Panel did not find evidence to conclude that Dr Tessier-Lavigne engaged in, directed or knew of the misconduct when it occurred.”
The group also found that “a scientist exercising reasonable care could not have been expected” to detect the research flaws at the time, though it did fault Tessier-Lavigne for failing to “decisively and forthrightly correct mistakes in the scientific record”.
The panel — comprised of neuroscientists, biologists and one Nobel laureate — examined 12 research papers Tessier-Lavigne participated in, seven in which he was a “non-principal author” and five where he was listed among the leads.
The review, it said, involved filtering through 50,000 documents and holding more than 50 meetings with witnesses and individuals involved in the scandal.
Questions about Tessier-Lavigne’s scientific work started to emerge on the platform PubPeer, where scientists can discuss and evaluate research online.
There, commenters like scientist Elisabeth Bik raised concerns as far back as 2015 about images in Tessier-Lavigne’s research that appeared to be digitally altered.
One research paper in particular, published in the journal Nature in 2009, sought to identify causes for brain degeneration in Alzheimer patients.
Tessier-Lavigne’s employer at the time, the biotech company Genentech, hailed the paper as “groundbreaking research” that offered “an entirely new way of looking at the cause of Alzheimer’s disease, the sixth leading cause of death in the United States”.
“Because of this research, we are working to develop both antibodies and small molecules that may attack Alzheimer’s from a novel entry point and help the millions of people who currently suffer from this devastating disease,” the company wrote in its annual report.
But scientists struggled to reproduce the results documented in the 2009 paper, leading to questions about the accuracy of its data — or whether it had been falsified altogether.
The Stanford Daily, a student-run campus newspaper, helped bring these concerns to light with a series of articles over the last year, quoting Bik and other scientists, some of whom chose to remain anonymous.
While Monday’s independent review ultimately found Tessier-Lavigne was “not reckless” in his scientific practice, it did affirm that “there was apparent manipulation of research data by others”.
Timely corrections, retractions and “forthright and transparent actions” would have “better served science and all concerned”, the panel said.
It called for “significant action” to “correct the scientific record”. It also noted that Tessier-Lavigne now plans to retract several of the publications.
For his part, Tessier-Lavigne has continued to deny allegations of unethical behaviour, noting that his career spans three decades and hundreds of research papers.
“I am gratified that the Panel concluded I did not engage in any fraud or falsification of scientific data,” he said in his resignation statement on Wednesday (19)
“As I have emphatically stated, I have never submitted a scientific paper without firmly believing that the data were correct and accurately presented. Today’s report supports that statement.”
One of the most selective private research universities in the US, located in the heart of Silicon Valley, Stanford has a history of pumping out notable alumni, from world leaders like the United Kingdom’s Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to tech entrepreneurs like Elon Musk who reportedly dropped out after two days.
Tessier-Lavigne has served in his role as president for nearly seven years. He will be replaced by interim president Richard Saller, starting in September.
Apollo 8 astronaut Bill Anders, who snapped one of the most famous photographs taken in outer space, has died at the age of 90.
Officials say a small plane he was flying crashed into the water north of Seattle, Washington.
Anders’ son Greg confirmed that his father was flying the small plane, and that his body was recovered on Friday afternoon. “The family is devastated. He was a great pilot. He will be missed,” a statement from the family reads.
Anders – who was a lunar module pilot on the Apollo 8 mission – took the iconic Earthrise photograph, one of the most memorable and inspirational images of Earth from space.
Taken on Christmas Eve during the 1968 mission, the first crewed space flight to leave Earth and reach the Moon, the picture shows the planet rising above the horizon from the barren lunar surface.
Anders later described it as his most significant contribution to the space programme.
The image is widely credited with motivating the global environmental movement and leading to the creation of Earth Day, an annual event to promote activism and awareness of caring for the planet.
Speaking of the moment, Anders said: “We came all this way to explore the Moon, and the most important thing that we discovered was the Earth.”
Officials said on Friday that Anders crashed his plane around 11:40PDT (1940BST).
The US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said the 90-year-old was flying a Beechcraft A A 45 – also known as a T-34. The agency said that the plane crashed about 80ft (25m) from the coast of Jones Island.
Anders also served as the backup pilot to the Apollo 11 mission, the name of the effort that led to the first Moon landing on July 24, 1969.
Following Anders’ retirement from the space programme in 1969, the former astronaut largely worked in the aerospace industry for several decades. He also served as US Ambassador to Norway for a year in the 1970s.
But he is best remembered for the Apollo 8 mission and the iconic photograph he took from space.
“In 1968, during Apollo 8, Bill Anders offered to humanity among the deepest of gifts an astronaut can give. He traveled to the threshold of the Moon and helped all of us see something else: ourselves,” Nasa Administrator Bill Nelson said in a statement.
Mark Kelly, a former astronaut who now serves as a US Senator for the state of Arizona, said in a post on X, formerly Twitter, that Anders “inspired me and generations of astronauts and explorers. My thoughts are with his family and friends”.
[BBC]
A Chinese spacecraft carrying rock and soil samples from the far side of the Moon has lifted off from the lunar surface to start its journey back to Earth, according to state media.
The achievement on Tuesday is a world first and the latest leap for Beijing’s decades-old space programme, which aims to send a crewed mission to the Moon by 2030.
The Xinhua News Agency, citing the China National Space Administration (CNSA), said that the ascender of the Chang’e-6 probe took off at 7:38am local time on Tuesday (23:38 GMT) and entered a preset orbit around the moon.
It described the move as “an unprecedented feat in human lunar exploration history”.
The Chang’e-6 probe was launched last month and its lander touched down on the far side of the Moon on Sunday. It used a drill and robotic arm to dig up soil on and below the Moon’s surface, according to Xinhua.
After successfully gathering its samples, the Chang’e-6 unfurled China’s national flag for the first time on the far side of the Moon, it said.
The agency cited the CNSA as saying that the spacecraft stowed the samples it had gathered in a container inside the ascender of the probe as planned.
[Aljazeera]
China says its uncrewed craft has successfully landed on the far side of the Moon – an unexplored place almost no-one tries to go.
The Chang’e 6 touched down in the South Pole-Aitken Basin at 06:23 Beijing time on Sunday morning (22:23 GMT Saturday), the China National Space Administration (CNSA) said.
Launched on 3 May, the mission aims to collect precious rock and soil from this region for the first time in history. The probe could extract some of the Moon’s oldest rocks from a huge crater on its South Pole.
The landing was fraught with risks, because it is very difficult to communicate with spacecraft once they reach the far side of the Moon. China is the only country to have achieved the feat before, landing its Chang’e-4 in 2019.
After launching from Wenchang Space Launch Center, the Chang’e 6 spacecraft had been orbiting the Moon waiting to land. The lander component of the mission then separated from the orbiter to touch down on the side of the Moon that faces permanently away from Earth.
During the descent, an autonomous visual obstacle avoidance system was used to automatically detect obstacles, with a visible light camera selecting a comparatively safe landing area based on the brightness and darkness of the lunar surface, the CNSA was quoted as saying by state-run Xinhua news agency.
The lander hovered about 100m (328ft) above the safe landing area, and used a laser 3D scanner before a slow vertical descent. The operation was supported by the Queqiao-2 relay satellite, the CNSA said.
Chinese state media described the successful landing as an “historic moment”. The state broadcaster said “applause erupted at the Beijing Aerospace Flight Control Center” when the Chang’e landing craft touched down on the Moon early on Sunday morning.
The lander should spend up to three days gathering materials from the surface in an operation the CNSA said would involve “many engineering innovations, high risks and great difficulty”. “Everyone is very excited that we might get a look at these rocks no-one has ever seen before,” explains Professor John Pernet-Fisher, who specialises in lunar geology at the University of Manchester.
He has analysed other lunar rock brought back on the American Apollo mission and previous Chinese missions. But he says the chance to analyse rock from a completely different area of the Moon could answer fundamental questions about how planets form.
Most of the rocks collected so far are volcanic, similar to what we might find in Iceland or Hawaii. But the material on the far side would have a different chemistry . “It would help us answer those really big questions, like how are planets formed, why do crusts form, what is the origin of water in the solar system?” the professor says.
The mission aims to collect about 2kg (4.4lb) of material using a drill and mechanical arm, according to the CNSA.
The South Pole–Aitken basin, an impact crater, is one of the largest known in the solar system.
From there, the probe could gather material that came from deep inside the lunar mantle – the inner core of the Moon – Prof Pernet-Fisher says.
The Moon’s South Pole is the next frontier in lunar missions – countries are keen to understand the region because there is a good chance it has ice.
The capsule in the last Chinese moon mission, Chang’e 5, brought back soil and rocks in 2020 (BBC)
Access to water would significantly boost the chances of successfully establishing a human base on the Moon for scientific research.
If the mission succeeds, the craft will return to Earth with the precious samples on board a special return capsule.
The material will be kept in special conditions to try to keep it as pristine as possible.
Scientists in China will be given the first chance to analyse the rocks, and later researchers around the world will be able to apply for the opportunity too.
This is the second time China has launched a mission to collect samples from the Moon.
In 2020 Chang’e 5 brought back 1.7kg of material from an area called Oceanus Procellarum on the Moon’s near side.
China is planning three more uncrewed missions this decade as it looks for water on the Moon and investigates setting up a permanent base there.
Beijing’s broader strategy aims to see a Chinese astronaut walk on the moon by around 2030.
The US also aims to put astronauts back on the moon, with Nasa aiming to launch its Artemis 3 mission in 2026.
(BBC)
US sports envoys to Lanka to champion youth development
Rahuman questions sudden cancellation of leave of CEB employees
