Stanford University President to Resign After Concerns About His Research

The president of Stanford University said Wednesday he would resign, citing an independent review (PDF) that cleared him of research misconduct but found flaws in papers authored by his lab.

Marc Tessier-Lavigne said in a statement to students and staff that he would step down Aug. 31.

The resignation comes after the board of trustees launched a review in December following allegations he engaged in fraud and other unethical conduct related to his research and papers.

Tessier-Lavigne said he “never submitted a scientific paper without firmly believing that the data were correct and accurately presented.” But he added he should have been more diligent in seeking corrections regarding his work.

The review assessed 12 papers that Tessier-Lavigne worked on, and he is the principal author of five of them. He said he was aware of issues with four of the five papers, but acknowledged taking “insufficient” steps to deal with the issues. He said he’ll retract three of the papers and correct two.

The panel reviewed a dozen scientific papers on which Tessier-Lavigne is listed as a co-author after allegations of misconduct aired on PubPeer, a website where members of the scientific community can raise issues or concerns regarding scientific publications, the report stated.

“Those comments were essentially ignored until November of 2022,” said Dr. Ivan Oransky, who teaches at New York University’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute and co-founded the nonprofit Retraction Watch. He’s also on the board of directors for PubPeer.

Oransky told KQED that the rise of online publication of scientific journals has encouraged more scientists and reporters to discuss concerns in a variety of forums.

“Let’s treat scientific error and frankly misconduct as the regular, frequent event that it is. There are 5,000 retractions a year now,” Oransky said. “I don’t know that they’re happening much more often. They’re in the news much more often.”

“The devil is always in the details,” Oransky went on, “so you don’t actually have to know about something to be responsible for it. I see a very common pattern of a leader who created and encouraged a culture of success above all else. … We must get these results and we must be able to publish them in these big journals because that’s how he (Tessier-Lavigne) continues to get grants and win support and get good positions. There was a deeper problem in that lab.”

The panel cleared him of the most serious allegation, that a 2009 paper published in the scientific journal Nature, was the subject of a fraud investigation and that fraud was found. The paper proposed a model of neurodegeneration, which could have great potential for Alzheimer’s disease research and therapy, the panel wrote in its report.

But the panel also concluded the paper had multiple problems, including a lack of rigor in its development and that the research that went into the paper and its presentation contained “various errors and shortcomings.” The panel did not find evidence that Tessier-Lavigne was aware of the lack of rigor.

The review, however, did find that Tessier-Lavigne did not work hard enough to get some of the problematic papers retracted.

“The Scientific Panel has concluded that at various times when concerns with Dr. Tessier-Lavigne’s papers emerged … [he] failed to decisively and forthrightly correct mistakes in the scientific record,” the review stated. “… timely correction or retraction and/or more forthright and transparent actions toward correcting the scientific record would have better-served science and all concerned.”

Matthew Schrag, assistant professor of neurology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, told KQED he understands how people could also look at this pattern as somewhat eyebrow-raising.

“This is not one single episode — and this has been pointed out to him and to the scientific community in various forums for quite a lot of years — to the point that you see that he initiated some corrective steps years ago that were never completed,” he said.

“When the supervising scientists become aware, they acquire a responsibility,” Schrag added. “It doesn’t mean they’re at fault for what happened, but they do have a responsibility to correct it.”

Tessier-Lavigne said he’s stepping down because he expects continued debate about his ability to lead the university. He will remain on the faculty as a biology professor. He also said he will continue his research into brain development and neurodegeneration.

He has been president for nearly seven years.

KQED’s Rachael Myrow contributed to this report.