Cloning humans

Dr. Hwang and clone that never existed "could be the title of a work of fiction, but it is the true story of a new chapter of scientific fraud.

As is known, the world of science was shaken by the scandal: Hwang Woo Suk, a South Korean scientist and a team of 25 investigators signatories had announced during 2004 and 2005 in two articles published in Science magazine for the first time have cloned cells human. After a conclusive report of the investigation Commltee of the Seoul National Universlty, January 12, 2006. Donald Kennedy, director of Science, inserted into the electronic edition of the magazine in an unusual retraction stating that in the two-scientific papers were produced "no real results and that therefore there had been a fraud. The first human clone never existed!

Now, several months after that science itself make self-criticism about the case. Spain has adopted a Law Research Biomedici-na. so that we can say that the rule is brought forward to the progress of science, which is usually not normal. It is one of the positive consequences of the Hwang case.

But, like what happened has cast doubt on the process of scientific publishing, has also led to questioning the process of transmission of news through the media. The case of Dr. Hwang is a proof that scientific journalism se basa en un then overly uncritical of everything that is published in the "prestigious" scientific journals.

The sources used by journalists to learn about science are essentially scientific journals Nature and Science type. But as reflected in the wake of the case The New York Times a few months ago in an article "Now, editors are starting to look at the information that comes from scientific journals with more skepticism."

Roy Peter Clark, professor at the Poynter Institute in Florida, believes that reporting on scientific discoveries mean greater difficulty, since it often requires some prior knowledge of the journalist, followed up with interviews with experts and some indication of how to give meaning to highly technical material.

"It seems clear-Clark concludes that this scandal will generate the need to increase the capacity level of critical journalists and probably also new communication protocols between scientists and disseminators."

If so. both the momentum of a law to investigate in biomedicine as requiring a higher level of scientific journalism have been positive corollaries of a memorable fraud in the history of science.