Elisabeth Bik (Science Integrity Digest)

The Microscopists

#49 — In this episode, we talk to Elisabeth Bik, former microbiome researcher turned scientific integrity consultant. Elisabeth spends her time searching biomedical literature for inappropriately manipulated photographic images and plagiarized text, and often discusses these on Twitter at @MicrobiomDigest.

Following her successful scientific career in the lab, a stolen sentence she authored led her to become a scientific sleuth—combing the literature for cases of misconduct from plagiarism to image manipulations. We also chat about how these cases of misconduct might be detected in future through the help of software—but that the human eye is still our best tool for doing this.

We chat about the cultural differences between the USA, where she is currently based, and The Netherlands where she is from originally—and how this may help her in her current work! We also hear about Elisabeth's love of gardening, and the issues of gardening in California.

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