Sir

Your Special Report “Named and shamed” (Nature 441, 392–393; 2006) and Editorial “Finding fraud in China” (Nature 441, 549–550; 200610.1038/441549b) report that scientific misconduct has become rampant in China, especially in universities. I would like to add my view to those of previous correspondents (Nature 441, 932; 200610.1038/441932a).

Misconduct is hampering the sound development of science in the nation's higher-education system. If scientific misconduct cases are not handled by the university (or other concerned authority), and much-needed outside supervision is not available, then each occasion that comes to light damages the academic reputation of the university concerned, the whistleblower and the person accused.

Unfortunately, serious and justified investigations of suspected fraud have been largely ignored by China's universities, with the exceptions of the prestigious Tsinghua University and Shanghai Jiaotong University, each of which has recently dismissed a professor (returned from abroad in each case) for fabricating research achievements or results. However, details of these investigations have not been disclosed, so other universities cannot learn from them.

Obviously, it is the university involved in a fraud case — not the Ministry of Education, the media, websites, journals or newspapers — that has the power to dismiss or demote the accused, if guilty. A mechanism is needed to deal with such eventualities.

To cope with embarrassing situations such as those currently being highlighted in the media, I suggest that editorials and articles on the subject in science journals such as Nature and Science should be used as materials for teaching a course of research ethics to students in China's universities. Access to case studies being taught in scientific ethics courses elsewhere would also be valuable. Our universities should play a key part in fighting scientific misconduct, and every honest Chinese professor should make a contribution to such courses as part of providing a complete university education.