Maintaining confidence in research

Citation

Grundy, P. (2003), "Maintaining confidence in research", Soldering & Surface Mount Technology, Vol. 15 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/ssmt.2003.21915aaa.001

Maintaining confidence in research

Maintaining confidence in research

All electronic product manufacturers need to feel comfortable that the technologies they have chosen to create and assemble a product are reliable and dependable, but the majority have very few resources themselves to research and develop those technologies.

It is therefore vital that fundamental research proceeds around the world and that the results of that research are made available through organs such as Soldering & Surface Mount Technology (SSMT).

The chosen themes for research reflect the worries and concerns of industry, as seen in the current crop of papers on lead-free soldering technology. There is now a lot more thought given to predictive modelling and more accurate analysis of possible long-term failures than before, and the users of technology now have a much better chance of making a choice of technology which will be safe and not lead to unacceptable product defect levels.

So far, so good, but what about the researchers? They need to know that their work is sound and will find a useful place in society. Furthermore, they need to be sure that, in placing their work in the public domain, they will not face plagiarism and copywrite infringements.

Recently, the academic world and industry was shocked to learn that a supposedly respected author of many papers, based at Lucent’s Bell Labs in Princeton NJ, has been falsifying results from his research into nanotechnology. This has put into question the future of superconducting materials and supercomputers, and the event has called for a rethink on peer group assessment since the author’s sponsor seems to have not paid quite as much attention to reviewing the work as necessary.

There is really no other way of assessing new research material and it is good to note that the papers published in SSMT are subjected to a range of different assessors, which raises the degree of confidence in their authenticity and usefulness.

It has been often reported that plagiarism is rife in the literary world and it is likely that it happens in the research and development world too. Hence the work being done under the guise of the RoMEO ( http://www.lboro.ac.uk/departments/ls/disresearch/romeo/index.html) project to allow academics to self-archive and protect their work is encouraging to all. Hopefully, no researchers will be put off from publishing their work because of fears of copywrite infringement if this project is successful.

If we can all believe in the integrity and security of the technology we are using, we will continue to make progress and push the frontiers of science and manufacturing to their limits.

Peter GrundySmart Group, UK