Research Replication: First university to require ALL of its graduate students to first replicate a...

...positive-result research in their academic field which their own future original research will NOT be fully or partially based upon and then doing likewise with positive-result research which their own original research will be based upon.  [Replicating research is one of the best ways to teach future scientists how to be future scientists.  It isn't waste time or effort but can and should be viewed as a crucial part of their education.]  If the unrelated (to their own future research) positive-result research is confirmed by their own replication, they must pick another unrelated positive-result research and replicate it.  If they cannot replicate their first unrelated positive-result research, the student doesn't have to replicate another unrelated positive-result research and can progress to replicate related positive-result research.  [Since they will have stirred up a hornet's nest by publicly challenging the results of the first unrelated positive-result research, that will be a great service to the scientific community and will very likely result in doing even more research on the disputed research.]  All this done BEFORE being allowed to commence their own original research.  For the unrelated positive-result research, the picked research must be one that has not been replicated and its replicated results publicly released to the scientific community.  For the related positive research, the picked research must be one that either has not been replicated and publicly released to the scientific community or, if all has been so replicated, the one that has been the least replicated.  The student cannot replicate any research done by their own university or a professor employed by that university, whether that professor's research was done at that university or another.  All such replication research must be registered BEFORE they commence it and then they must publicly release their results, whether confirming or disputing, in enough of their field's respected scientific websites to make it reasonably possible for all researchers in that field to be aware of what they've done and found.

      [Presently, academic and scientific journals almost always only publish positive results and have been known to refuse to publish later research that contradicts positive results they've previously published.  And when positive-result research has been replicated, replication of the same results have not been achieved for a surprisingly large percentage of the research, and, in some cases, the majority of the research.  This is a MAJOR problem for science and medicine since a core tenet of the scientific method is replication of results.  It isn't a fact unless it can be replicated.  Unfortunately, the problem is becoming worse with each passing year as the number of scientists rapidly increases and the "publish or perish" imperative for career advancement intensifies as competition increases due to supply (scientists) outnumbering demand (scientist jobs).  The Economist has nicely laid out the problem in their articles "How Science Goes Wrong" and "Trouble at the Lab".  This challenge aims to correct that by getting graduate students to do what the scientific community should have been doing all along: replicating each other's research.]

1) First science foundation solely devoted to funding research that attempts to duplicate positive research results.  Grant preferences given to applicants wanting to replicate research that science and/or medicine is currently being based upon.  Grant applicants cannot be associated in any way or form with the original researchers; work at the original researcher's current university/institute; have received even a single college credit from the university where the original research was conducted or any of the universities from which the original researcher received college credits; nor work at a university or institute that is either in the same US state (if original research was done in the USA) or, if not done in the USA, same country where the original research was conducted.  The foundation must require all grant applicants to register their research upon receiving their grant and BEFORE they commence their research and then publicly release their results, whether positive or negative, on the foundation's website.  [With this grant money, researchers who think they smell something fishy, see a potential fatal flaw, and/or think that it sounds too good to be true can apply to this foundation to help clean up science and medicine by exposing fluke, bad, and/or falsified research.  And if through its grants the foundation is able to catch a SINGLE one of these "errors", the foundation's entire existence is justified and worthwhile.  Science doesn't magically come into existence but is built upon the discovery of earlier scientists.  If faulty research is left unchallenged, undiscovered, and allowed to continue to influence, all of science is hurt in the process.  Even if the faulty science is in another scientific field, it can and usually does influence other scientific fields.  Eliminating this garbage and thus improving science is the sole goal of this challenge.]  To win this challenge, the foundation must have an endowment of at least $1 billion and only use interest off of that money for the grants so it will last essentially forever.

2) First scientist to receive a grant from the above science foundation or one so structured and win a Nobel Prize in science or medicine for research that causes the retraction of previously published research in science or medicine.

3) First scientist to receive a grant from the above science foundation or one so structured and win a Nobel Prize in science or medicine for research that causes the retraction of previously published research in science or medicine for which someone else had previously won a Nobel Prize in science or medicine.