...many leaders in the field are still seeking prestige from a few for-profit, rent-seeking journals.



He then pointed us to better publication practices:
- @peercommunityin.bsky.social

- @unjournal.bsky.social

- @metaror.bsky.social

Post credits: @alexh.bsky.social, @jwastrachan.bsky.social

NC: EPA released a draft review that looks great! Systematic review! But it is very flawed. They only included papers older<2019, excluded 100s of relevant studies, it was cherry picking data.
www.epa.gov/assessing-an...
We did a systematic review: pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/...
#AIMOS2025

NC: Another systematic review came to very different conclusions, but ... it was funded by the American Chemistry Council.
We need more actual systematic reviews that do not have those conflicts of interest -
LInks:
prheucsf.blog/category/op-...
www.industrydocuments.ucsf.edu/home/
#AIMOS2025

NC: TSCA: primary federal law regulation production/use of non-pesticide chemicals. But after Obama admin, industry people were put in power and chemical lobby were fighting regulation.
EPA has failed to rely on science for their evaluation.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toxic_S...

#AIMOS2025

NC: We are more and more exposed to plastic - oil companies love to produce more as we move away from fossil fuels.
We all have exposure signals in our blood. Pollution kills more people than drugs, alcohol, or smoking.
Low-income people more exposed.
#AIMOS2025

NC: Industry-funded papers underestimate the risk.
We scientists need to shape the public narrative around the harms of their products - we should get out of our echo chambers. There is wide partisan support to have chemicals regulated by government. We need to move the needle.
#AIMOS2025

NC: We know this is true, we have preclinical/animal data, but we are told to prove this through RCTs.
US EPA released reports but Australian government still claims PFAS are not proven to be bad.
We are exposed to 1000s of chemicals, yet we still evaluate one chemical at the time.
#AIMOS2025

The talk starts with a video about PFAS (toxic chemicals) leakage from a chemical plant near Jervis Bay.
More background: www.abc.net.au/news/2023-02...
Leading organizations did not use a lot of systematic reviews about environmental hazards.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

#AIMOS2025

3. Inika Sharma: The landscape of randomised controlled trials in India: A mapping review.
11,932 studies were included, over 7M participants, Changes in guidelines caused dips or increases over time.

#AIMOS2025

2. Gerben ter Riet & Anne de Jong (prerecorded): Four-Year Trends of Adherence to a Checklist for Responsible Research Practices.
Do people adhere to guidelines? We looked at 23 studies, adherence went down over time, in particular those related to open science such as preregistration.
#AIMOS2025

AW: Set of papers where the discussion sounded like a second introduction (background information) with many new references, much more than other control papers.
Likely citation manipulation. This could help sleuths find more of such papers.
* But be aware about ESL language issues.
#AIMOS2025

1. James Heathers, @jamesheathers.bsky.social with: The evolving field of forensic metascience:
ForMet: Modify trust by evaluating research accuracy of scientific documents by tools. It is not designed to find fraud.
A lot of science is bad/wrong.

#AIMOS2025

1. Madeleen van der Merwe: Statistical Errors in Health Journal Articles. A systematic review.
We looked at 53 articles - identified 940 statistical errors
#AIMOS2025