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Professor found guilty will appeal decision
By Laura Hoffman, Summer Reporter
The [PurdueUniversity] Exponent

Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Rusi Taleyarkhan, the nuclear engineering professor who was found guilty of research misconduct on Friday, will be filing an appeal today.

According to his attorney, John Lewis, Taleyarkhan will appeal on the grounds that crucial evidence was excluded from the recent investigation.

The report of the investigative committee found that Taleyarkhan was guilty of two types of research misconduct: knowingly adding a name of student to his publication when the student was in fact was not involved with the research, and stating that his observations regarding his work with bubble fusion were independently confirmed when there was no weight supporting his claim.

Regardless of the appeal, Mark Hermodson, a Purdue professor of biochemistry and the chairman of the inquiry committee that governed the matter of integrity in research, wrote in an e-mail that "the committee stands by its report."

Joseph Bennett, vice president for university relations, wrote in an e-mail that Taleyarkhan has the right to appeal under Purdue's policy on research integrity and that the policy requires the appeal process be completed within 25 days.

Purdue's appeal procedures requires a three-person committee, based on their expertise, to be chosen to review the case. The committee will review issues such as whether the investigation was conducted fairly, whether each fact necessary to establish research misconduct was met and whether new evidence could alter the decision, as long as that evidence wasn't known to the accused at the time of the initial investigation. The process is explained thoroughly at http://www.purdue.edu/policies/pages/human_resources/c_22.htm.

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