title: The reproducibility issue and preclinical academic drug discovery: educational and institutional initiatives fostering translation success.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Drug discovery depends critically upon published results from the academy. The reproducibility of preclinical research findings reported by academia in the peer-reviewed literature has been called into question, seriously jeopardizing the value of academic science for inventing therapeutics.
  
  
  METHODS
  The corrosive effects of the reproducibility issue on drug discovery are considered. Purported correctives imposed upon academia from the outside deal mainly with expunging fraudulent literature and imposing punitive sanctions on the responsible authors. The salutary influence of such post facto actions on the reproducibility of discovery-relevant preclinical research data from academia appears limited. Rather, intentional doctoral-scientist education focused on data replicability and translationally-meaningful science and active participation of university entities charged with research innovation and asset commercialization toward ensuring data quality are advocated as key academic initiatives for addressing the reproducibility issue.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  A mindset shift on the part of both senior university faculty and the academy to take responsibility for the data reproducibility crisis and commit proactively to positive educational, incentivization, and risk- and reward-sharing practices will be fundamental for improving the value of published preclinical academic research to drug discovery.
authors.affiliation: a Center for Drug Discovery , Northeastern University , Boston , MA , USA.|b Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences and Health Sciences Entrepreneurs, Bouvé College of Health Sciences , Northeastern University , Boston , MA , USA.|c Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, College of Science , Northeastern University , Boston , MA , USA.
authors.forename: David R
authors.initials: DR
authors.lastname: Janero
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D055808:Drug Discovery / Q000592:standards*; D005178:Faculty; D006801:Humans; D017712:Peer Review, Research / Q000592:standards*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D057170:Translational Research, Biomedical / Q000592:standards*; D014495:Universities
keywords: Asset commercialization; data reproducibility; education; mentoring; pharmacological intervention; preclinical research; scholarly publication; therapeutics discovery; translational science; universities