“The university is instituting an independent external review,” a spokesman, Christopher Davey, said in a statement, adding
that the review “is not an indication that we have discovered any evidence of scientific misconduct or other issues raised in your inquiry.”
Whatever the outcome of that review, Mr. Davey said, decisions on research misconduct at Ohio State were based solely on “the facts
and the merits of each individual case,” not a researcher’s grant money.
“Please note,” Dr. Whitacre wrote, “that the Institution considers continued activities in this
vein as constituting frivolous allegations and a waste of university and state resources.”
In response to questions from The Times, Ohio State issued a statement on behalf of Dr. Whitacre
and Dr. Yucel, saying they “believe they followed all policies and procedures in their roles in responding to the matters involving Dr. Carlo Croce based on the facts that were available at the time.”
Dr. Sanders, the Purdue virologist, tests his analysis of data falsification in Dr. Croce’s papers in a particularly
direct way: He teaches one of them to his sophomore biology students as an example of scientific misconduct.
Any other suggestion would be “false and offensive,” he said, adding
that the university has “spent significantly more to support his research program than he has brought in from outside sources.”
During an interview in October, and in a later statement, Dr. Croce, 72, denied any wrongdoing, said he had been singled out in some of the accusations simply because he was a prominent figure,
and largely placed the blame for any problems with figures or text on junior researchers or collaborators at other labs.
