Hi Flowers, It seems that various issues regarding data are being raised. 1.Use and abuse of FC data. 2.Misinterpretation of data. (deliberate or just lack of knowledge). 3.Bad presentation of data-i.e good or bad data. Although I am in favour of peer review; from the discussion so far I get the feeling that peer review will only confirm the fact that there is indeed a high percentage of journals floating around containing bad FC data. What then? A serious drop in publications maybe- >From the concern shown reviewing is essential but one should not ignore the root of the problem which is: as FC expands it seems to me that education and training in FC barely plays a role, which in turn creates a divide between the scientists (who have to depend on the expertise of the flow cytometrists) and the flow cytometrist. One "knows it all" including the limitations, and the other gains just enough information to allow him/her to draw "meaningful" conclusions for an experiment. If institutes provide the scientific tools surely they should also be committed to providing the training and education that goes with these tools. An expert doing the job is well and good- but that does not create users with acquired skills or expertise in dealing with generated data. If institutes referee their own papers the FC data presented will more than likely end up back in the lab where it was generated for evaluation- if not well..... Regards Ann
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