Federal research funds cannot be expended by a principal investigator who has a conflict of interest under the federal rules until a satisfactory compliance plan is in place to manage, reduce, or eliminate the conflict. The UW-Madison Conflict of Interest Committee will assist the principal investigator to comply with federal requirements. Faculty and staff should file the state form annually by April 30. Principal investigators who wish to receive federal research support must file the federal reporting form annually by April 30. Disclosure forms must be updated throughout the year if financial circumstances change so as to create an actual or apparent conflict of interest.
Research ethics are fundamental to all academic investigation and training.
Traditionally students learned about professional and research ethics in their classes and from discussions with their advisors. To augment the efforts of advisors and teachers and to foster a greater understanding of research ethics among all scientists at UW-Madison, the committee on Graduate Training in Research Ethics was organized. Increased interest in training graduate students about research ethics can also be traced to the NIH mandate that all NIH trainees receive training in research ethics. NIH does not mandate a curriculum in ethics but suggests that topics in the study of research ethics might include authorship, conflict of interest, data management, use of human and animal subjects, safety, definitions of misconduct, and policies for handling misconduct. Committee members can help you further individualize these cases to meet the interests of special groups.