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how pranking at work can lift lab spirits

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Green "bunny ears" cactus with googly eyes on a bright pink background

Harmless lab pranks, such as spraying objects with unexpected scents or adding googly eyes, can lift spirits and encourage research-group bonding.Credit: Juj Winn/Getty

On 1 April 2022, John Prensner, then a postdoctoral researcher in cancer biology, received a surprising letter. Typed on official-looking letterhead paper, the message outlined plans for a Smithsonian Institution exhibit dedicated to the Human Genome Project, which in 2001 produced the first draft sequence of the human genome. Through professional connections, the writer said, they had learnt that Prensner held a piece of that history on his lab bench at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard in Cambridge, Massachusetts: a PTC-200 machine used for PCR reactions during the pioneering work.

The machine had been inherited from a colleague at the nearby Whitehead Institute, where much of the project’s research was done, and was a favourite of Prensner’s because it was so simple to operate. He used the PTC-200 exclusively, and by then it was nearly as old as he was. When it finally stopped working, Prensner took the machine apart to try to fix it. But it never woke again, collecting dust until the letter arrived. “I wouldn’t get rid of it because I loved it so much, so I was excited that it might get a second life,” he says. “Until I turned the letter over.”

On the back, the letter stated that the Smithsonian was also interested in antiquated sound technology, including Prensner’s barely functioning 1995 boom box. Tipped off by the halo of labmates lurking surreptitiously around him, he soon realized that the whole thing was probably a prank. “Fortunately, the lab had a very positive atmosphere, so there weren’t any ill feelings,” Prensner says, adding that when he left in 2023 to start his lab at the University of Michigan Medical School in Ann Arbor, he trashed the PCR machine, but kept the boom box and letter.

Practical jokes such as this play out in labs every day, and many live on as group lore, stretching across generations of students and staff. Pranks, it turns out, are about much more than a laugh, and can serve important purposes — as tools for community-building, creative outlets in an otherwise intense working environment and as a means of passing on guidance. And although jokes can take nearly any form, there are underlying rules that define if and when pranking is appropriate. (Lab safety comes first: no researchers or experiments were harmed by these pranks.)

“The basis of a good prank is that you have to like and respect the person you’re pranking,” says Jess McLaughlin, who once hid tiny plastic horses they had found in a box on the kerb all throughout their lab when they were doing a genomics postdoc at the University of California (UC), Berkeley. “You’re not there to cause someone distress — you’re doing it with the person rather than to them.”

A prankster’s playbook

Some scientists, including McLaughlin, approach pranking opportunistically — striking when the Universe provides. Others pursue it with intention. Monica Tomaszewski , a programme manager at the University of Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania, recalls glueing down teachers’ chalk at school, but her pranking talents truly blossomed during her PhD at the same university. There, she discovered that her adviser, who is now retired, had a similar sense of humour. Because he was Canadian, Tomaszewski planned a prank to make his office smell like maple syrup. She bought candle-scenting solution, and each spring, applied it to his radiator, where he kept a collection of some 70 cacti.

“His office would smell like syrup for a few weeks, and he had no idea why,” Tomaszewski says. But one day, he quietly shared his suspicions with her — that his cacti were going into heat and releasing pheromones. “It was such a ridiculous sentence, because cacti don’t have a mating cycle, and he is a very intelligent biologist,” she says. Tomaszewski nearly gave away the prank then and there, but ultimately kept it up — even passing the scenting solution to lab colleagues when she moved on — before finally confessing over lunch one day several years later.

This idea of ‘pranking up’ — targeting people in positions of authority — is one of the many unspoken rules of practical jokes, alongside pranking laterally by targeting friends and peers. But to a fault, researchers who spoke to Nature say that pulling pranks on people over whom you hold power is poor form.

Social cues also determine whether pranking is appropriate. Jennifer Phillips, a research associate in genetics at the University of Oregon in Eugene, says that it often comes down to whether it’s “the right time, in the right place, with the right people”. Not all labs embrace a culture of pranking, and group dynamics are constantly in flux as people come and go. But when Phillips joined the university for her PhD in 1998, “the lab was made up of a unique group of people who really put fun in the centre of the table”, she says.

An ongoing prank involved the timers used to track experiments. Good etiquette dictates that people quickly silence beeping alarms to avoid disturbing others, but that didn’t always happen. A first infraction might earn you some gentle ribbing, but that quickly escalated to snack bribes to recover hidden timers, rude words etched into offending timers and, in the worst cases, timers embedded in agarose gel. Phillips says there were few instances in which people didn’t catch on quickly.

Pranks helped to create a more egalitarian environment, she says. “Having fun made it easier to approach each other if someone had a question,” she says, noting that that was especially true for her, as a new student. “And the flip side is that we would also have intense lab meetings, where people would really go hammer and tongs on your data. The collegial lab culture made those criticisms seem more constructive and less personal.”

Indeed, among the researchers who spoke to Nature, leveraging humour to strengthen social bonds was a common reason why people prank. For example, Tomaszewski and her labmates were cleaning out lab stocks one day in 2006, when they found a bottle of calcium chloride solution that was one month shy of its 21st birthday. Rather than toss it, the group held a birthday party to celebrate. “We put one of those little triangular birthday hats on it,” she says, and they later adjourned to a local bar called Filthy McNasty’s to toast the bottle’s coming-of-age.

Although targeting junior or new people with pranks is discouraged, it’s perfectly reasonable to bring them in on the joke as co-conspirators. Back in 2015, independent palaeontologist Lisa Buckley pulled the summer rotation students into a long-standing prank war between herself and her husband, fellow palaeontologist Richard McCrea.

Buckley saw the move as a form of teamwork that strengthened otherwise temporary bonds. She and the students printed out cat pictures and crafted dozens of tiny pom-pom cats, which they scattered throughout McCrea’s office at the Peace Region Paleontology Research Centre in Tumbler Ridge, Canada, where the couple worked as curators. In retaliation for these ‘cat wars’, McCrea launched ‘the spidering’ — when Buckley returned from a week of field work, she found her office completely engulfed in fake webs and hundreds of fake spiders, including a giant one over her desk and another dangling underneath. Both Buckley and McCrea discovered cats and spiders among their possessions for years afterwards — squashed between pages in books or hidden in boxes — even after they’d each left for new positions. Buckley says there are probably more still hidden in the lab, along with an Annoyatron noisemaker she left in the ceiling that periodically emitted a cricket chirp.

“I pity the person that has to inhabit any of those offices,” she says.

The purpose of play

Pranking does take time and energy, but some scientists stress that it’s worth the small dent in productivity because of the positive benefits of humour and play — including offsetting the intensity of academic careers. Increasingly, early-career researchers face a demoralizing duo of stagnating wages and poor job prospects. Pranking, researchers say, serves as a pressure-release valve that keeps people invested in the work they’re doing. “Doing something silly with your lab, whether that’s pulling a prank or going out to karaoke, lets you remember that there’s joy in the work,” Tomaszewski says.

A small memorial scene has been set up around a few dead insects on a stairwell ledge

A dead millipede in Rachel Thayer’s former lab building inspired passers-by to create a memorial scene, complete with other dearly departed lab specimens.Credit: Rachel Thayer

Rachel Thayer, now a postdoc in evolutionary biology at UC Davis, had a similar experience in 2018 while she was a PhD student at UC Berkeley. For weeks, a dead millipede lay in the stairwell that Thayer used to access her lab, until one day, a funerary scene popped up around it — complete with a headstone, a priest and some shrubbery. Other students quickly added to the display, often using dearly departed model organisms from their work. Thayer contributed a butterfly from her research on the evolution of structural colour, which rested alongside fruit flies and pill bugs. “It changed trudging up and down the stairs into an inside joke,” she says, adding that it was “a light-hearted, silently shared moment in an otherwise boring and repetitive part of the day”.

Indeed, researchers recall past pranks with fondness, particularly those who say they have since matured into boring, non-pranking adults. Daniel Bolnick, now an evolutionary biologist at the University of Connecticut in Storrs, was a solid jokester earlier in his career. He once placed a life-like rubber hand in a colleague’s −80 °C freezer and, as a student, designed a poster at a conference claiming to provide scientific evidence of the butterfly effect — an aspect of chaos theory that describes how the flap of a butterfly’s wings can lead to a typhoon on the other side of the world. He watched as his co-prankster, Evan Preisser, now a community ecologist at the University of Rhode Island in Kingston, presented the work under an assumed name. “Folks either got it or they didn’t,” Preisser says. “People in the latter group tried to educate us, and a few got agitated that they knew we were wrong but couldn’t prove it.”

Recalling these pranks, Bolnick says, feels cathartic, “because it does bring to mind times when I tapped into the creativity of science.” He adds that he might even feel compelled to start pranking again, albeit beginning with something gentle. As it happens, some of his former students are now faculty members in his department — and as staff of the same station, he thinks they are fair game. “That makes it easy — I know exactly who my first victims would be.”



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JLab Epic Lab Edition review:

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JLab Epic Lab Edition: Three-minute review

The JLab Epic Lab Edition isn’t the cheapest of earbuds and when you pay a premium price for some headphones, you expect a base level of music quality – but it manages to buck that expectation. JLab charges you a princely sum for these top-end headphones, but I’ve heard better audio quality on cheap buds that cost a quarter of the price.

JLab’s earbud range almost entirely falls within the ‘best budget wireless earbuds’ bracket, with our ranking of the best earbuds flagging some of its offerings as worthy low-cost alternatives to premium options. Of its current selection, the Epic Lab Edition costs twice as much as its nearest siblings, the JLab Epic Air. If you didn’t tell me the price, though, I’d believe that the Epic Lab Edition was just another member of this busy market bracket, and it’s startling that JLab would sell these for more than the Apple AirPods.

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Inside China’s giant underground neutrino lab

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Kaiping, China

Seven hundred metres below the rolling green landscape of Kaiping, southeast China, construction workers are furiously finishing a 35-metre-diameter orb-shaped detector that aims to observe ghostly subatomic particles known as neutrinos in exquisite detail. If all goes to plan, the US$376 million Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO) will be ready to start detecting by the end of this year, says JUNO’s on-site manager Yuekun Heng, a physicist at the Chinese Academy of Science’s Institute of High Energy Physics in Beijing.

That will make it the first of several ambitious new neutrino detectors currently being built around the world to go online. Two others — in Japan and the United States — are due to start collecting data in 2027 and 2031.

JUNO’s main goal will be to help researchers determine which type of neutrino has the highest mass and which has the least, one of the biggest mysteries in physics. Solving this problem could help physicists to understand what neutrinos are and why their mass is so small. Researchers at JUNO aim to do this by measuring neutrinos pouring in from two nuclear-power stations located more than 50 kilometres away from the observatory. Another goal is to study neutrinos streaming in from other sources, including the Sun, atmosphere, exploding stars and natural radioactive decay processes within the Earth.

On 7 March, researchers at the observatory started to fill a miniature version of the detector with liquid scintillator — a cocktail of solvent and organic chemicals that emits light when neutrinos zip through it. This model will test whether the scintillator is pure enough to help researchers to crack the mass-order problem.

JUNO’s approach sets it apart from the other detectors being built. Japan’s planned Hyper-Kamiokande detector will use purified water as its neutrino-detecting medium, whereas the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment in the United States will rely on liquid argon to measure the elusive particles, says Mary Bishai, a physicist at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York and co-spokesperson for the US observatory. Both of these future detectors will measure neutrinos beaming in from nearby particle accelerators rather than nuclear reactors.

Like telescopes that view the cosmos at different wavelengths, having several neutrino detectors that use distinct techniques to observe neutrinos from various sources, such as the Sun and nuclear power stations, will allow researchers to develop a better understanding of neutrino characteristics and the role of these particles in the Universe, says Bishai. “It gives us a unique way of checking that our picture is consistent,” she says.

The liquid scintillator must contain only minuscule traces of uranium and thorium, radioactive elements that can mimic neutrino events when their decay accidentally coincides with other signals and can destroy experiment results. If levels of these elements are too high, it will be almost impossible to measure neutrinos with the sensitivity needed to solve the mass-ordering problem, says JUNO team member Alberto Garfagnini, a physicist at the University of Padua, Italy. The team is therefore filling the miniature version of JUNO — called OSIRIS — to test the fluid’s radiopurity before it is pumped straight into the main detector next door. It’s important to get this step right, because there’s no going back once JUNO is filled with 20,000 tonnes of the liquid. “It has to be pure from the beginning,” says Garfagnini.

A technician at work beneath rows of gold-coloured globular glass detectors.

Photomultiplier tubes will detect flashes of energy produced when neutrinos interact with matter.Credit: Institute of High Energy Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences

Ghostly particles

Observing a neutrino sounds like it should be easy, given that they are the most abundant particles that have mass in the Universe, with billions of them passing through every cubic centimetre of Earth each second. But their properties remain mostly a mystery, because most of them barely interact with matter while they glide through the cosmos, making it difficult to detect them directly. However, neutrinos might hold clues about how the Universe evolved, says Garfagnini. “They are an important ingredient in cosmology,” he says.

Physicists know that there are three flavours of neutrinos: electron, muon and tau (each named after the fundamental particles they are produced with). More than two decades ago, the Super-Kamiokande experiment in Hida, Japan, and the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory in Canada discovered that neutrinos morph from one flavour into another as they travel1,2, which physicists could explain only if the particles had mass. And in 2012, the Daya Bay Reactor Neutrino Experiment outside Shenzhen, China, precisely measured one of the parameters that describes the rate at which neutrinos switch between flavours3.

Neutrinos also have three mass states — ν1, ν2 and ν3 — and each flavour is a mixture of all of them. Physicists have deduced that ν2 is slightly more massive than ν1, and that there’s a big difference between ν3 and the others. But they still haven’t figured out whether ν3 is heavier or lighter than its better understood counterparts. The answer to this mass-ordering problem has remained elusive, because it demands larger, more-sensitive detectors that are close enough to a well-understood neutrino source, says Bishai. “You have to be in the sweet spot for the effect you are looking for.”

Rows of photomultiplier tubes seen from below.

More than 40,000 neutrino-detecting photomultiplier tubes cover the main detector sphere.Credit: Institute of High Energy Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences

A giant orb

JUNO is located beneath a granite hill, which will act as a shield against cosmic rays — supercharged particles from space that can drown out faint neutrino signals. Every day, fluorescent-vested researchers and construction workers take a 15-minute cable-car ride down a steep 1.3-kilometre tunnel to continue building the detector inside a pristine, temperature-controlled hall. The acrylic sphere, which is roughly two-thirds complete, will soon be submerged in 35,000 tonnes of high-purity water, which will further shield the detector from background radiation. Once the liquid scintillator has passed its radiopurity test, it will be funnelled into the main detector. The entire process will take six months, says Heng.

Safeguarding JUNO’s sensitivity has been no easy feat. When construction started in 2015, the team were hoping to finish the building work in three years. But removing the huge volumes of groundwater resulted in delays. “Water was a big problem,” says Heng. To address this, the team installed a system that pumps 500 cubic metres of water out of the snaking underground tunnels every hour. To control levels of radon — a radioactive gas produced naturally by granite and other rocks that doesn’t play well with sensitive neutrino experiments — the cavernous facility is dotted with whirring, cylinder-shaped fans.

The reason for its difficult location lies on the surface. JUNO sits between two nuclear power stations, each located 53 kilometres away, that will supply the detector with a steady stream of electron antineutrinos, which have the same mass as neutrinos. The sheer number of them churned out by these power plants will give researchers a chance of measuring them with the precision needed to determine their mass order, says Heng.

Neutrinos cannot be detected directly, so to figure out their mass, physicists measure the energy of other particles produced on the rare occasion that a neutrino interacts with matter. In JUNO’s case, when an electron antineutrino bumps into a proton in the liquid scintillator, the interaction will produce a positron and a neutron, a process called inverse beta decay. The energy from the positron results in a flash of light, while the neutron produces another flash when it is captured by a proton. These telltale flashes — 200 microseconds apart — will be measured by more than 40,000 bubble-shaped photomultiplier tubes that will cover the sphere. The time difference between these flashes will help researchers to separate neutrinos from cluttering background signals, says Garfagnini. “It’s a clear signature,” he says. The researchers hope to detect 100,000 neutrinos over the next six years.

Its size, shielded environment and proximity to nuclear power sources will make it one of the most sensitive neutrino detectors in the world, says Geoffrey Taylor, a physicist at the University of Melbourne in Australia. This gives it a good chance of solving the mass order of neutrinos before other experiments get off the ground, he adds. “It’s on track to be a winner.”

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the inside story of deception in a rising star’s physics lab

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In 2020, Ranga Dias was an up-and-coming star of the physics world. A researcher at the University of Rochester in New York, Dias achieved widespread recognition for his claim to have discovered the first room-temperature superconductor, a material that conducts electricity without resistance at ambient temperatures. Dias published that finding in a landmark Nature paper1.

Nearly two years later, that paper was retracted. But not long after, Dias announced an even bigger result, also published in Nature: another room-temperature superconductor2. Unlike the previous material, the latest one supposedly worked at relatively modest pressures, raising the enticing possibility of applications such as superconducting magnets for medical imaging and powerful computer chips.

Most superconductors operate at extremely low temperatures, below 77 kelvin (−196 °C). So achieving superconductivity at room temperature (about 293 K, or 20 °C) would be a “remarkable phenomenon”, says Peter Armitage, a condensed-matter researcher at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland.

But Dias is now infamous for the scandal that surrounds his work. Nature has since retracted his second paper2 and many other research groups have tried and failed to replicate Dias’s superconductivity results. Some researchers say the debacle has caused serious harm. The scandal “has damaged careers of young scientists — either in the field, or thinking to go into the field”, says Paul Canfield, a physicist at Iowa State University in Ames.

Why a blockbuster superconductivity claim met a wall of scepticism

Previous reporting by The Wall Street Journal, Science and Nature’s news team has documented allegations that Dias manipulated data, plagiarized substantial portions of his thesis and attempted to obstruct the investigation of another paper by fabricating data.

Three previous investigations into Dias’s superconductivity work by the University of Rochester did not find evidence of misconduct. But last summer, the university launched a fourth investigation, led by experts external to the university. In August 2023, Dias was stripped of his students and laboratories. That fourth investigation is now complete and, according to a university spokesperson, the external experts confirmed that there were “data reliability concerns” in Dias’s papers.

Now, Nature’s news team reveals new details about how the scandal unfolded.

The news team interviewed several of Dias’s former graduate students, who were co-authors of his superconductivity research. The individuals requested anonymity because they were concerned about the negative impact on their careers. Nature’s news team verified student claims with corroborating documents; where it could not do so, the news team relied on the fact that multiple, independent student accounts were in agreement.

The news team also obtained documents relevant to the acceptance of the two Nature papers and their subsequent retractions. (Nature’s news and journal teams are editorially independent.)

The investigation unearths fresh details about how Dias distorted the evidence for room-temperature superconductivity — and indicates that he concealed information from his students, manipulated them and shut them out of key steps in the research process. The investigation also reveals, for the first time, what happened during the peer-review process for Dias’s second Nature paper on superconductivity. Dias did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Together, the evidence raises questions about why the problems in Dias’s lab did not prompt stronger action, and sooner, by his collaborators, by Nature’s journal team and by his university.

Zero resistance

Dias came to the University of Rochester in 2017, fresh from a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he worked under physicist Isaac Silvera. “He’s not only a very talented scientist, but he’s an honest person,” Silvera told Nature’s news team.

Once Dias settled at Rochester, he pursued high-temperature superconductivity. Three years earlier, the field had been electrified when researchers in Germany discovered superconductivity in a form of hydrogen sulfide with the formula H3S at 203 K (−70 °C) and at extremely high pressures3. This was a much higher temperature than any superconductor had achieved before, which gave researchers hope that room-temperature superconductivity could be around the corner.

Dias proposed that adding carbon to H3S might lead to superconductivity at even higher temperatures.

Ranga Dias, a professor of mechanical engineering and physics at University of Rochester whose team is doing superconductivity research, in 2023.

Ranga Dias at the University of Rochester, New York.Credit: Lauren Petracca/New York Times/Redux/eyevine

His former graduate students say they synthesized samples of carbon, sulfur and hydrogen (CSH), but did not take measurements of electrical resistance or magnetic susceptibility that showed superconductivity. When a superconducting material is cooled past a critical temperature, its electrical resistance drops sharply to zero, and the material displays a similarly sharp change in its magnetic properties, called the Meissner effect. Students say they did not observe these key signs of superconductivity in CSH.

Because of this, students say they were shocked when Dias sent them a manuscript on 21 July 2020 announcing the discovery of room-temperature superconductivity in CSH. E-mails seen by the news team show that the students had little time to review the manuscript: Dias sent out a draft at 5.13 p.m. and submitted the paper to Nature at 8.26 p.m. the same evening.

When the students asked Dias about the stunning new data, they say, he told them he had taken all the resistance and magnetic-susceptibility data before coming to Rochester. The news team obtained e-mails that show Dias had been making similar claims since 2014. In the e-mails, Dias says he has observed a sulfur-based superconductor with a temperature above 120 K — which is relatively high, but far from room temperature. The students recall that they felt odd about Dias’s explanation but did not suspect misconduct at the time. As relatively inexperienced graduate students, they say, they trusted their adviser.

During peer review, however, Dias’s claims about CSH met more resistance. Nature’s news team obtained the reports of all three referees who reviewed the manuscript. Two of the referees were concerned over a lack of information about the chemical structure of CSH. After three rounds of review, only one referee supported publication.

The news team showed five superconductivity specialists these reports. They shared some of the referees’ concerns but say it was not unreasonable for the Nature editors to have accepted the paper, given the strongly positive report from one referee and what was known at the time.

The paper was published on 14 October 2020 to fanfare. Dias and a co-author, Ashkan Salamat, a physicist at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV), also announced their new venture: Unearthly Materials, a Rochester-based company established to develop superconductors that operate at ambient temperatures and pressures.

At the time, students say, they trusted Dias’s explanations of where the resistance and magnetic-susceptibility data came from. Now, however, they no longer believe the result, or Dias’s explanation for the data. “I don’t think any of the other data was collected,” one student says.

Matters arise

Soon after the CSH paper was published, Jorge Hirsch, a condensed-matter theorist at the University of California, San Diego, began pressing Dias to release the raw magnetic-susceptibility data, which were not included in the paper. More than a year later, Dias and Salamat finally made the raw data public.

In January 2022, Hirsch and Dirk van der Marel, a retired professor at the University of Geneva in Switzerland, posted an analysis of the raw data on the preprint server arXiv4. They reported that the data points were separated by suspiciously regular intervals — each exactly a multiple of 0.16555 nanovolts. Hirsch and van der Marel stated that this feature was evidence of data manipulation.

Laser spectroscopy is used to trigger chemical reactions in experiments with room-temperature superconductivity in a University of Rochester lab.

Dias’s team used laser spectroscopy to measure the pressure of samples in diamond anvil cells.Credit: Lauren Petracca/New York Times/Redux/eyevine

Dias and Salamat responded in an arXiv preprint, arguing that the voltage intervals were simply a result of a background subtraction5 (the preprint was subsequently withdrawn by arXiv administrators). In high-pressure experiments, the signal of a sample’s superconductivity — a drop in voltage — can be drowned out by background noise. Researchers sometimes subtract this background, but the CSH paper did not mention the technique.

Questions about the data prompted Nature’s journal team to look further. In response to the concerns from Hirsch and van der Marel, editors at Nature asked four new referees to participate in a post-publication review of the CSH paper, which, like most peer review, was confidential.

Now, Nature’s news team has obtained the reports, which show that two of the anonymous referees found no evidence of misconduct. But two other reviewers, whom the news team can identify as physicists Brad Ramshaw at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, and James Hamlin at the University of Florida in Gainesville, found serious problems with the paper.

In particular, Hamlin found evidence that led him to conclude the raw data had been altered. Nature applied an editor’s note to the CSH paper on 15 February 2022, alerting readers to concerns about the data.

On 4 March 2022, Dias and Salamat sent a rebuttal to the referees, denying data manipulation. But the rebuttal, seen by the news team, does not provide an explanation for the issues that Hamlin and Ramshaw found in the raw magnetic-susceptibility data. “I don’t know of any reasonable way this could come about,” Ramshaw wrote in a 13 March e-mail to Nature’s manuscript team in response to the rebuttal. “The simplest conclusion would be that these data sets are all generated by hand and not actually measured.”

On 27 March 2022, Hamlin sent Nature’s journal team his response to the rebuttal, which proposed an explanation for the odd data: rather than deriving the published data from raw data, Dias had added noise to the published data to generate a set of ‘raw’ data.

To assess the evidence for data fabrication, Nature’s news team last month asked two superconductivity specialists to review the post-publication reports. They said that Hamlin’s analysis gives credence to claims of misconduct.

In July 2022, using a different analysis, van der Marel and Hirsch independently came to the same conclusion and posted their findings on arXiv as an update to their original preprint. In it, they state that the raw data must have been constructed from the published data6.

Why superconductor research is in a ‘golden age’ — despite controversy

In light of these concerns, Nature started the process of retracting the CSH paper. On 11 August, Nature editors sent an e-mail to all the co-authors asking them whether they agreed to the retraction. Students who spoke to the news team say that they were surprised by this, because Dias had kept them out of the loop about the post-publication review process. They remained unaware of any of the referees’ findings, including that there was evidence for data fabrication.

Nature retracted the CSH paper on 26 September 2022, with a notice that states “issues undermine confidence in the published magnetic susceptibility data as a whole, and we are accordingly retracting the paper”. Karl Ziemelis, Nature’s chief applied and physical sciences editor, says the journal’s investigation ceased as soon as the editors lost confidence in the paper, which “did leave other technical concerns unresolved”.

The retraction does not state what Hamlin and Ramshaw found in the post-publication review process instigated by Nature: that the raw data were probably fabricated. Felicitas Heβelmann, a specialist in retractions at the Humboldt University of Berlin, says misconduct is difficult to prove, so journals often avoid laying blame on authors in retractions. “A lot of retractions use very vague language,” she says.

Publicly, Dias continued to insist that CSH was legitimate and that the retraction was simply down to an obscure technical disagreement.

As Nature journal editors were investigating the CSH paper, the University of Rochester conducted two investigations into Dias’s work; a separate one followed the retraction. One of the university’s inquiries was in response to an anonymous report, which included some of the evidence indicating possible data fabrication that surfaced during Nature’s post-publication review.

The university told Nature’s news team that the three investigations regarding the CSH study did not find evidence of misconduct.

A spokesperson for Nature says that the journal took the university’s conclusions into account during its deliberations, but still decided to retract the paper.

The lack of industry-wide standards for investigating misconduct leaves it unclear whether the responsibility to investigate lands more on journals or on institutions. Ziemelis says: “Allegations of possible misconduct are outside the remit of peer review and more appropriately investigated by the host institution.”

Heβelmann says the responsibility to investigate can “vary from case to case”, but that there is a trend of more journals investigating misconduct, regardless of institutional action.

Funding agencies can also investigate alleged misconduct. In this case, Dias has received funding from both the US National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Department of Energy (DoE). The DoE did not respond to questions from Nature’s news team about Dias’s grant. The NSF declined to say whether it is investigating Dias, but it noted that awards can be terminated and suspended in response to an investigation.

The students who spoke to Nature’s news team say that none of them were interviewed in the three investigations of the CSH work by the university, which they were not aware of at the time. “We were hoping someone would come talk to us,” one student says. “It never happened.”

A new claim

By the time the CSH paper came under scrutiny by Nature journal editors in early 2022, Dias’s graduate students were starting to grow concerned. In summer 2021, Dias had tasked them with investigating a compound of lutetium and hydrogen (LuH), which he thought might be a high-temperature superconductor.

They began testing commercially purchased samples of LuH and, before long, a student measured the resistance dropping to zero at a temperature of around 300 K (27 °C). Dias concluded the material was a room-temperature superconductor, even though there was extremely little evidence, several students told Nature. “Ranga was convinced,” one student says.

Physicist James Jeffrey Hamlin in his lab at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida in 2023.

Physicist James Hamlin raised concerns about data reported by the Rochester group.Credit: Zach Stovall for Nature

But the measurements were plagued by systematic errors, which students say they shared with Dias. “I was very, very concerned that one of the probes touching the sample was broken,” one student says. “We could be measuring something that looks like a superconducting drop, but be fooling ourselves.” Although students did see resistance drops in a few other samples, there was no consistency across samples, or even for repeated measurements of a single sample, they told Nature’s news team.

Students were also worried about the accuracy of other measurements. During elemental analysis of a sample, they detected trace amounts of nitrogen. Dias concluded that the samples included the element — and the resulting paper refers to nitrogen-doped lutetium hydride. But further analysis, performed after the paper was submitted, indicated that nitrogen was not incorporated into the LuH. “Ranga ignored what I was saying,” one student says.

Because they were not consulted on the CSH paper, the students say they wanted to make sure they were included in the process of writing the LuH paper. According to the students, Dias initially agreed to involve them. “Then, one day, he sends us an e-mail and says, ‘Here’s the paper. I’m gonna submit it,’” one student says.

E-mails seen by Nature’s news team corroborate the timeline. Dias sent out the first draft of the LuH paper in an e-mail at 2.09 a.m. on 25 April 2022. “Please send me your comments by 10.30 AM,” Dias wrote. “I am submitting it today.” The manuscript they received did not contain any figures, making it difficult to assess. The students convinced Dias to hold off on submitting until the next day, when they could discuss it in person.

One student was upset enough by the meeting that they wrote a memorandum of the events four days afterwards. The memo gives details of how students raised concerns and Dias dismissed them. Students worried that the draft was misleading, because it included a description of how to synthesize LuH; in reality, all the measurements were taken on commercially bought samples of LuH. “Ranga responded by pointing out that it was never explicitly mentioned that we synthesized the sample so technically he was not lying,” the student wrote.

The students say they also raised concerns about the pressure data reported in the draft. “None of those pressure points correspond to anything that we actually measured,” one student says. According to the memo, Dias dismissed their concerns by saying: “Pressure is a joke.”

Students say that Dias gave them an ultimatum: remove their names, or let him send the draft. Despite their worries, the students say they had no choice but to acquiesce. “I just remember being very intimidated,” one student says. The student says they regret not speaking up more to Dias. “But it’s scary at the time. What if I do and he makes the rest of my life miserable?”

Dias made some changes that the students requested, but ignored others; the submitted manuscript contained a description of a synthesis procedure that had not been used. He sent the LuH manuscript to Nature that evening.

Paper problems

After Nature published the LuH paper in March 2023, many scientists were critical of the journal’s decision, given the rumours of misconduct surrounding the retracted CSH paper. They wanted to know on what basis Nature had decided to accept it. (In the case of both papers, neither the peer-review reports nor the referees’ identities were revealed.) Nature’s news team obtained those reviews and can, for the first time, reveal what happened during the review process for the LuH paper. Nature editors received the manuscript in April 2022 (about a month after Nature received the CSH post-publication review reports) and sent it out to four referees.

Brad Ramshaw giving a talk while using a projector.

Physicist Brad Ramshaw, together with James Hamlin, investigated data questions surrounding Dias’s superconductivity research.Credit: Kim Modic

All four referees agreed that the findings, if true, were highly significant. But they emphasized caution in accepting the manuscript, because of the extraordinary nature of the claims. Referee 4 wrote that the journal should be careful with such extraordinary claims to avoid another “Schön affair”, referring to the extensive data fabrication by German physicist Jan Hendrik Schön, which has become a cautionary tale in physics and led to dozens of papers being retracted, seven of them in Nature. Referees 2 and 3 also expressed concern about the results because of the CSH paper, which at the time bore an editor’s note of concern but had not yet been retracted. Referees raised a plethora of issues, from a lack of details about the synthesis procedure to unexplainable features in the data.

Although Dias and Salamat managed to assuage some of those concerns, referees said the authors’ responses were “not satisfactory” and the manuscript went through five stages of review. In the end, only one referee said there was solid proof of superconductivity, and another gave qualified support for publication. The other two referees did not voice support for publication, and one of them remained unsatisfied with the authors’ responses and wanted more measurements taken.

The news team asked five superconductivity specialists to review key information available to Nature journal editors when they were considering the LuH manuscript: the referee reports for the LuH paper and the reports indicating data fabrication in the CSH paper. All five said the documents raised serious questions about the validity of the LuH results and the integrity of the data.

“The second paper — from my understanding of timelines — was being considered after the Nature editors and a lot of the condensed-matter community were aware there were profound problems” with the CSH paper, Canfield says. The specialists also pointed to negative comments from some of the LuH referees, such as the observation by Referee 1 that “raw data does not look like a feature corresponding to superconducting transition”.

When asked why Nature considered Dias’s LuH paper after being warned of potential misconduct on the previous paper, Magdalena Skipper, Nature’s editor-in-chief, said: “Our editorial policy considers every submission in its own right.” The rationale, Skipper explains, is that decisions should be made on the basis of the scientific quality, not who the authors are.

Many other journals have similar policies, and guidelines from the Committee on Publication Ethics state that peer reviewers should “not allow their reviews to be influenced by the origins of a manuscript”. But not all journals say they treat submissions independently. Van der Marel, who is the editor-in-chief of Physica C, says that he would consider past allegations of misconduct if he were assessing a new paper by the same author. “If you have good reasons to doubt the credibility of authors, you are not obliged to publish,” he says.

Under review

Soon after the LuH paper was published in March 2023, it came under further scrutiny. Several teams of researchers independently attempted to replicate the results. One group, using samples from Dias’s lab, reported electrical resistance measurements that it said indicated high-temperature superconductivity7. But numerous other replication attempts found no evidence of room-temperature superconductivity in the compound.

As previously reported in Science, Hamlin and Ramshaw sent Nature a formal letter of concern in May. Dias and Salamat responded to the issues later that month, but the students say they were not included in the response, and learnt about the concerns much later.

A recording of a 6 July 2023 meeting between Dias and his students, obtained by Nature’s news team, shows that Dias continued to manipulate the students. Throughout the hour-long meeting, Dias said he wanted to involve the students in deciding how the team would respond to concerns about the LuH paper. But he didn’t tell them that he and Salamat had already responded to the technical issues raised by Hamlin and Ramshaw.

A graduate student makes adjustments to a diamond anvil cell used for a superconductivity experiment in the University of Rochester lab.

One of Dias’s students adjusts a diamond anvil cell, which the team used in its experiments.Credit: Lauren Petracca/New York Times/Redux/eyevine

The recording also reveals how Dias tried to manipulate the Nature review, because he believed the process would turn against him once more. “We can pretend we’re going to cooperate and buy time for a month or so, and then gather some senior scientists from the community,” Dias says in the recording. Dias explains how he wants to use the credibility of senior scientists — or the University of Rochester — to pressure Nature and avert a retraction.

But Dias’s plans were thwarted. Later that month, the students received an e-mail from Nature’s editors that showed Dias and Salamat had, in fact, already responded to the concerns. The students realized that Dias had sent them a document with the dates removed, apparently to perpetuate the falsehood.

On 25 July 2023, the journal initiated a post-publication review and asked four new referees to assess the dispute. All of the referees agreed that there were serious problems with the data, and that Dias and Salamat did not “convincingly address” the issues raised by Hamlin and Ramshaw. A spokesperson for Nature says the journal communicated with University of Rochester representatives during the post-publication review.

Separately, Dias’s students were beginning to mobilize, re-examining the LuH data they were able to access. The students hadn’t done this before, because, they say, Dias produced almost all of the figures and plots in both of the Nature papers.

Several other researchers told the news team that the principal investigator does not typically produce all the plots. “That’s weird,” Canfield says.

The students say they were especially concerned about the magnetic susceptibility measurements — again, the raw data seemed to have been altered. Looking at the real raw data, one student says, the material does not look like a superconductor. But when Dias subtracted the background, the student says, that “basically flips that curve upside down and makes it look superconducting instead”.

They continued finding problems. For the resistance measurements, too, the alleged raw data didn’t match data actually taken in the lab. Instead, it had been tweaked to look neater. “Science can be really messy … some of these plots just look too good,” a student says.

Back to school

By this point, some students were deeply concerned about their careers. “My thesis is going to be full of fabricated data. How am I supposed to graduate in this lab?” one student says. “At that point, I was thinking of either taking a leave of absence, or of dropping out.”

During the summer, Dias began facing other issues. One of his papers in Physical Review Letters8 — unrelated to room-temperature superconductivity — was being retracted after the journal found convincing evidence of data fabrication. Around the same time, Dias was stripped of his students and the University of Rochester launched a fourth investigation — this time, the students say they were interviewed.

‘A very disturbing picture’: another retraction imminent for controversial physicist

In late August, the students decided to request a retraction of the LuH paper and compiled their concerns about the data and Dias’s behaviour. Before they sent a letter to Nature, Dias apparently caught wind of it and sent the students a cease-and-desist notice, which the news team has seen. But, after consulting a university official who gave them the green light, the students sent their letter to Nature editors, precipitating the retraction process. Eight out of 11 authors, including Salamat, signed the letter and the LuH paper was retracted two months later, on 7 November.

According to multiple sources familiar with the company, Salamat left Unearthly Materials in 2023 and is under investigation at UNLV. He did not respond to multiple requests for comment, and a spokesperson for UNLV declined to comment publicly on personnel issues.

The scandal has also had an impact on Nature’s journal team. “This has been a deeply frustrating situation, and we understand the strength of feelings this has stirred within the community,” Ziemelis says. “We are looking at this case carefully to see what lessons can be learnt for the future.”

With the university’s investigation now complete, Dias remains at Rochester while a separate process for addressing “personnel actions” proceeds. He has no students, is not teaching any classes and has lost access to his lab, according to multiple sources. Dias’s prestigious NSF grant — which has US$333,283 left to pay out until 2026 — could also be in jeopardy if the NSF finds reason to terminate it.

Dias has not published any more papers about LuH, but on X (formerly Twitter), he occasionally posts updates about the material. In a 19 January tweet, Dias shared an image of data, which he said showed the Meissner effect — “definitive proof of superconductivity!”

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JLab Epic Lab Edition true wireless earphones

JLab Epic Lab Edition true wireless earphones

JLab has unveiled its latest offering, the Epic Lab Edition true wireless earphones. These earbuds are not just another pair on the market; they are a testament to the company’s commitment to quality and innovation. With a price tag of £199.99, they are positioned as a premium option for those who take their listening seriously. Available for purchase through JLab, Amazon, and Argos, these earphones are already making waves among discerning audiophiles.

The Epic Lab Edition earphones are a cut above the rest, thanks to their hybrid dual-driver design. This design ensures that every note and nuance in your music is delivered with clarity and depth. The sound quality is further refined by the Knowles Preferred Listening Response Curve, which brings an expanded treble range to the forefront, catering to those who crave a detailed and vibrant audio profile.

But the innovation doesn’t stop there. Active noise cancelling technology is one of the standout features of these earphones. It allows users to immerse themselves in their music by effectively reducing unwanted background noise. This feature is a boon for anyone looking to escape into their favorite tunes without the distractions of the outside world.

True wireless earphones

For those who are particular about the quality of their audio, the Epic Lab Edition earphones support Hi-Res Audio and spatial audio. This means listeners can enjoy a rich, three-dimensional soundscape that brings their music to life. Whether you’re listening to a live recording or a studio album, these earphones promise an experience that is as close to real as it gets.

Connectivity is also a breeze with the Epic Lab Edition earphones. They come equipped with Bluetooth LE, ensuring a stable and energy-efficient connection to both Android and iOS devices. The earphones support high-resolution audio codecs, which means that the sound quality is maintained at its highest level, no matter the source.

JLab Epic Lab Edition internal workings

For those who like to have control over their listening experience, the JLab App is a valuable tool. It allows users to customize noise cancelling levels and EQ presets to their liking. This level of personalization means that whether you prefer a bass-heavy sound or a more balanced profile, you can adjust the earphones to suit your preferences.

Battery life is a crucial factor for any wireless device, and the Epic Lab Edition earphones excel in this area. They come with a wireless charging case that provides convenience and ensures that your earphones are always ready to go. The dual connect feature is another practical addition, allowing each earbud to be used independently. This is particularly useful for those who need to stay aware of their surroundings or want to extend the battery life even further.

Switching between devices can often be a hassle, but the Bluetooth multipoint connections on these earphones make it seamless. This feature is perfect for those who use multiple devices throughout the day and need their earphones to keep up.

Durability is another key aspect of the Epic Lab Edition earphones. With an IP55 rating, they are resistant to dust and water, which means they can withstand the rigors of daily use. Whether you’re caught in the rain or sweating it out at the gym, these earphones are built to last. And for added peace of mind, JLab offers a 2-year warranty.

Specifications :

  • Battery life:
    • 56+ hours playtime (13+ hours in each earbud)
    • 36+ total hours playtime (9+ hours in each earbud) with ANC activated
  • Dual connect technology allows each bud to be used independently
  • Bluetooth LE Audio with USB-C dongle
  • Bluetooth multipoint connects to multiple devices
  • Spatial Audio Compatible with applications such as Dolby Atmos, Tempest 3D AudioTech and Windows Sonic
  • Hi-Res Audio LDAC (Android) or AAC (iOS) or LC3 (with compatible devices)
  • Smart Active Noise Cancelling with 3 noise control modes
  • Touch controls and optional wear detect auto play/pause feature
  • Microphone: 3 MEMS (each earbud) -38 dB +/- 1 dB
  • Patented Custom EQ3 sound and touch controls
  • Bluetooth 5.3
  • Range: 30+ ft
  • Protocols: HSP/HFP/A2DP/AVRCP
  • Codecs: ACC / LDAC / SBC / LC3
  • Drivers: Dual design, with a Knowles Balanced Armature Driver and a second 10 mm dynamic driver in each earbud
  • 20-40 kHz frequency response
  • Impedance: 16 Ω
  • Output: 98 +/-3 dB
  • Earbud battery: 85 mAh lithium polymer
    • Earbud charge time: 2 hours (in case)
    • Quick Charge: 15 mins of charging = 1 hour battery life
  • Charging case battery: 820mAh lithium polymer
  • Case charge time: 2 hours
  • Charging: Wireless or via USB-C to USB-C cable
  • IP Rating: 55
  • Three sets of gel eartips and three sets of JLab Cloud Foam
  • Google Fast Pair
  • Total weight: 76.3 grams (including USB-C dongle in case)
    • Earbuds: 5.5 grams each
    • Dongle weight: 1.9 grams
    • Case only: 63.5 grams
    • 25.1 grams (earbuds + case)
  • Dimensions:
    • Single earbud: 0.92″ L x 1.05″ D x 0.73″ H
    • Case: 2.71″ L x 1.06″ D x 1.63″ H
    • 2-year warranty

The JLab Epic Lab Edition earphones are more than just a listening device; they are an ally for anyone who values exceptional sound quality and practical features. They strike the perfect balance between advanced audio technology and user-friendly design. Whether you’re an audiophile with a keen ear for detail or an everyday listener who appreciates a premium audio experience, these earphones are sure to impress. With their robust build and cutting-edge features, the Epic Lab Edition earphones are poised to set a new benchmark for true wireless earbuds in the market.

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Astro Pi Replay simulation tool launched for Mission Space Lab

Astro Pi Replay simulation tool for Mission Space Lab projects

The Raspberry Pi Foundation has announced a new simulation tool, Astro Pi Replay, to support participants in the European Astro Pi Challenge 2023/24, specifically for the Mission Space Lab. This educational project, run in collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA), allows young people up to 19 years old to write programs that operate on the International Space Station (ISS).

The challenge is divided into two missions: Mission Zero for beginners and Mission Space Lab for more experienced coders. This year’s Mission Space Lab includes a new format and resources, with a specific scientific task for teams to calculate the speed of the ISS using Python programming and onboard sensors.

Imagine having the chance to write a computer program that will run in space. That’s exactly what young coders are doing with the help of the Raspberry Pi Foundation and the European Space Agency (ESA). These organizations have come together to create the initiative, which builds on the success of the European Astro Pi Challenge. This program is not just another coding competition; it’s an opportunity for young people up to 19 years old to make a real impact on the operations of the International Space Station (ISS).

Your Mission if you would like to accept it!

The Astro Pi Challenge has been a beacon for young minds interested in space science, offering a hands-on experience that goes beyond the classroom. By participating, students can contribute directly to the research and activities conducted on the ISS. The challenge is divided into two missions: Mission Zero, which is designed for beginners, and Mission Space Lab, which is tailored for more advanced coders. For those who are ready to take on a significant scientific challenge, Mission Space Lab in the 2023/24 cycle presents a unique task. Participants will use the Python programming language and the sensors aboard the ISS to calculate the orbital speed of the station. This task is not just about writing code; it’s about applying problem-solving skills to a real-world scenario in an extraordinary setting.

Astro Pi Replay is the latest tool introduced to help participants perfect their code. This simulation tool is a game-changer for preparation, as it allows students to test and refine their programs under conditions that closely mimic those on the ISS. The goal is to ensure that the code will perform without a hitch when it’s finally deployed in space.

Astro Pi Replay

To support the participants in their journey, the Raspberry Pi Foundation and ESA have provided a wealth of resources. These include guides for mentors and creators, as well as a focused ISS speed project guide that helps students approach their scientific task methodically. Additionally, virtual sessions are available, offering expert support and insights to help students navigate the challenges they may face.

One of the most exciting aspects of Astro Pi Replay is that it will be open source. This means that the code and the tools used in the project will be available for anyone to see, use, and learn from. It also allows the community to contribute to the project, fostering a collaborative environment where innovation thrives. This open-source approach is about more than just transparency; it’s about building a network of young innovators who are committed to advancing space science education.

The Astro Pi Challenge, with its new simulation tool and comprehensive support resources, is an invitation to explore the boundaries of coding and space science. As participants write code that will operate in the unique environment of space, they become part of a legacy of educational excellence and discovery. This is a call to all young coders to prepare, test, and set their sights high. The mission to code for space is underway, and it promises to be an unforgettable adventure.

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Astro Pi Mission Space Lab coding competition launches once again

Astro Pi Mission Space Lab

The team over at Raspberry Pi have once again launched the Astro Pi Mission Space Lab competition enabling young people all over Europe a chance to have their code for a science experiment run in space on the International Space Station (ISS). So if you are think you are up for the challenge this year’s Mission Space Lab, astronauts from the European Space Agency are setting young people a task : to write a computer program that runs on the ISS and calculates the speed at which the ISS is orbiting planet Earth. Participation in Mission Space Lab is completely free.

The Astro Pi Mission Space Lab is a unique initiative that offers young people an unprecedented opportunity to contribute to space exploration. This program invites participants aged up to 19 years to write a Python program for the Astro Pi computers onboard the International Space Station (ISS) with the goal of calculating the speed of the ISS.

Other articles you may find of interest on the subject of Raspberry Pi range of mini PC systems :

 

Participants engage in this project in teams of 2 to 6, working under the guidance of mentors who help them navigate through the process. The Mission Space Lab program is designed to be inclusive and accessible to all levels of programming experience. For beginners, a guided project is available to provide a roadmap for the mission. Meanwhile, more experienced teams are encouraged to create their own innovative solutions.

Raspberry Pi Astro Pi

The Astro Pi, the heart of this program, are Raspberry Pi computers equipped with a High Quality Camera, a Sense HAT add-on board with sensors, and a Coral machine learning accelerator. The Astro Pis are not just ordinary computers; they are specifically designed to withstand the harsh conditions of space and function effectively in the ISS environment.

In this program, participants are encouraged to use sensor data from the Astro Pis in creative ways to calculate the ISS’s speed. This requires not only programming skills but also an understanding of physics and mathematics. The combination of these disciplines provides a rich and challenging learning environment for participants.

Certificate of achievement

All participants whose programs successfully run on the ISS will receive a certificate of achievement, adding a noteworthy accomplishment to their portfolio. In addition, they will have the chance to attend a Q&A webinar with an ESA astronaut, a rare opportunity to interact directly with a professional in the field of space exploration. They will also receive data from the ISS based on their programs, providing them with a unique dataset for further analysis and learning.

Astro Pi Guides

To support the teams in their mission, the Astro Pi Mission Space Lab provides a mentor guide and a creator guide. The mentor guide includes tips on structuring the mission and assisting the team in problem-solving. It serves as a valuable resource for mentors to effectively guide their teams. On the other hand, the creator guide is designed to help participants design and create their Python programs. It provides insights into the technical aspects of the mission, guiding participants through the process of program creation.

Furthermore, a project guide is also provided as part of the resources. This guide showcases one way to complete the task by writing a program that calculates the ISS speed using photos taken by the Astro Pi’s camera. This guide serves as an example and inspiration for participants, showing them what is possible with the Astro Pi and Python programming.

The Astro Pi Mission Space Lab is a groundbreaking program that combines space exploration with coding, offering young people a unique opportunity to contribute to real-life space missions. It not only enhances their programming skills but also fosters a deeper understanding of space science, making it a truly enriching experience.

For more details and to apply to enter the new Astro Pi Mission Space Lab  jump over to the official Raspberry Pi Foundation website.

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Perplexity Lab pplx-api API for open-source LLMs

Perplexity API for open-source LLMs

Perplexity Labs has recently introduced a new, fast, and efficient API for open-source Large Language Models (LLMs) known as pplx-api. This innovative tool is designed to provide quick access to various open-source LLMs, including Mistral 7B, Llama2 13B, Code Llama 34B, and Llama2 70B. The introduction of pplx-api marks a significant milestone in the field of AI, offering a one-stop-shop for open-source LLMs.

One of the key features of pplx-api is its ease of use for developers. The API is user-friendly, allowing developers to integrate these models into their projects with ease using a familiar REST API. This ease of use eliminates the need for deep knowledge of C++/CUDA or access to GPUs, making it accessible to a wider range of developers.

Perplexity Lab pplx-api

The pplx-api also boasts a fast inference system. The efficiency of the inference system is remarkable, offering up to 2.9x lower latency than Replicate and 3.1x lower latency than Anyscale. In tests, pplx-api achieved up to 2.03x faster overall latency compared to Text Generation Inference (TGI), and up to 2.62x faster initial response latency. The API is also capable of processing tokens up to 2x faster compared to TGI. This speed and efficiency make pplx-api a powerful tool for developers working with LLMs.

Benefits of the pplx-api

  • Ease of use: developers can use state-of-the-art open-source models off-the-shelf and get started within minutes with a familiar REST API.

  • Blazing fast inference:  thoughtfully designed inference system is efficient and achieves up to 2.9x lower latency than Replicate and 3.1x lower latency than Anyscale.

  • Battle tested infrastructure: pplx-api is proven to be reliable, serving production-level traffic in both Perplexity answer engine and  Labs playground.

  • One-stop shop for open-source LLMs: Perplexity Labs is dedicated to adding new open-source models as they arrive. For example, we added Llama and Mistral m

The infrastructure of pplx-api is reliable and battle-tested. It has been proven reliable in serving production-level traffic in both Perplexity’s answer engine and Labs playground. The infrastructure combines state-of-the-art software and hardware, including AWS p4d instances powered by NVIDIA A100 GPUs and NVIDIA’s TensorRT-LLM. This robust infrastructure makes pplx-api one of the fastest Llama and Mistral APIs commercially available.

API for open-source LLMs

The pplx-api is currently in public beta and is free for users with a Perplexity Pro subscription. This availability allows a wider range of users to test and provide feedback on the API, helping Perplexity Labs to continually improve and refine the tool. The API is also cost-efficient for LLM deployment and inference. It has already resulted in significant cost savings for Perplexity, reducing costs by approximately $0.62M/year for a single feature. This cost efficiency makes pplx-api a valuable tool for both casual and commercial use.

The team at Perplexity is committed to adding new open-source models as they become available, ensuring that pplx-api remains a comprehensive resource for open-source LLMs. The API is also used to power Perplexity Labs, a model playground serving various open-source models. The introduction of pplx-api by Perplexity Labs represents a significant advancement in the field of AI. Its ease of use, fast inference system, reliable infrastructure, and cost efficiency make it a powerful tool for developers working with open-source LLMs. As the API continues to evolve and improve, it is expected to become an even more valuable resource for the AI community.

In the near future, pplx-api will support:

  • Custom Perplexity LLMs and other open-source LLMs.

  • Custom Perplexity embeddings and open-source embeddings.

  • Dedicated API pricing structure with general access after public beta is phased out.

  • Perplexity RAG-LLM API with grounding for facts and citations.

How to access pplx-api

You can access the pplx-api REST API using HTTPS requests. Authenticating into pplx-api involves the following steps:

1. Generate an API key through the Perplexity Account Settings Page. The API key is a long-lived access token that can be used until it is manually refreshed or deleted.
2. Send the API key as a bearer token in the Authorization header with each pplx-api request.
3. It currently support Mistral 7B, Llama 13B, Code Llama 34B, Llama 70B, and the API is conveniently OpenAI client-compatible for easy integration with existing applications.

For more information, visit the official Perplexity Labs API documentation and Quickstart Guide.

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