Make researchers revisit past publications to improve reproducibility

Abstract

Scientific irreproducibility is a major issue that has recently increased attention from publishers, authors, funders and other players in the scientific arena.  Published literature suggests that 50-80% of all science performed is irreproducible.  While various solutions to this problem have been proposed, none of them are quick and/or cheap.  Here, we propose one way of reducing scientific irreproducibility by asking authors to revisit their previous publications and provide a commentary after five years. We believe that this measure will alert authors not to over sell their results and will help with better planning and execution of their experiments.  We invite scientific journals to adapt this proposal immediately as a prerequisite for publishing.