---
title: "Anil Potti"
chunk: 1/3
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anil_Potti"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T04:24:05.826585+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

Anil Potti is a physician and former Duke University associate professor and cancer researcher, focusing on oncogenomics. He, along with Joseph Nevins, are at the center of a research fabrication scandal at Duke University. On 9 November 2015, the Office of Research Integrity (ORI) found that Potti had engaged in research misconduct. According to Potti's voluntary settlement agreement with ORI, Potti can continue to perform research with the requirement of supervision until year 2020, while he "neither admits nor denies ORI's findings of research misconduct." As of 2024, Potti, employed at the Cancer Center of North Dakota, had 11 of his research publications retracted, one publication received an expression of concern, and two others had been corrected.

== Biography ==
Anil Potti graduated from Christian Medical College, Vellore, India in 1995. He finished an internship in Internal Medicine at the University of North Dakota School of Medicine in 1999. In 2006 Potti completed training in hematology and oncology at Duke University.
Potti resigned from Duke in 2010, following the discovery of flaws in the genomics research conducted at Duke and allegations of embellishments in his resume, assuming responsibility for the anomalies in the scientific research.
Following his resignation from Duke, Potti worked as an oncologist in South Carolina, but was let go in 2012.

== Scientific misconduct ==
According to the Office of Research Integrity (ORI), Potti engaged in scientific misconduct while a cancer researcher at both Duke University's Medical Center and School of Medicine. He resigned in November 2010 after Duke put him on administrative leave, terminated the clinical trials based on his research and retracted his published data.
Potti and his team were accused of falsifying data regarding the use of microarray genetic analysis for personalised cancer treatment, which was published in various prestigious scientific journals. While there were questions concerning Potti's work beginning in 2007, notably from two bioinformatic statisticians, Keith Baggerly and Kevin Coombes at MD Anderson Cancer Center, 2010 brought further and more widespread scrutiny when it was discovered by Paul Goldberg and reported in The Cancer Letter that Potti had claimed on his curriculum vitae that he had been a "Rhodes Scholar (Australian Board)". He said he was referring to the Association of Rhodes Scholars in Australia Scholarships, an award granted by an organisation of former Rhodes Scholars to bring Commonwealth citizens who attend overseas institutions in to Australia.
Potti's fraudulent research was funded by the US government through the National Institutes of Health; the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute; and the National Cancer Institute, in the form of six multi-year grants, and by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
60 Minutes described the case as "one of the biggest medical research frauds ever".

== University response ==
Duke University became aware of the suspicions of research misconduct by 2008, when a medical student working with Potti and Nevins withdrew his name from the research and submitted a memorandum entitled "Research Concerns" to the administration. The administration denied any misconduct and convinced the student not to report his experiences to the funding agency, Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Duke later falsely claimed that there had not been a whistleblower involved in the issue.

== Investigation ==
The Potti scandal prompted the Institute of Medicine to conduct a study of the proper use of genomics in clinical trials. The Institute of Medicine's report, entitled "Evolution of Translational Omics: Lessons Learned and the Path Forward", was published on 23 March 2012 and made detailed specific recommendations for clinical trials that incorporate "omics". In February 2012, Joseph Nevins stated that it was "abundantly clear" that there was "manipulated data" that could not have occurred by chance. This was confirmed by the 2015 ORI report.