When Professor Simona Francese embarked on yet another police collaboration two years ago, she knew she was taking a risk. Francese, an internationally renowned researcher in forensic and bioanalytical mass spectrometry from Sheffield Hallam University, had an opportunity to more robustly prove her pioneering “molecular fingerprinting” technique, could gather vital intelligence from fingerprints in operational conditions. But, as always in research, there was always the chance that things wouldn’t work out as planned.

The technology, MALDI mass spectrometry imaging, uses a laser to turn molecules from a fingerprint into ions in a gas phase, which can then be detected to deliver biometric and chemical information on potential suspects. Francese and her colleagues had already shown the method worked in the laboratory and — through previous police projects and a handful of actual operational casework— that it offered a lot of potential at crime scenes.

Yet the real-world tests threw up several unforeseen hurdles. Bureaucracy slowed the project down. Many of the fingerprints were caked in powder, which affected the instrumentation. All the marks provided to her team were decades old. And the major problem was that the new state-of-the art instrumentation simply didn’t behave the way it was supposed to. “We kind of had a baptism of fire
with this cutting-edge instrument which was the first to be sold in the UK,” says Francese.

Despite the setbacks the researchers gained valuable insights from the project, such as the strengths and limitations of the technique and ways to circumvent specific challenges when using it in police environments. And as a world-respected scientist, publishing her negative results — along with the lessons she learned — contributed to the fundamental progression of science, which depends, as Sir Isaac Newton put it, on ‘standing on the shoulders of giants’. She supported future generations of scientists and their experiments, while advancing her field.

Progression through failure is one of the principle tenets of scientific discovery. In order to better understand the world, scientists test their own observations through the scientific method. This logical system of problem solving is set up with the expectation of encountering failure and learning from the outcome. 

An observation leads to a question, which becomes a hypothesis. If tests prove this hypothes is to be false, the experiment is adjusted and run again. Hypotheses are essentially educated guesswork; while the hope is that they are correct the first time, this isn’t always expected. Successive failures steadily bring us closer to the truth. 

In fact, rigorous scientific testing uses a null hypothesis, one which states no relation between the things being tested — the Earth does not orbit the Sun, for example. The aim is to disprove it to add evidence to the contrary, much as a suspect is innocent until proven guilty. If a researcher proves their null hypothesis they may see this as failure, yet this is a critical finding— a discovery — in and of itself. A ‘failure’ to reach the expected outcome can lead to a successful redesign of an experiment. Without failure, there can be no long-term progress.

Iterate to innovate

Similar ways of thinking flow through the human history of innovation. Successful invention depends on iteration through mistakes. Estimates vary, but Thomas Edison is thought to have tried thousands of different filaments before finding the one that could work in the world’s first commercially viable lightbulb. Flight wasn’t invented in a day. Neither was surgery, and that’s a good thing: the insights from many failed attempts are what has made it so successful today.

That’s not to say encountering setbacks is an easy process. “We kind of have to hope for failure to learn and improve things,” says Francese. “But when failure happens, your state of mind is very different. The initial thoughts are: I don’t know why this is happening, it shouldn’t be happening, and you do feel very deflated,” she says. “However, the scientist in you has learnt resilience and swiftly refocusses energies to troubleshoot and understand whether the problem lies in the hypothesis or the design of experiments.”

Perhaps the key to embracing failure as an opportunity to learn comes in the behaviours directly following it. One study published in Nature¹ in 2019 analysed patterns behind failures and eventual success in three massive data sets, from grant applications, venture capital investments and terrorist attacks. The analysis showed that repeated failures don’t necessarily lead to eventual success, but some key factors do: figuring out what went wrong in previous attempts, and minimising the time before the next one. Rather than ditching the whole idea and starting afresh, success comes from iterating and pushing ahead while taking lessons on board.

Challenges with science or innovation also bring powerful benefits that extend beyond the individual, from the insights that are shared with the wider community. In the scientific world, the publishing of negative results is critical to advancing knowledge. Other scientists can learn from negative findings and attempt iterations of their own. Due to a bias for publishing ‘successful’, positive results, however, this practice appears to be in decline.¹

Beyond the implications for scientific or technological progress, sharing negative results bolsters trust in institutions and ensures the processes underpinning them are credible and robust. It also helps others to save time and valuable resources, by avoiding exact replications of previous ideas and directing innovation down more efficient pathways—and ultimately making innovation more successful.

If publishing negative results — or not initially succeeding — becomes more normalised, people may not think so much before taking a risk, says Francese, as it becomes part of the process. “Once you understand the importance of the knowledge that comes from a negative result, then you shouldn’t have any fear in doing this,” she says.

​This process isn’t one-directional of course, as all researchers can benefit from the prior efforts of others. Francese has no qualms with publishing negative results as she herself has been helped by others doing the same. “If somebody did this in my area of research, I would be very grateful as it would save me time through refraining from testing certain hypothesis or using methods that have
been tested and have failed to gain the expected insights.” she says. “I don’t feel any less of a researcher for having occasionally published negative results.” ​​​​​​​​

A leap into the dark

Police forces face a growing pressure to keep up with the pace of technological advance, both to effectively serve the public and to stay ahead of criminals who may use new technologies for their own gain. While innovation may inherently carry a degree of risk, not trying to innovate could arguably be more tantamount to failure than trying and not succeeding the first time — or the fiftieth.

The framing around failure is often instilled at an early age: success is the goal; and failure is to be avoided at all costs. Making failure an accepted or even intended part of the process may help to change this framing, one which understands that success and failure are not mutually exclusive—and the former may even depend on the latter.

An openness to innovation through failure can help others learn from the experience and fits within the ​​ NPCCs commitment to open science, which intends to promote ideas across forces while allowing the public to evaluate efforts.

Francese hopes her experience will encourage others to take a leap and start innovative collaborations. Though there are potential risks both for academics and police, there are huge opportunities to gain new insights, intended or otherwise: “success is how you define it and what you make of it, isn’t it?” 

Written by Richard Kemeny and Lucy Pennington

1. Highlight negative results to improve science (https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-02960-3)