Over the past month, the story of Lauren Arrington’s sixth-grade science project on lionfish salinity tolerance has exploded. In the past week, however, questions have arisen as to the validity of her study and the events that led to her project, particularly the involvement of scientist Zachary Jud, who was rarely mentioned in early reports on Lauren’s work. Some are saying Zack is trying to “steal the spotlight” from a 13 yr old girl, while others are saying Lauren “hijacked” her project from Zack and referring to it as “plagiarism”.
Given the conflicting media coverage of Lauren’s project and Zack’s research, it seemed prudent to have a complete timeline of the events, both prior to and after Lauren’s project. Here is that timeline, which has been confirmed through emails, blog posts (including one by Craig Layman), and my personal communication with Zachary Jud. I contacted Albrey Arrington on July 23, 2014. Albrey did not respond.
