FRANK
To systematically capture, validate, and disseminate negative, null, and inconclusive findings in immunotherapy and cell therapy research —
because what does not work is as scientifically vital as what does.
FRANK exists so that no patient enrolls in a trial already lost, no researcher wastes a career repeating a failure, and no dollar is spent on a path the evidence has already closed.
Publication bias is a patient safety crisis.
Consequences of suppressing negative data.
Patient harm & duplicated exposure
Patients are enrolled in trials already shown to fail, risking toxicity and delaying access to effective alternatives. Informed consent is ethically compromised when prior failures are hidden.
Corrupted meta-analyses
Systematic reviews and guidelines built on biased literature overestimate treatment benefit — leading to drugs entering practice that do not work, or at harmful doses.
Billions in wasted research spend
Repeated failures consume hundreds of millions in trial costs per program. A single failed Phase III immunotherapy trial costs $800M–$1.4B. Sharing negatives prevents this duplication.
Stalled mechanistic science
Understanding why immunotherapy fails — irAE patterns, resistance mechanisms, non-responder biology — is impossible without the negative data. FRANK makes failure scientifically generative.
What FRANK offers.
Rapid 21-day peer review
Structured fast-track pathway — negative results do not languish in review queues. Guaranteed editorial decision within 3 weeks of submission.
Citeable DOI from submission
Preprint DOI assigned at submission so authors can cite and reference their work immediately, removing the "invisible CV" problem of unpublished negatives.
Protected author identity option
Early-career researchers may opt for triple-blind review to reduce reputational risk associated with negative findings from well-known labs or industry programs.
Waived APCs for LMIC authors
No article processing charges for authors from low- and middle-income countries. Subsidized fees for independent investigators not backed by pharma funding.
Impact metrics re-framed
FRANK tracks "field redirection citations" — how often a FRANK paper prevented a redundant trial or changed a research program. A new currency for academic credit.
Submission categories.
Phase I/II trial report
Safety, tolerability, or dose-finding results with negative or inconclusive primary endpoints
Biomarker failure study
Predictive or pharmacodynamic markers that did not validate in immunotherapy context
irAE case series
Immune-related adverse events leading to trial discontinuation or dose modification
Manufacturing failure report
Cell therapy (CAR-T, TIL, NK) manufacturing failures, yield failures, or release failures
Null translational study
Preclinical findings that failed to translate to clinical benefit — with proposed mechanistic hypotheses
Withdrawn trial data
Results from terminated or suspended trials not otherwise reportable through traditional journals
Acceptance based solely on scientific rigor and completeness of reporting — never on direction of result
Pre-registered trials given priority — authors who registered before recruitment receive expedited handling
Raw de-identified datasets must be deposited in a FRANK-linked repository as a condition of publication
Industry-sponsored submissions accepted with mandatory disclosure of sponsor involvement in data access and analysis
No minimum sample size — small, single-arm, or pilot studies with clean negative findings are within scope
All published papers cross-indexed to ClinicalTrials.gov, EU CT Register, and WHO ICTRP
Publish your null result. It belongs in the record.
FRANK is fully peer-reviewed, DOI-assigned, and indexed. Your negative finding is a citable contribution to science — not a career liability. We exist precisely because the conventional publication system failed you.
- —Rigorous double-blind peer review
- —DOI assigned to every accepted paper
- —No positive-result bias in editorial decisions
- —Open access — CC BY 4.0
Search before you trial.
Before enrolling patients in a trial, know what has already failed. FRANK's archive is the evidence base the field was missing. No patient should enroll in a trial already lost.
Search by therapy type, target antigen, tumor type, or trial phase. Every finding is peer-validated and fully citable.
Search the Archive"Science advances by knowing what does not work. FRANK is the journal that finally keeps that record."