Question about an experiment

[justpassingby]

I'm a student and i remember my chemistry teacher telling me about and experiment that a scientist did wrong. Then other scientists tried to imitate it and got the right results but tried to change it to the scientist's result and were stumped about why they couldn't imitate the data. What was the name of that experiment again, anyone know?

[insane_alien]

impossible to say as there have likely been many many cases of this, some will have been accidental others will have been fraud.

[justpassingby]

Oh, can you give me one that was accidentally done wrong? I should really have posted this on the homework forums.

[John Cuthber]

Millikan's oil drop experiment?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_drop_experiment#Millikan.27s_experiment_and_cargo_cult_science