As reported in the Report on Research Compliance, the Office of Inspector General (OIG) of the National Science Foundation (NSF) recently held a workshop on the performance of federal research misconduct investigations.[1] Within OIG, investigations involving research are handled by the Division of Research Integrity and Administrative Investigations in the Office of Investigations.
Research integrity investigations often deal with issues like plagiarism or data fabrication and falsification. These are highly specialized investigations, yet most of the best practices covered in the workshop could apply to any compliance-related investigation.