About two weeks ago, we reported on the first retraction of a paper co-authored by Silvia Bulfone-Paus, whose work at her Research Center Borstel lab is being investigated for misconduct. On Friday, Borstel announced that journals had accepted four more retractions of papers by Bulfone-Paus’s group.
Three of those papers are in the Journal of Immunology (citations according to Thomson Scientific’s Web of Knowledge):
- The IL-15 receptor alpha chain signals through association with Syk in human B cells (2001, cited 58 times)
- Murine mast cells.express novel functional IL-15Rα isoforms (2003, cited 32 times)
- Extracellular ATP induces cytokine expression and apoptosis through P2X7 receptor in murine mast cells (2005, cited 46 times)
The other, “A promiscuous liaison between the IL-15 receptor and the Axl receptor tyrosine kinase in cell death control,” was published in 2005 in the the EMBO Journal and has been cited 37 times. The EMBO Journal confirmed that the retraction will appear in an upcoming issue, but said the date and text of the retraction are under embargo.
We tried to reach editors of the Journal of Immunology and will update if we hear back.
Borstel said last month that it had asked for a total of 12 retractions. According to a release (translated from German):
In six papers, an external commission (see December 2 announcement) found manipulations during a formal investigation. For another four, manipulations were admitted. Further, two publications were asked to be retracted prospectively.
Buzzinga! (another one)
http://mcb.asm.org/cgi/content/full/31/6/1330
Thanks, we reported on this one last week: http://www.retractionwatch.com/2011/02/27/ninth-bulfone-paus-retraction-notice-appears-in-molecular-and-cellular-biology/
You can find all of our coverage of this case here: http://en.wordpress.com/tag/bulfone-paus/
I use Web of Science from ISI-Thompson-Reuters, and realized that some articles, for instance the EMBO J article mentioned in this news, are not modified after a retraction was printed. I asked for a correction of the data base. They asked for more details. When I gave them, they said that they were unable to delete any article from their database until requested by the editors. Follows the email exchage:
“Copy of your original request sent to Technical Support:
Date of request:7/11/2011
Case #: TS-00451251
Subject: EMEA Article/Record (abstract/title/keyword) Web of Science®
Description: This article has been retracted in EMBO J. 2011 Feb
2;30(3):627.”
Answer…. “Dear Dr Pablo García,
Thank you for contacting Thomson Reuters. Your query has been passed on to
us at Technical Support.
In regards to your data correction request , please provide us few more
information on the exact correction that has to be made so that we can
process this further.”…
My answer…”Dear Sirs,
The mentioned article has been retracted, but there is no indication in your
record that it is a retracted article. This means that most people would
continue using the information you provide as if the study refered was part
of the scientific literature.
Your data base should have a link to the note of retraction.”
Final message…”Dear Dr Pablo Garcia de Frutos,
Thank you for your email.
We will not be able to remove any articles from Web of Science unless we receive a request from the publisher.
I apologize for any inconvenience this might have caused to you.
Based on the information provided above, this case will be closed and no further action is required on your part. However, if this does not resolve your issue, please reply to this email and your case will be immediately reopened for additional support.”
They have been very efficient, as the whole message interchange took less than one day. But the point is that the article continues to appear in the ISI database without mentioning that the article has been retracted.This is not the case with other databases, as pubmed, where a note and a link informs that this article has been retracted.