Every now and then, we see retraction notices that refer vaguely to legal issues. Sometimes, we can dig up the actual reason. But the European Biophysics Journal has two retractions that leave us completely in the dark.
The two notices basically say the same thing. Here’s one:
The Authors in agreement with the Editor-in-Chief of the “European Biophysics Journal”, the European Biophysical Societies’ Association, and the publisher hereby retract the article entitled “Human recombinant α-crystallins: temperature dependence of diffusion coefficients” by Georgalis Y, Braun N, Peschek J, Appavou MS; published online in the “European Biophysics Journal” on January 11, 2013. This article is retracted due to unsolved legal reasons.
And here’s the other:
The Authors in agreement with the Editor-in-Chief of the “European Biophysics Journal”, the European Biophysical Societies’ Association, and the publisher hereby retract the article entitled “Attractive interactions prevail in dilute solutions of human recombinant α-crystallins” by Georgalis Y, Peschek J, Appavou MS; published online in the “European Biophysics Journal” on January 10, 2013. This article is retracted due to unsolved legal reasons.
We have no idea what this means. Appavou, the corresponding author of both papers, hasn’t responded to a request for comment, and neither has the editor of the journal. We’ll update with anything we learn.
some ophtalmologic patent I would guess…
Maybe some major European salami producer protested that the scientists were giving his product a bad name.
Reblogged this on The Firewall.
Interesting, speaking of legal disputes , which jurisdiction and which law applies to ideas piracy/ theft research misconduct/fraud…., when each participant comes from a different zone?
Sniff sniff… smells like unauthorized materials transfer and use.
“unsolved legal reasons” (?). This is more than vague. You can have an unsolved legal dispute, but a reason? Or the reason is an “unsolved legal”?