Bharat Aggarwal, an MD Anderson researcher under investigation by his institution, has threatened to sue us.
Today, we received a letter from the Houston firm of Paranjpe & Mahadass LLP telling us to pull every post related to their client off our site within 20 days, or they’d “file a lawsuit against” us on his behalf.
On what grounds? According to the March 26 letter, which we have posted here in its entirety: Continue reading MD Anderson’s Bharat Aggarwal threatens to sue Retraction Watch
A second investigation into work co-authored by Paul Morgan, a dean at Cardiff University, has cleared him of research misconduct, but has found that Rossen Donev, a former researcher at the university — who has already retracted one study — falsified images in four papers.
As we reported last August, Cardiff “initiated its Procedure for Dealing with Allegations of Academic Misconduct in Research” after Science-Fraud.org and pseudonymous whistleblower Clare Francis brought concerns about several studies to the university’s attention. That followed an earlier investigation into work by some of the same authors. Cardiff has now completed its report, whose findings were first reported by the BBC and Times Higher Education.
According to a university release, the panel, led by a former Cardiff circuit judge, found that (quoting here): Continue reading Cardiff clears dean of misconduct allegations, but finds former researcher falsified images
A potential weight loss drug has been dealt what could be a serious setback after regulators found problems at two trial sites.
While awaiting a final report, The Lancet, which published a study of the drug, tesofensine, has issued an Expression of Concern: Continue reading Trial irregularities earn Lancet study of potential weight loss drug tesofensine Expression of Concern
Last month we wrote about a paper in Nature Photonics that, because of a measurement error, had to be retracted.
It turns out that wasn’t the only problem with the article — but we’re afraid that the glitch requires us to issue a correction.
The article, “Greatly enhanced continuous-wave terahertz emission by nano-electrodes in a photoconductive photomixer,” has listed Aaron Danner as the last — and, we’d assumed — senior author of the paper. But as Danner pointed out to us, that was a mistake by Nature Photonics.
A pair of Iranian physicists is facing the retraction of one of their papers after editors found out some of the work was plagiarized from two textbooks and an encyclopedia.
Here’s the notice: Continue reading Plagiarism of textbooks, encyclopedia leads to physics retraction
Former National University of Singapore and University of Liverpool scientist Alirio Melendez has two more of the 20-something retractions suggested by the investigations into his work. Both appear in the Journal of Biological Chemistry.
Here’s the notice for “FcγRI-triggered generation of arachidonic acid and eicosanoids requires iPLA2 but not cPLA2 in human monocytic cells:” Continue reading Alirio Melendez notches retractions 10 and 11
A case of alleged misconduct at the University of Washington in Seattle may finally be over. The Office of Research Integrity released its findings following an investigation into the work of Andrew Aprikyan, a former hematology researcher at the university.
The Aprikyan case has dragged on for a decade. In 2010, the university fired the scientist after a court denied his appeals based on allegations that they had denied him due process. As the Seattle Times reported at the time: Continue reading ORI rules in longstanding University of Washington misconduct case
Whose business are the reasons behind a retraction?
Our readers will no doubt know by now that we think they’re basically everyone’s — at least if journals want us to believe that they’re interested in maintaining the integrity of the scientific record. But not all editors seem to agree. Hank Edmunds, for example, didn’t in early 2011, telling us, “It’s none of your damn business.” A chemistry journal editor said, in a similar vein, “the purpose of keeping these retraction notices slim is not to produce too much detail.”
Now, a psychology journal editor joins those ranks. Here’s the notice in question: Continue reading Editor on retraction details: “I do not think this is the business of anyone but our journal, please”
A paper suggesting that scientists may want to rethink what levels of benzene are carcinogenic has led to a sharp exchange in the journal that originally published it.
In 2006, Stephen Rappaport, of UNC-Chapel Hill, and colleagues, published a paper that began by saying that benzene
is an important industrial chemical that is also emitted into the air from gasoline, engine exhausts and combustion of organic materials (including cigarette smoke) (1,2). Occupational exposures to benzene at air levels greater than ∼10 p.p.m., have long been linked to hematotoxicity and to acute myelogenous leukemia (3–5). A recent report of hematotoxic effects in workers exposed to benzene <1 p.p.m. (6) has raised additional concerns regarding the health consequences of low exposures to this contaminant.
The authors conclude: Continue reading Environmental scientists call for retraction of oil industry-funded paper on benzene exposure
What’s that sucking sound you hear from the journal Vacuum? Why, a retraction, of course.
The journal is pulling a 2012 paper by a group of researchers from India who stole images and used them in misleading ways — that’s data fabrication, kids.
Here’s the retraction notice for the article, titled “Microwave synthesis, characterization and humidity sensing properties of single crystalline Zn2SnO4 nanorods”:
Continue reading Vacuum retracts paper on nanorods for plagiarism, image manipulation