A pharmacy researcher at Tehran University of Medical Sciences has had three papers retracted, and one corrected, because he duplicated his other articles.
Hamid Akbari Javar is the common author on all four papers, which appear in the African Journal of Pharmacy and Pharmacology, the International Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences and Research, the Indian Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences, and the International Journal of Molecular Medicine.
Narges Shokri, of the School of Pharmacy of Ardabil University of Medical Sciences, also in Iran, is an author of the three retracted papers, but not the corrected paper in the International Journal of Molecular Medicine.
Here’s the notice for “Comparison of Calcium Phosphate and Zinc Oxide Nanoparticles as Dermal Penetration Enhancers for Albumin,” in the Indian Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences:
Notice of Retraction: After careful and considered review of the content of this paper by a duly constituted expert committee, this paper has been found to be in violation of IJPS Publication Principles. We hereby retract the content of this paper. Reasonable effort should be made to remove references to this paper.
Evidence
It has come to our attention that there are substantial overlaps between the text of the above article and the following papers, especially in the introduction, methods, and discussion.
It has been pointed out that the above study appeared to contain a high level of similarity with four articles by the same authors published as below:
Shokri N, Akbari Javar H. Comparison of calcium phosphate and zinc oxide nanoparticles as dermal penetration enhancers for albumin. Indian J Pharm Sci. 2015 Nov-Dec; 77(6): 694-704
Shokri N, Akbari Javar H. Using a Synergistic Combination of Two Enhancers for Dermal Delivery of Collagen in Pharmaceutical and Cosmetic Products. Journal of Pharmaceutical Research. 2015 Jan-Mar, 14(1); 1-6
Shokri N, Akbari Javar H. Zinc Oxide Nanoparticles as Skin Permeation Enhancer for Solvents and Surfactants. Journal of Pharmaceutical Research. 2014;13(3):85-91.
Shokri N, Goodarzi MT, Akbari Javar H, Soltani Y. Zinc Oxide and Zinc Oxide Nanoparticles as Enhancers in Topical Pharmaceutical and Cosmetic Products. Journal of Pharmaceutical Research. 2014;13(2): 40-44.
Shokri N. Different Inorganic Nanoparticles as Enhancers for Dermal Delivery of Proteins in Pharmaceutical and Cosmetic Products. Journal of Pharmaceutical Research. 2014 Oct; 13(4):116-121.
The published paper in IJPS and the paper in the Journal of Pharmaceutical Research. 2014 Oct; 13(4): 116-121, had overlap in the introduction, aim, methods, results, discussion, and conclusion indicate that these papers are an example of redundancy. Following an internal investigation, it was established that the studies were conducted along broadly similar lines. Furthermore, submitting multiple articles derived from the same data set with the overlap without cross-referencing is not legitimated based on the ethical principles of Scopus. Hence the article was retracted from the Indian Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences.
Neither Javar nor Shokri has responded to a request for comment.
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