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The week at Retraction Watch featured:
- NYU postdoc with federal research misconduct settlement awarded NIH grant
- An Elsevier journal said it would retract 10 papers two years ago. It still hasn’t.
- UPenn prof with four retractions “may no longer be affiliated” with school
- Papers on Alzheimer’s slapped with expressions of concern
Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up to 238. There are more than 34,000 retractions in our database — which powers retraction alerts in EndNote, LibKey, Papers, and Zotero. And have you seen our leaderboard of authors with the most retractions lately — or our list of top 10 most highly cited retracted papers?
Here’s what was happening elsewhere (some of these items may be paywalled, metered access, or require free registration to read):
- “Could artificial intelligence hijack author contributions?”
- “Hijacked-journal tracker helps researchers to spot scam websites.”
- “The distribution of alleged vaccine efficacies of the Sputnik vaccine by age in the phase-III trial is very unlikely to occur in genuine experimental data…”
- “Let’s stop (usually) with the second round of review.”
- “Should you be highlighting that paper you’re reading?”
- “Sacked US professor given a year in prison for lying about his China links.”
- “Challenges and threats to quality in scholarly knowledge production: views of selected stakeholders from 17 countries.”
- “What do researchers think about paying to publish open access – Findings from a global survey.”
- “Publisher buys company behind online tool embroiled in controversy over handling of Twitter criticism.”
- “Peer review: Can this critical step in the publication of science research be kinder?”
- “Analysing retracted papers in Computer Science.”
- “Here, by developing a simple model and a simulation of the publication process I investigate how beneficial cartels can be and what measure can be used to restrict them.”
- “China’s largest academic paper database CNKI opens some services to individuals after Beijing’s antitrust probe.”
- “Clinical research: What will be the effect of closing down ‘unviable’ trials?”
- A Trinidad and Tobago government minister says that in 2007, he withdrew from a master’s program following plagiarism charges.
- “Open peer review is the key to tackling public health misinformation.”
- “Many researchers say they’ll share data — but don’t.”
- “The Mystery of Fleet Street: An Article on Boris Johnson Vanishes.”
- “First journal with entirely transgender board launched.”
- “How to spot a bad journal.”
- A survey of publishers about paper mills finds that “overall the percentage of suspect papers being submitted to journals ranges from 2-46%.”
- “After publication, it was noted that Figures 6 and 7 used incorrect data from a different study. This has led to the authors having a loss of confidence in the results of their article.”
- “Years after Brigham-Harvard scandal, U.S. pours millions into tainted stem-cell field.” On this case, from 2014.
- A new study finds that “women in research teams are significantly less likely to be credited with authorship than are men.”
- “Reporting of funding and conflicts of interest improved from preprints to peer-reviewed publications” in biomedicine.
- Why was that paper retracted? Depends which Elsevier version of the notice — or lack of notice — you come across.
- “Equity must be baked into randomized controlled trials.” And “Needed: a clearer explanation of why diversity in clinical trials is important.”
- “The John Hughes Plagiarism Scandal.”
- “On Saturday June 18 2022 WCSJNews.com published a Daily Jail Bookings Article that stated Andrew Bradford, 38 was arrested on two Champaign County warrants, driving while license suspended and bringing contraband into a penal institution. This was incorrect.”
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A survey of publishers about paper mills finds that “overall the percentage of suspect papers being submitted to journals ranges from 2-46%.”
Would be highly informative to know if these papers have any impact i.e. do they gather any citations whatsoever (beyond the ones from other suspect papers)
Regenerative medicine and stem cell fraud
There are remarkable similarities between the disastrous judgements of administrators and so-called experts at both Brigham-Harvard and the Karolinska Institute.
In one case Anversa secured fame and multi-million grants based on experimental stem cell therapy for cardiac disease in mice which he translated into human experimentation. In the Swedish example (RW 18-19 June) Macchiarini proceeded with experimental tracheal surgery on humans based on incomplete animal experimentation and the arguments of a confidence salesman. Common to both episodes were the terms “regenerative medicine” and “stem cells” which appeared to have a hypnotic effect on persons in positions of power and influence in both institutions.
And common to both institutions, the administrators involved , with some notable exceptions, proceeded with their elegant careers with hardly a hiccup.
There is a lot to think about in Marisa Taylor’s article. There are many elements in the Harvard/Brigham case, but at the moment the primary shortcoming is the long delay about specific knowledge as to the basis for corrections to the literature. There are multiple fields involved, spanning quite a range, from confocal fluorescent microscopy, to spectra, to blots (see PubPeer).
What we know at present is only from the DOJ investigation which -like an HHS OIG investigation- involves determination of fraud without reaching any conclusions about science. The credit is to HMS/Brigham for their subsequent letters to the editors, perhaps resulting from questions originally asked by Retraction Watch. But whoever you look at it, the “experts” who one evidently should ask are not at HMS/Brigham but the journals. If ORI makes findings it can state where corrections to the literature are warranted, and that action will pressure the journals to do so.
But that was an HMS finding (as cited by Anversa himself). It is worth asking ORI whether they have ever made a finding against a lab chief following a prior DOJ finding? There was reference to an HMS finding involving Anversa as lab chief based on a single standard of “reckless disregard,” and it may be worth asking whether ORI has ever used that standard alone as a basis for research misconduct? (I left ORI in may 2013 and so don’t know the answer.) That limitation, if so, would not preclude an ORI finding on another respondent, as was done in the Sarkar PubPeer lawsuit. Yes, it has taken a long time.
One question to start with in clinical research involves the Risk/Benefit Ratio. Assuming that the “Risks” are acceptably low, one should then also ask NIH whether the science shows real Benefits? Absent that, what then justifies excluding other clinical research that might have provided more benefit? Again, I know nothing about the clinical side of this, but that question is one that the NIH ought to be readily able to clarify.