An engineer accused of being involved in paper mill activities mysteriously reappeared on a list of editorial board members at Springer Nature’s Scientific Reports earlier this year, Retraction Watch has learned.
The journal had “parted ways” with the engineer, Masoud Afrand of the Islamic Azad University in Iran, in March 2022 after an internal audit found “irregularities” in how he handled papers, editor-in-chief Rafal Marszalek told us last year.
Because of “an oversight,” however, Afrand remained on the publication’s website until a story by Retraction Watch and Undark raised concerns about his work last year.
Our story quoted sleuth Alexander Magazinov saying Afrand “was likely part of a paper mill operation for a special issue in Mathematical Methods in the Applied Sciences,” in which Afrand was cited more than 130 times. Magazinov later expanded on his suspicions in a comment on our site.
But at some point this year, Afrand, who has not responded to emails seeking comment, was back on Scientific Reports’ website.
In a December 15 email copying Retraction Watch and fellow sleuth Dorothy Bishop, among others, Magazinov wrote to Marszalek to ask why Afrand had apparently been reinstated. Marszalek replied:
Dr Afrand left Scientific Reports Editorial Board in 2022, and this remains true to this day (i.e. he has not been re-instated). However, as a result of clerical mistakes, he was not removed from our homepage (though has been properly retired in 2022 from all other systems), and this has been rectified now.
Bishop countered in a December 16 email to Marszalek that:
contrary to what you say, Dr Afrand was removed from the home Editors webpage in 2022, and was still absent in June 2024 [as evidenced by this archived webpage]. However, his name did reappear some time in the summer of 2024. I checked with the Wayback machine, and he was absent from the list at the start of 2024 through to June 2024, but was present in September 2024 […] This is a strange kind of clerical error.
Marszalek offered no explanation, telling Bishop only:
I appreciate you flagging that. At this point I can only confirm that Dr Afrand has not been a member of Scientific Reports Editorial Board and has not handled any content since 2022.
Marszalek told us he did not have “much more to add than what I told Dr Bishop.”
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There was an allegation against Masoud Afrand back then. Now he was punished with two years break. Is it possible that after two years break Masoud Afrand come back? why not? he made a mistake, but learned the lesson, and gained experiences and wishes to come back. What is wrong with that? Many scientists or sleuth had not so much bright history.
But according to Marszalek, that is not what happened here.
As Cheshire said, this is not what is claimed to have happened. But also I would not give second chances on a matter like this. If you find that your employee is willing to ruin your good name to enrich themself, I see no reason to ever employ them again.
The claimed infraction is not “a mistake.” If it is true that Afrand ran his special issue as a paper mill and citation farm project, that’s systematic, prolonged, deliberate dishonesty for personal gain.
Where is the evidence that lessons were learned?
https://pubpeer.com/search?q=authors%3A+%22masoud+afrand%22
Yes, indeed, I see. Yet I realised that these Pubpeer comments made either by you or your colleagues and the reliability needs confirmation. Every few hours you make a comment, do you you really read these papers before commenting?
Do you really read the PubPeer comments before commenting here?
Skimming the list of recent Afrand-related PP threads, I see one recent retraction instigated by the publisher (“authorship concerns”, which is often a euphemism for “authorship positions were auctioned off”). I see various concerns raised by a range of contributors, all with evidence of recycled images or recycled text or compromised citations (as the PubPeer moderators insist).
Which of the recent comments do you believe to be from me? Which of the contributors do you believe to be “my colleagues”?
Just saying, if I were the one who believed that M. Afrand’s many papers had been criticised unfairly, I would provide my refutations of those critiques on the corresponding PubPeer threads where the critics and the journal editors could read them. I wouldn’t be leaving vague ominous hints of persecution here.
Sadly, many reputable journals are being ruined by such acts.
This looks a bit like a witch hunt.
I wouldn’t defend the actions of Afrand, but it has to be pointed out that he is only operating within a corrupted academic environment.
What he is doing is no different from what countless others are doing, except they will never get ‘caught’
This is not an attempt to excuse his behaviour. I am merely pointing out that he is just one symptom of a disease. if academia continues along its current path, there will continue to be countless Afrands.
They are encouraged to behave in this way because it leads to rewards. High citations, recognition and fame, awards, editorial board memberships, promotion, higher salaries, power and influence, visiting paid positions in places looking to boost their profiles, consultancy, etc etc.
Academia worldwide has redefined success. It is almost entirely about funding, followed to a lesser extent by publication in high impact factor journals and citation counts, and ‘visibility’
Long gone are the days that academics were scholars, experts in their fields. Not to say there wasn’t any dead wood, of course there was. However, those who were active were much more involved in the research than they are now.
The template for success became acquisition of large grants, self promotion and exaggeration of research significance, building large groups and pumping out lots of papers.
Almost all the work and frequently even the funding proposals are taken care of by postdocs and PhD students. The role of the academic is fund raising, marketing and project management, typically leaving them totally divorced from day to day technical issues. Usually the bigger the name, the less knowledge they have outside buzzwords and summaries.
Most younger staff will of course try to emulate successful senior colleagues. It’s all a big game of self promotion, denying reality, exaggerating and making ludicrous claims in papers and funding proposals, and a disdain for technical details.
Those who are good at this sort of thing will rise to the top. It helps if you can lie and exaggerate without a hint of shame, and even better if it is without self awareness.
Blaming individuals for misconduct and demanding retractions, dismissal etc is not wrong per see, but it misses the bigger picture and can only really identify a tiny number of examples, concentrated in a few disciplines.
You are arguing along the lines of Grudniewicz. Bigger picture, more research, better definitions and all that. In reality, Grudniewicz and a few other big talkers and hand wavers marginalized all action against predatory publishing. And now we aren’t hearing much on the topic – not because predatory publishing is no longer an issue (hijacked journals being a notable sub-topic, thanks Anna Abalkina for shining light into this corner), but rather because many legacy journals would be predatory by the standards of when the term “predatory” had just been introduced. Then again, Jeffrey Beall is retired, and no one has come up with a robust definition, as Grudniewicz and his ilk demanded.
It is time to replace dispute and debate about fraudulent publishers with meaningful action. Same with fraudulent paper mill actors. Just pick yet another Afrand and push their case to the end. A hundred such cases will make the difference, but someone needs to push these cases.
I have no idea who Grudniewicz is or what his opinions are. I’m just one individual offering an opinion based on my own observations.
There is no point conducting more research, the root causes are obvious. Academia has lost its way.
Neither did I argue that nothing should be done. My only point is that it is futile unless the root causes are tackled, which in my opinion is extremely unlikely. There are too many vested interests at play.
If someone or some organisation wishes to pursue ‘rogue’ scientists, good luck to them. As much as I don’t think much will come of it, I don’t see any good reason to try to impede it.