Weekend reads: Science publishing a ‘hot mess’; AI microscopy ‘indistinguishable’ from real; social media as a bellwether for retractions

Dear RW readers, can you spare $25?

The week at Retraction Watch featured:

• Duke scientists lose eight papers for alleged image manipulation
• Sleuth unearths citation, authorship issues at earth sciences journal
• Former student who ran paper mill up to 11 retractions
• Journal issues speedy retraction in less than a day for ‘inadvertent mistake’
• Wiley retracts study stolen by reviewer, following Retraction Watch coverage

Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up past 500. There are more than 60,000 retractions in The Retraction Watch Database — which is now part of Crossref. The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker now contains more than 300 titles. And have you seen our leaderboard of authors with the most retractions lately — or our list of top 10 most highly cited retracted papers? What about The Retraction Watch Mass Resignations List?

Here’s what was happening elsewhere (some of these items may be paywalled, metered access, or require free registration to read):

• “Fake microscopy images generated by AI are indistinguishable from the real thing.”
• “Scientific Journals in the Hot Seat”: In which our Ivan Oransky calls academic publishing a “hot mess.”
• “Can social media provide early warning of retraction?”
• Co-founder of research institute suspended after asking colleagues “to look into anonymous allegations of research misconduct” against CEO.
• “Do Journalists Update Retracted Science News?”
• “When Collaborative Maintenance Falls Short: The Persistence of Retracted Papers on Wikipedia.”
• A Wiley journal has retracted two more papers by an Egyptian ob-gyn, bringing his total to 12. Read our previous coverage.
• “AI tools could reduce the appeal of predatory journals,” professors write in a correspondence to Nature.
• “Even high-quality work feels inadequate when others produce in greater numbers.”
• Professor accused of plagiarism and sexual harassment “has removed 7,170 ‘irregular’ citations from his CV” after research council says they plan to remove him from their annual ranking.
• “The Problem with Inadequately Reviewed Fringe Science.” Read our coverage of a related paper.
• A study found most health and science journalists think predatory journals are “not a problem they would ever fall for.” Here are some strategies to spot them. 
• Professor who was fired following investigation into misconduct at equine lab sues university and others.
• “Science Under Attack”: Experts at European Respiratory Society Congress this year “Warn of Rising Threats to Research Integrity.”
• “A Little Knowledge Is a Dangerous Thing” and the “awareness of predatory journals among researchers.”
• “We Forgot The True Purpose of Peer Review.” 
• Study of biology faculty at US universities found “female faculty members tend to produce fewer publications per year … to publish in lower-impact factor journals, and to be less cited.”
• “China’s research hospitals push for prominence.”
• “Navigating the ethical world of clinical researchers in China: challenges and pathways for improvement.”
• “AI-generated ‘participants’ can lead social science experiments astray, study finds.”
• “Six journal rejections and a major rethink: why I’m happy to admit to my research failures, and you should too.”
• “Fraud, AI slop and huge profits: is science publishing broken?”: A podcast.
• Korean “Ministry of Science reviews canceling Top 100 award” after fMRI paper retracted. 
• “Interventions to promote medical research integrity: a scoping review.”
• “How scholarly publishers wield soft power.”
• “Trends and characteristics of retracted articles in the smoking field.”
• Plagiarism case against former Bulgarian prime minister candidate dismissed because “the entire scientific paper was not copy-pasted (but ‘only’ 90 or so pages).”
• Former professor found guilty of misconduct in Norway responds to “Unjustified Criticism” in newspaper.
• Researcher suggests adding “speculation box” to papers in which “authors could share imaginative interpretations of their findings, possible causal mechanisms behind associations or ambitious directions for future work.”

Like Retraction Watch? You can make a tax-deductible contribution to support our work, follow us on X or Bluesky, like us on Facebook, follow us on LinkedIn, add us to your RSS reader, or subscribe to our daily digest. If you find a retraction that’s not in our database, you can let us know here. For comments or feedback, email us at [email protected].