A Springer Nature journal has retracted four papers by a group of materials scientists in France, Spain and Tunisia, and slapped expressions of concern on four more.
All eight papers, from Journal of Materials Science: Materials in Electronics, share three common authors: Abdelmajid Lassoued, Salah Ammar, and Abdellatif Gadri, of Université de Gabès in Tunisia. The retractions and expressions of concern all relate to duplicate publication of other work by papers that include various members of the team as authors.
A typical retraction notice, for “Synthesis and characterization of Ni-doped α-Fe2O3 nanoparticles through co-precipitation method with enhanced photocatalytic activities”:
The Editor-in-Chief has retracted this article [1] because it substantially overlaps with the following articles (among others) [2,3,4,5]. [Author Abdelmajid Lassoued has not responded to any correspondence from the editor or publisher about this retraction.]
The papers have been cited a total of 80 times, according to Clarivate Analytics’ Web of Science.
Abdelmajid Lassoued, who is corresponding author of six of the papers, did not respond to a request for comment.
Like Retraction Watch? You can make a tax-deductible contribution to support our work, follow us on Twitter, like us on Facebook, 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].
Many people are thinking ( may be) doing research is easy as many informations are available in the internet.
As the internet users are spreading like a wild fire this kind of” events” are more to come.
May be it would be better to organise( start) a global body where all researchers or research organisations must register and get some kind of status or grading.
This need not relate to funding . But purely on merit . So it could be classified with in that organisation as Engg, science etc….. But one global body with out bias should be organised. This gives opportunity to all the retired good quality professors to work from home itself.!
All countries could be involved like UN.
This is only a opinion .
Thank you
Regards,
Morrison ,
India
I have no patience for cowards
This is an excellent suggestion. I second you
Was it free or paid, did the Journal charge fees.
What was similarity score of the article before publication. Was it done or not. If not why, if yes how did it escape.
This will again be biased ! Not all will the opportunity! Reputed scientists and professors will get exposure and chance. Not a new scholar who just started his or her career.
Research methodology may be similar but data generated and findings are different not published anywhere in world in any form then it is research. Research can’t be compared to Invention or patent work. Max reputed journals unpaid reject research work of new findings because they see research as business for earning more money and suggest to publish in open access journals where they charge huge money and discourage research. I am against duplicate publication already published or under publication but different findings are always different. Researchers must respond comments of reviewers .Due to limitations of number of pages of journal paper it is difficult to explain elaborately everything.
This is really a compact argument on the part of new young students and researcher who have just initiated its new w0rk. Your comment is really encourging and inspiring for the new Birgade of researchers who is putting everything in the field for the very first time.