Weekend reads: Plagiarism allegations swirl around superconductor scientist; the ice cream studies no one wants to talk about; when fraud doesn’t pay

Would you consider a donation to support Weekend Reads, and our daily work?

The week at Retraction Watch featured:

• Former Yale prof faked data, says Federal watchdog
• Journal hasn’t retracted ‘Super Size Me’ paper six months after authors’ request
• Author denies Chinese censorship prompted COVID-19 retraction
• ‘Misleading’ and ‘false’ portrayal of racism-related experiences leads to retraction

Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up to more than 300. There are more than 39,000 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):

• “Plagiarism allegations pursue physicist behind stunning superconductivity claims.”
• “Studies show a mysterious health benefit to ice cream. Scientists don’t want to talk about it.”
• “Researcher who defrauded Innovate UK repays over £1m.”
• “Retracted Covid-19 articles: significantly more cited than other articles within their journal of origin.”
• “Searching the web for science: how small mistakes create big problems.”
• “Trends in retractions as AI arms race on misconduct looms.”
• STM, a trade association for scholarly publishers, says it has made an “MVP (minimal viable product) of a paper mill detection tool” that is so far available to “participating publishers in the STM Integrity Hub.”
• “Authorship in the time of ChatGPT.”
• “University ethics boards are not ready for Indigenous scholars.”
• “Climate sceptics sneak unsound research into peer-reviewed journals, scientists warn.”
• A journal publishes a paper by Victoria Braithwaite, who is known for showing fish can feel pain…and who died in 2019.
• Unknowing co-authors of Geoff Marcy’s are withdrawing their names from papers.
• The authors of a meta-analysis on anxiety and omega-3 fatty acids have updated it to remove a now-retracted study that had been originally included.
• Why “more ‘piecemeal knowledge’ does not lead to ‘Better Understanding’”.
• What do NSF Fellows think should happen after scientific misconduct?
• “Judge dismisses claim that institute defamed David Sabatini in harassment case.”
• A peer reviewer appears to have passed along fake references created by chatbot.
• “Are predatory medical publishers exploiting peer review system? Here’s a solution.”
• “Florida health officials removed key data from COVID vaccine report.”
• “Anti-vaxxers loved to cite this study of COVID vaccine deaths. Now it’s been retracted.”
• “Why Nature is updating its advice to authors on reporting race or ethnicity.”
• A way to investigate “work suspected of fraudulent data manipulation using Benford’s Law.”
• “Retraction in story entitled: ‘Wildcats get pounded by Calvary Christian.'”
• Watching the leaked U.S. military documents story play out was like watching a PubPeer feed.

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].