Two countries have recently announced plans to learn more about research misconduct, with the goal of preventing it from happening in the first place. In Japan, the effort takes the form of a joint study group among six universities, which will interview researchers who have engaged in misconduct to discover patterns and common factors for their … Continue reading Japan, Taiwan taking closer look at fraud — and how to stop it
A journal is pulling additional papers authored by twin brothers for peer review issues. After retracting three papers by Cheng-Wu Chen earlier this year for “compromised” peer review, Human Factors and Ergonomics in Manufacturing & Service Industries is now pulling four more by Chen for the same reason — and four others by his twin brother, Chen-Yuan Chen, who was a … Continue reading Authors in 2014 peer review ring lose 4 more papers each for “compromised” review
A journal is retracting three papers — including one that is highly cited — after learning the reviewers that recommended publication had conflicts of interest. This is a case of family values gone awry: The author common to all papers is Cheng-Wu Chen at the National Kaohsiung Marine University in Taiwan, the twin brother of one … Continue reading Author in 2014 peer review ring loses 3 more papers for peer review problems
It’s not often that an article is retracted only to be later proven correct. But that may have happened this past summer in the chemistry literature. In July, a group of researchers recapitulated an experiment largely similar to one that Nobelist Georg Wittig had performed – and subsequently retracted — decades earlier. Their findings suggest Wittig … Continue reading 50 years later, is it time to retract a retraction by a Nobel prize-winning author?
Ever since we broke the news about the issues with the now-retracted Science paper about changing people’s minds on gay marriage, we’ve been the subject of a lot of press coverage, which has in turn led a number of people to ask us: Who has the most retractions? Well, we’ve tried to answer that in … Continue reading Who has the most retractions? Introducing the Retraction Watch leaderboard
Taiwan’s education minister, Chiang Wei-ling, whose name appeared on several of 60 retracted articles by Peter Chen — apparently the architect of a peer review and citation syndicate we were first to report on last week — has resigned over the publishing scandal. According to the University World News:
This one deserves a “wow.” SAGE Publishers is retracting 60 articles from the Journal of Vibration and Control after an investigation revealed a “peer review and citation ring” involving a professor in Taiwan. [Please see an update on this post.] Here’s the beginning of a statement from SAGE:
The week at Retraction Watch featured the retraction of a paper on the effects of fracking, authors who retracted a paper when they realized they’d been studying the wrong species, and a story about why a paper linked to an alleged doping scandal in Norway was retracted. Here’s what was happening elsewhere:
The week at Retraction Watch featured a the story of how a nonexistent paper earned 400 ciations, a lawsuit filed against a journal for publishing criticism, and the retraction and replacement of a paper by a group of anti-vaccine advocates. Here’s what was happening elsewhere:
Title: Characterization of a novel epigenetically-silenced, growth-suppressive gene, ADAMTS9, and its association with lymph node metastases in nasopharyngeal carcinoma What caught our attention: One year ago, a PubPeer user suggested an image from a 2008 paper looked similar to one from another paper. After the authors stated their belief in the soundness of the image, without … Continue reading Caught Our Notice: Concerns about image in 2008 paper prompt editorial notice
