Avery Orrall

A second article describing new pain syndrome under scrutiny

Among the critiques of a new article is a figure (left) duplicated from a retracted paper (right).

A second paper on a contested pain disease is under investigation after sleuths raised questions about the methodology and possible fabrication of data.

Last year, Scientific Reports retracted a paper comparing the condition, which the authors dubbed Middle East Pain Syndrome, to rheumatoid arthritis for failing to establish a clear distinction between the two ailments.

The new article, published in January in BMC Rheumatology with two overlapping authors, compares MEPS to fibromyalgia, claiming it is distinct for its “hand tufts spur-like excrescences.”

Editorial board resigns after journal cancels special issue on Palestine

The editorial board of an architecture journal has resigned after its parent association cancelled an upcoming theme issue titled “Palestine.”

The Journal of Architectural Education planned to publish the issue in fall 2025, according to an archived version of the call for papers, which refers to the “Zionist, militarist, carceral, and capitalist regime of Israeli settler colonialism and apartheid.”

“In the face of the ongoing Israeli genocidal campaign against Palestinians in Gaza, this issue of the Journal of Architectural Education calls for urgent reflections on this historical moment’s implications for design, research, and education in architecture,” the call for papers read.

Don’t tread on me: Snake paper retracted for ‘soft-stepping’ technique

*Bothrops jararaca* is a pit viper species prevalent in southeastern Brazil.
*Credit: Butantan Institute*

Agitating snakes isn’t something most of us would do on purpose, but for a group of researchers, it was central to their research. The authors of a May 2024 paper in Scientific Reports achieved that by “softly” stepping on the head, tail and mid-body of newborn, juvenile and adult pit vipers to see how often they would bite.

But the technique wasn’t quite what the authors’ ethics committee had in mind when approving the study. The journal retracted the paper last month, noting the ethics approval the authors received “did not include newborn snakes or the use of the ‘soft stepping’ method.”

Lead author João Miguel Alves-Nunes blamed the retraction on a “communication error” by the ethics committee. The researchers believed they had approval both to step on snakes and to include newborn snakes, Alves-Nunes, a former researcher at the Butantan Institute in São Paulo, Brazil, said in an email to Retraction Watch.

ICYMI: Dean under investigation for plagiarism following Retraction Watch story: report

A university dean is being investigated for plagiarism following our coverage of accusations against him, a Bulgarian newspaper reported last month.

The Academic Ethics Commission in Bulgaria has launched an investigation into Milen Zamfirov, dean of the faculty of educational sciences at Sofia University, Dnevnik reported February 25.

The accusations concern a 2021 paper he wrote with his colleague Margarita Bakracheva, “In Search of Integrativity of Sciences: the Principle of Supplementarity in the Story of Pauli and Jung.” As we reported in December 2024, the paper “seems to have significant overlap” with other sources.

Five studies from “Bust Size and Hitchhiking” author retracted

A journal has retracted five papers about the appearance, sexual behavior and attractiveness of women.

Nicolas Guéguen, a professor of marketing at the Université de Bretagne-Sud in France, was an author on each of the papers, published in the Sage journal Perceptual and Motor Skills (PMS) at least 15 years ago. All of the articles garnered expressions of concern in 2023, but Guéguen’s history of misconduct long precedes the PMS papers.

Sleuths have been flagging Guéguen’s work for years for seemingly impossible results. In 2019, he was cleared of wrongdoing by his university, but since then has racked up at least four retractions, according to the Retraction Watch database.

Author forges document to claim USDA affiliation

A journal has retracted three papers after an investigation revealed one of the authors falsely claimed he was affiliated with the United States Department of Agriculture.

All three retraction notices, issued February 13 by the Journal of Environmental Management, state study coauthor Tariq Shah claimed affiliation with the USDA Plant Science Research Unit. “When asked about these issues during an editorial investigation, Shah’s responses caused the editor to further lose confidence in the validity/integrity of the article,” the notices say.

A spokesperson for Elsevier, which publishes the journal, told us in an email “Shah provided a document claiming to show his official affiliation with USDA that we later learned through our investigation was forged.” Neither Shah nor Elsevier clarified what the document was.

IQ paper gets expression of concern as misconduct fallout continues

The authors of a paper on how incentives influence IQ have requested an expression of concern after a recent retraction altered the results of their study.

On January 20, we reported that a paper by embattled researcher and child psychologist Stephen Breuning was retracted decades after an investigation found evidence of scientific misconduct. Breuning’s papers came into question following a 1987 report from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), which found he “knowingly, willfully, and repeatedly” engaged in research misconduct and fabricated results in 10 NIMH funded articles.

Since then, six of Breuning’s papers have been retracted. The latest retracted article, originally published in 1978, was not part of the investigation but came about “due to concerns about the integrity of the data reported and other issues identified within the NIMH Final Report that clearly established a pattern of ongoing scientific misconduct,” the retraction notice read.

Paper on conversion therapy retracted, authors planning to republish

A four-year-old paper claiming conversion therapy reduced same-sex thoughts in gay men has been retracted after criticism from other researchers prompted further review of the work.

“Efficacy and risk of sexual orientation change efforts: a retrospective analysis of 125 exposed men,” published in F1000Research in March 2021, found conversion therapy (referred to in the paper as sexual orientation change efforts) was “effective and safe.”

F1000Research is an open publishing platform where peer review takes place after publication. The title is not indexed in Clarivate’s Web of Science but does appear in Scopus, which reports the paper was cited seven times.

Wiley journal retracts 26 papers for ‘compromised peer review’

A Wiley journal has retracted more than two dozen articles in the last few months for peer review issues.

The articles, which appeared in Environmental Toxicology, have been retracted in batches, the latest on February 16-17, with previous sets in January and November.

The retraction notices of all 26 papers read in part:

When a sleuth gets hired by a publisher: A Q&A with Nick Wise

Nick Wise had a prolific start to his sleuthing journey. In July 2021, the fluid dynamics researcher started looking for tortured phrases in published papers, and has since had a hand in at least 1,000 retractions. He also helped identify unique phrases for the Tortured Phrases Detector, a function of the Problematic Paper Screener that identifies signs of misconduct. Last month, Wise teamed up with other research fraud hunters in a Nature article that outlined “five essential steps to combat industrialized scientific misconduct.”

His success in calling out research misconduct helped him land a full-time job. In January, Wise started a new position as research integrity manager at publisher Taylor & Francis. We spoke with him about how his new position will impact his career trajectory and how he plans to use his sleuthing past in his new position.

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