Two journals, same name: Did one editor retract the other’s paper?

amphibian-and-reptile-conservationTwo journals sharing the same title — allegedly due to an “academic divorce” between the founders — are giving two different accounts to why a paper may (or may not) have been retracted.

Confused yet? We are.

Here’s what we can piece together. The journal Amphibian and Reptile Conservation once had two editors, Craig Hassapakis and Robert Browne; both names appear on the same cover of a 2011-2012 issue of the journal, as librarian Jeffrey Beall noted in a blog post published last year. But since then, there seems to have been an “academic split” between the two (as defined by Beall), and each now publishes a different version of the publication named Amphibian and Reptile Conservation.

Recently, we came across a 2013 paper co-authored by Browne marked “Retracted” on the version of the site founded by Craig HassapakisBrowne’s version of the journal can be found here

Meanwhile, the study’s first author, Omar Fadhil Al-Sheikhly from the University of Baghdad in Iraq, claims the paper was never retracted in the first place: Continue reading Two journals, same name: Did one editor retract the other’s paper?

Authors retract third cancer paper for missing original data

international-journal-of-oncologyResearchers have retracted their third paper due to missing original data, following an investigation at their former institution in New York.

We’ve previously reported on two retractions of papers co-authored by Bhagavathi Narayanan and Narayanan K. Narayanan, previously based at the New York University (NYU) School of Medicine. The studies were pulled when the pair couldn’t provide original images to investigators at NYU School of Medicine. One author has blamed the lack of original data on the abrupt closure of her previous institution in 2004, after it allegedly misspent millions in federal grants. 

However, the latest retraction affects a paper published eight years later in the International Journal of Oncology. Its coauthors include Bhagavathi Narayanan, Narayanan K. Narayanan and Rajkishen Narayanan; we haven’t been able to uncover if there is a relation between them.

A spokesperson for the NYU School of Medicine sent us this statement: Continue reading Authors retract third cancer paper for missing original data

Leading diabetes researcher acted negligently, probe concludes

Kathrin Maelder
Kathrin Maedler

Several duplications in the work of a prominent diabetes researcher were the result of negligence, but there is not enough evidence to support charges of misconduct, according to an investigation at her university in Germany.

Recently, we’ve reported on several notices for papers co-authored by Kathrin Maedler, a researcher at the University of Bremen. So far, Maedler has one retraction, multiple corrections, and two expressions of concern to her name, after several of her papers were questioned on PubPeer. Previously, the University of Zurich in Switzerland — where Maedler completed her PhD in 2002 — determined there was a lack of evidence to support allegations of misconduct in papers that were part of her doctoral thesis. 

Last week, the University of Bremen released its own investigation report (in German), which we translated using One Hour Translation. It concludes that Maedler Continue reading Leading diabetes researcher acted negligently, probe concludes

Author pulls Diabetes paper with duplicated Western blots

diabetesA researcher has retracted a paper from Diabetes after re-using some Western blots in one of the figures from other papers.

According to the retraction notice, the first and corresponding author — Eric Berglund, formerly at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee — contacted the journal himself to report the error, for which he takes full responsibility.

Here’s the retraction notice: Continue reading Author pulls Diabetes paper with duplicated Western blots

Medical journal retracts study over fake review, authorship concerns

european-journal-of-medical-researchA journal has retracted a 2015 study about lung cancer after learning the peer-review process had been compromised.

The paper was published in March, 2015 — the same month publisher BioMed Central (BMC) pulled 43 papers for fake reviews.

According to the retraction notice in the European Journal of Medical Research, the authors’ institution in China informed the publisher that the authors had used a third party to help with copyediting and submission to the journal, raising concerns about the authorship of the paper.

Here’s the retraction notice, published in August: Continue reading Medical journal retracts study over fake review, authorship concerns

Neuro journal pulls paper due to doubts over authors’ identities

international-journal-of-neuroscienceA neuroscience journal has retracted a 2015 study after noticing the author list changed from submission to publication.

According to the retraction notice in the International Journal of Neuroscience, “conflicting messages” were conveyed between the study’s alleged two lead authors, causing the journal to doubt the provenance of the paper.

All the study’s authors are listed as affiliated with The People’s Hospital of Laiwu City in Shandong, China.

Here’s the retraction notice, issued earlier this year: Continue reading Neuro journal pulls paper due to doubts over authors’ identities

Who wrote this chem paper? Author claims her name was removed without consent

Spectrochimica ActaA researcher is claiming that her former PhD students impersonated her to remove her name as a co-author on a 2015 study.   

According to an editor’s note, published in Spectrochimica Acta Part A: Molecular and Biomolecular Spectroscopy, the journal received confirmation from all three authors that the aforementioned researcher should be removed from the author list during proofing stage. However, the researcher whose name was omitted — Nahid Nishat of the Jamia Millia Islamia in Jamia Nagar, New Delhi, India — later contacted the journal claiming that she didn’t okay this move.  

Nishat told Retraction Watch that she believes the two listed authors on the paper wrote to the journal on her behalf to remove her name:  Continue reading Who wrote this chem paper? Author claims her name was removed without consent

Authors pull malaria study after arguing over the results

journal-of-advanced-pharmaceutical-technology-researchResearchers have retracted a study about malaria infections in India after follow-up research unveiled problems with the data and set off a dispute among the authors.

According to the notice, when the authors continued their research on the same topic, some of the new data raised concerns about what was reported in the 2010 paper. That set off a “number of disputes between authors,” which led them to retract the paper.

This account was supported by the study’s first and corresponding author, Naitik Trivedi, from the A.R. College of Pharmacy & G.H. Patel Institute of Pharmacy in Anand, Gujarat, India. Trivedi told us he believes the previous study didn’t include some relevant parameters, which affected the results. 

Trivedi noted that all the authors agree to the retraction, adding: Continue reading Authors pull malaria study after arguing over the results

Materials researcher falsified data in two studies, probe reveals

advanced-materialsA materials journal has retracted two 2013 papers, citing an investigation at Pennsylvania State University that concluded the first author falsified data.

According to the retraction notice in Advanced Materials, Mehdi Ghaffari — formerly based at Penn State — was solely responsible for the misconduct. Ghaffari’s LinkedIn page says he finished his PhD at Penn State in 2014, and now works as an independent consultant in New York, after a stint as a postdoc at Procter and Gamble.

A Penn State spokesperson sent us this statement:  Continue reading Materials researcher falsified data in two studies, probe reveals

Even top economists publish in predatory journals, study finds

repec

Top-ranking economists sometimes publish papers in open access journals deemed potentially “predatory,” according to a new analysis.

The findings contradict previous results that show that researchers who publish papers in “potential, possible, or probable” predatory journals (as defined by librarian Jeffrey Beall) are largely inexperienced.

According to the study, 27 of the most eminent economists (within the top 5% of their field) have published nearly 5% of their papers in predatory journals. These researchers published 31 papers in predatory journals in 2015 alone.

The finding — which is not yet peer reviewed — comes as a “big surprise,” co-author Frederick Wallace of the Gulf University for Science and Technology in West Mishref, Kuwait, told Retraction Watch. Continue reading Even top economists publish in predatory journals, study finds