A postdoc at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation faked data in a submitted paper and in a grant application, according to a new report from the Office of Research Integrity.
Bin Kang admitted to the misconduct, in which he Continue reading Oklahoma postdoc admits to faking data in grant application, submitted paper
This week at Retraction Watch witnessed the fall of a “golden boy” and a “NASA Patriot Boy.” Here’s what was happening elsewhere: Continue reading Weekend reads: Vaccine research fraudster to plead guilty; nonsense authors publish another paper
Less than three months after publishing a paper in Science which they claim to have been able to detect the spin of a single proton, the authors have retracted it for “a potentially serious issue with the main conclusion.”
Here’s the notice: Continue reading Researchers retract Science paper claiming to have detected a single proton
The first full week of 2015 featured a few drug company-related retractions. Here’s what was happening elsewhere: Continue reading Weekend reads: Silenced Anil Potti whistleblower revealed; how to identify scientific crackpots
Olivier Voinnet, a researcher at ETH in Zurich and the winner of the 2013 Rössler Prize, is correcting a number of papers following critiques of more than a dozen of his studies on PubPeer.
The work appears in journals including Cell and PNAS. Voinnet’s co-author on several of the papers, David Baulcombe, who is also highly decorated, left this comment on relevant PubPeer entries: Continue reading Award-winning plant researcher correcting several papers critiqued on PubPeer
Ariel Fernandez‘s list of papers with editorial asterisks next to them grew again this week.
Fernandez has had one paper retracted, two papers subject to Expressions of Concern, including one from Nature, and another put on hold over data concerns. He threatened to sue us for covering one of the Expressions of Concern.
Here’s the “Notice from PLOS Genetics” for “Protein Under-Wrapping Causes Dosage Sensitivity and Decreases Gene Duplicability:”
Please be advised that PLOS is working with the authors on an investigation regarding one or more issues that have been raised with respect to the content or authorship of this paper.
We asked Fernandez for more details. He did not provide any, saying only that the criticisms of the work “have no scientific value” because they were made anonymously: Continue reading PLOS Genetics investigating paper by Ariel Fernandez
Happy New Year! This week, we took a look back at 2014. Here’s what was happening elsewhere: Continue reading Weekend reads: Sensationalism in science journalism and PR; Beall’s predatory publisher list grows
A paper arguing that HIV does not cause AIDS has been retracted a few weeks after Jeffrey Beall, who tracks predatory publishers, called attention to it on his blog.
Here’s what Beall wrote about the paper on December 16:
The article is entitled “Basic Principles Underlying Human Physiology” [1], and you don’t have to be a scientist to know that it’s junk, for it is a manifestation of AIDS denialism. The conclusion’s first paragraph says,
HIV is not etiologically involved in AIDS. It is just a common retrovirus found in AIDS conjuncturally. There is only AIDS that may not be strictly associated neither to a primary immune deficiency nor to an acquired immune deficiency. Actually, heart failure represents the causal factor of AIDS and many other “primary” immune deficiencies (p. 1821).
Now, in that article’s place, this retraction, dated December 19, appears: Continue reading AIDS denialism paper retracted after Jeffrey Beall draws attention to it
The number of papers retracted for fake peer reviews — well in excess of 100, by our count — continues to grow.
The latest to join the list are “Rebamipide plus proton pump inhibitor versus proton pump inhibitor alone in treatment of endoscopic submucosal dissection-induced gastric ulcer: a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials” and “Association study of TGFBR2 and miR-518 gene polymorphisms with age at natural menopause, premature ovarian failure and early menopause among Chinese Han women,” both published in 2014 in Medicine.
Here’s how both notices, signed by senior publisher Duncan A. MacRae, read: Continue reading Fake peer review fells two more papers
2014 was quite a year for Retraction Watch. We reported on hundreds of retractions — here are our top 10 — but we also took some big steps in our development. Some highlights: Continue reading Retraction Watch: A year in review, an accounting, and thanks