Author: Shannon Palus

Does dose matter? Tumor killer paper thought so, now must retract

Molecular Medicine ReportsAfter questions from a reader, researchers took a second look at their data about the effects of a vitamin A metabolite on tumor cells, and realized their key finding was inaccurate.

They’re now retracting the paper, from Molecular Medicine Reports, because it originally reported that higher concentrations of retinoic acid (RA) were more effective in curbing the proliferation of brain tumor cells. But it seems that the RA dose made less of a difference than they originally believed, according to the retraction notice:

Continue reading Does dose matter? Tumor killer paper thought so, now must retract

More than half of plant toxicity paper isn’t original, journal says

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Plagiarism and duplication can be deadly to a paper in any dose. In the case of a study on the toxicity of nanoparticles to plants, the publisher has presented the precise amount of plagiarism and duplications that ultimately felled the paper.

Specifically, according to Nanomaterials, 56% of “Potential Impact of Multi-Walled Carbon Nanotubes Exposure to the Seedling Stage of Selected Plant Species” was taken from other work.

Here are more details from the retraction notice, published last year:

Continue reading More than half of plant toxicity paper isn’t original, journal says

A headache: Brain paper retracted over author argument

neurochemical researchResearchers have retracted a paper following an argument over who deserves top billing, according to the last author of the paper.

The last author added the authors plan to republish the paper once they work things out.

The work for the paper — about cell death in the aftermath of a brain hemorrhage — was started in one lab at the Department of Neurology at the Affiliated Hospital of Nantong University, and completed in another.

That led to a dispute, reports the retraction notice, issued by Neurochemical Research:

Continue reading A headache: Brain paper retracted over author argument

Why did a chemistry journal fix fraud with a correction instead of a retraction?

Chemical Communciations

Are some cases of research fraud fixable with a correction notice?

A chemistry journal thought so in 2014, when it issued a correction notice for a 2012 paper after the first author admitted to manipulating an image. After an investigation, the publisher agreed the manipulation was a “clear breach” of its ethical guidelines, but decided not to retract the paper since the overall conclusions remain valid.

The last author told us the first author had to repeat the experiments under supervision, and received a “serious warning.”

It’s an older notice, but one we thought interesting enough to cover now. Once you’ve read through the journal’s reasoning, tell us if you agree with the decision to correct (rather than retract) the paper in a poll at the bottom of this post.

Here’s the correction for “A novel route for preparing highly proton conductive membrane materials with metal-organic frameworks,” issued by Chemical Communications:

Continue reading Why did a chemistry journal fix fraud with a correction instead of a retraction?

Saudi institution didn’t clear genotyping study

Journal of Pharmacy and Pharmacology

A journal is retracting a paper that sought to validate genotyping techniques after learning the authors skipped a key step.

The authors scanned blood samples from 500 people who visited “the Blood Bank of our institution,” as they note in the abstract, to validate the use of genotyping techniques in the Saudi population. But the authors didn’t obtain the proper clearance from their institution, King Faisal Specialist Hospital, to publish the work.

Here’s the retraction notice for “Genotyping of CYP2C19 polymorphisms and its clinical validation in the ethnic Arab population:”

Continue reading Saudi institution didn’t clear genotyping study

Institute director loses third paper following investigation

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An autism researcher is retracting a paper she shared with the director of a New York institute, following a misconduct investigation.

In 2011, suspicions raised by peer reviewers triggered the investigation into several papers by Xiaohong Li at the Institute for Basic Research in Developmental Disabilities (IBR) in New York. The probe concluded in 2013 that there was no evidence of misconduct, but the committee recommended the institute review all relevant papers. This additional review led to the latest retraction, the result of problems with figures which “underpin the conclusions of the study.”

This is Li’s third retraction, all of which she shares with W. Ted Brown, the director of  IBR. The pair lost two articles in 2013.

Here’s the retraction notice for “Alteration of astrocytes and Wnt/beta-catenin signaling in the frontalcortex of autistic subjects,” published in the Journal of Neuroinflammation: 

Continue reading Institute director loses third paper following investigation

Researcher hired lawyers to try to get journal to run correction he wanted

BMCLogoWhen a researcher suspected a paper on fireflies had borrowed some of its methodology, he called lawyers to help him convince the publisher to craft a correction notice that was to his satisfaction.

Although the authors submitted a correction to BMC Plant Biology acknowledging Robert Birch as the original author of some material, as we reported previously, the publisher instead issued an expression of concern (EOC), noting that there was an “authorship dispute.”

When our post ran earlier this year, we didn’t know why a request for correction had turned into an EOC, which — as its name states — is typically more cause for concern than a correction. We’re still not sure exactly why, but we have learned that Birch disputed the content of the authors’ suggested correction, and hired lawyers to try to change the wording. From his perspective, there are several problems with the paper, he told us:

Continue reading Researcher hired lawyers to try to get journal to run correction he wanted

Crow’s feet filler study omitted pharma funding, gets retracted

JKMSA paper on a filler for eye wrinkles did not disclose that it was funded by a pharmaceutical company that produces the cosmetic.

The paper explicitly noted that the authors do not have any financial conflicts of interest, and that a government program supported the study. According to the journal, a reader alerted them to the conflict of interest.

The cooperate tie wasn’t a secret, though — one of the authors was listed as affiliated with the  company, Pharma Research Products, based in Korea.

Here’s the retraction notice for “A Phase III, Randomized, Double-Blind, Matched-Pairs, Active-Controlled Clinical Trial and Preclinical Animal Study to Compare the Durability, Efficacy and Safety between Polynucleotide Filler and Hyaluronic Acid Filler in the Correction of Crow’s Feet: A New Concept of Regenerative Filler:”

Continue reading Crow’s feet filler study omitted pharma funding, gets retracted

Vector wasn’t a gift after all, correction notes

CirculationA paper accidentally credited the wrong researcher with providing part of an experiment.

It turns out that one of the authors supplied an expression vector to a Circulation paper about the molecular underpinnings of atherosclerosis — not the outside researcher originally thanked in the acknowledgements section.

The correction notice to the paper makes the situation sound more mysterious than it appears to be:

Continue reading Vector wasn’t a gift after all, correction notes

Diabetes researcher logged 1 retraction, 3 correx, after PubPeer comments

Kathrin Maelder
Kathrin Maedler

A journal has retracted a paper by a leading diabetes researcher — who has also issued three corrections — after questions about her research were raised on PubPeer.

Kathrin Maedler — who works at the University of Bremen in Germany — corrected another paper in 2014. All of the notices are dated from 2015, and all describe issues with figures.

The ongoing comments have led Maedler to carefully look through her original data, according to a statement she emailed us: Continue reading Diabetes researcher logged 1 retraction, 3 correx, after PubPeer comments