A journal has published an expression of concern (EoC) for a paper on cancer genetics in mice, over a concern about data in some gel panels.
The EoC for “Suppression of intestinal tumorigenesis in Apc mutant mice upon Musashi-1 deletion,” appeared Sept. 21 in Journal of Cell Science (JCS).
With the notice, the journal says:
Continue reading Journal issues note of concern, tips off university’s research integrity office
A biologist is crying foul at a journal’s decision to correct (and not retract) a paper he claims plagiarized his work — and one of his colleagues has resigned from the journal’s editorial board as a result.
The 2016 paper, published by Scientific Reports, is an application of a previously published algorithm designed to better identify regulatory sequences in DNA. The three authors, based at the Shenzhen campus of the Harbin Institute of Technology, used the technique to identify recombination spots in DNA. They called it SVM-gkm.
On April 2, Michael Beer of Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore notified the editors of Scientific Reports that he believed the paper had plagiarized his work. Despite Beer’s efforts, the journal ultimately decided to issue a correction notice, which cites “errors” and the authors’ failure to credit Beer’s work. That isn’t good enough for Beer — nor one of his colleagues at Johns Hopkins, who resigned from the journal’s editorial board saying “the recent affair with Mike Beer’s work being plagiarized did not impress me.”
Continue reading Board member resigns from journal over handling of paper accused of plagiarism
A journal is planning to retract a paper that purported to link a component of vaccines to autism in mice.
The paper, about the effects of aluminum adjuvants in vaccines on the immune response in the brains of mice, is the second retraction for co-authors Christopher Shaw and Lucija Tomljenovic, of the University of British Columbia. The journal’s editor told us he and the authors are jointly retracting the paper.
Just over a month old, the paper has already received plenty of criticism. Numerous commenters on PubPeer have allegedly identified image duplications and other problems with the paper. One commenter described “clear and deliberate” removal of control results in the paper, while others suggested gel bands were duplicated within the paper, and appear similar to those from another paper published in 2014 by Shaw and Tomljenovic. In a blog post, David Gorski, a professor and surgeon at Wayne State University, called the paper “antivaccine pseudoscience.”
Shaw, the paper’s last author, told us that his lab became aware of the PubPeer discussion a few weeks after publication: Continue reading Journal to retract paper called “anti-vaccine pseudoscience”
A journal has retracted a recent case report about a stem cell therapy in a child with cerebral palsy, after discovering the study failed to meet “ethical standards.”
According to the journal, Regenerative Medicine, the ethical issue is that the authors failed to report the case to the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare of Japan, which violates the country’s guidelines for conducting stem cell research. Unfortunately, we don’t know much more than that about what happened.
Laura Dormer, editorial director of Future Science Group, which publishes Regenerative Medicine, explained that the paper’s first author, Masato Kantake, requested the retraction because: Continue reading Case report of stem cell therapy in child didn’t meet “ethical standards,” says journal
A pharmaceutical company has admitted that one of its former researchers falsified early data on a compound that’s designed to fight cancer, now in human trials.
The data, published as an abstract in August 2015 in the journal Cancer Research, reported a therapeutic benefit of acalabrutinib in a mouse model of pancreatic cancer. The compound, developed by the company Acerta Pharma, has also been the subject of additional trials published in the New England Journal of Medicine and Blood in 2015. The 2015 NEJM study, which had several authors in common with the Cancer Research abstract, showed the agent had “promising safety and efficacy profiles in patients” with relapsed chronic lymphocytic leukemia.
But an investigation into the data underlying the 2015 abstract shows some were falsified, prompting the journal to retract the abstract.
Ed Tucker, senior vice president of Medical Safety, Quality and Compliance at Acerta Pharma, told us that in August 2016 the company identified an issue with the data in the Cancer Research abstract and started an investigation:
Nature has added an “editor’s note” to a high-profile August paper alerting readers to the fact that the article has been subject to criticism.
Journals often flag papers that are being debated — what’s unusual here is that the journal doesn’t label the notice as an official “Expression of Concern,” which are indexed by PubMed. Yet the Nature notice reads just like an expression of concern.
Here’s the text of the new notice, which was added October 2 (and spotted by Paul Knoepfler):
Continue reading Nature adds alert to heavily debated paper about gene editing
Plant biologists from China have retracted a 2013 paper in The Plant Cell after discovering that some of the plant material used was “inadvertently contaminated.”
According to the retraction notice, the authors believe the contamination affects the main conclusion of their paper. Continue reading Authors retract plant biology paper after they realized sample was contaminated
A journal has removed an expression of concern for a 2011 paper after Karolinska Institutet (KI) “concluded no wrongdoing had occurred.”
In June, Journal of Cell Science (JCS) issued the expression of concern, after a reader contacted the editors with questions about the data in one of the figures. JCS investigated but could not resolve the issue, and in March 2017 turned the case over to KI where the authors are based.
The 2011 paper had already received a correction in 2016, citing inadvertent figure duplication.
In late August, KI concluded its investigation into the 2011 paper by last author Boris Zhivotovsky; JCS has now updated the expression of concern with a publisher’s note: Continue reading “No wrongdoing had occurred,” says Karolinska, following investigation of cancer research
Researchers have retracted a 2015 paper in Cell after an investigation revealed the first author committed misconduct.
According to the retraction notice, which first author Ozgur Tataroglu declined to sign, the researchers realized there was an issue with the 2015 paper when they were unable to replicate the findings. Corresponding author Patrick Emery and his team at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester reviewed the data and found “clear evidence” that Tataroglu — who had been a postdoc in Emery’s lab — “had repeatedly misrepresented and altered primary data,” the notice states.
UMass subsequently conducted an investigation in which it “concluded that the first author committed scientific misconduct.”
Here’s the retraction notice for “Calcium and SOL Protease Mediate Temperature Resetting of Circadian Clocks:” Continue reading Author blamed for misconduct in Cell paper declines to sign retraction notice
A once-prominent stem cell biologist, who recently lost both her job and a sizable grant, has lost her fifth paper.
Recently, Molecular and Cellular Biology retracted a 2003 paper by Susana Gonzalez. Last February, the National Center for Cardiovascular Research (CNIC) in Spain dismissed her from her position over allegations of misconduct. The reason: suspicions of data manipulation.
As with a previous retraction, the journal said Gonzalez “could not be reached for approval of this retraction.”
Here’s the full notice:
Continue reading Stem cell scientist appealing dismissal loses another paper