Rash decision? Duplicate submission of dermatitis paper leads to publishing ban

IJDA trio of skin specialists in Egypt has lost a 2009 paper in the Indian Journal of Dermatology for duplication. And the journal wasn’t happy about it.

The article, “Serum mucosa-associated epithelial chemokine in atopic dermatitis : A specific marker for severity,” came from a group at Ain Shams University in Cairo. According to the abstract: Continue reading Rash decision? Duplicate submission of dermatitis paper leads to publishing ban

It’s happened again: Journal “cannot rule out” possibility author did his own peer review

ijkcThomson Reuters’ online peer review system ScholarOne is having quite a year.

This summer, a scientist exploited basic security flaws in how the system accepts author suggestions for peer reviewers to review a whole pile of his own manuscripts, ultimately resulting in the retraction of 60 papers and the resignation of the Taiwan minister of education.

Now, another journal that uses the system, Wiley’s International Journal of Chemical Kinetics, has retracted a paper because the authors provided their own peer reviewers and “the identity of the peer reviewers could subsequently not be verified.”

We asked editor Craig A. Taatjes if he was concerned the authors had conducted their own peer review. His response is reflective of many of the breaches we’ve seen so far for these online systems: Continue reading It’s happened again: Journal “cannot rule out” possibility author did his own peer review

Image manipulation forces retraction of hepatitis C paper

ljii20.v032.i04.coverA group of researchers from Egypt has lost their 2013 article on hepatitis C in the Journal of Immunoassay and Immunochemistry for fudging their figures.

The article was titled “In vitro neutralization of HCV by goat antibodies against peptides encompassing regions downstream of HVR-1 of E2 glycoprotein.” According to the abstract: Continue reading Image manipulation forces retraction of hepatitis C paper

“Is Imitation the Sincerest Form of Flattery? Not Without Proper Attribution.”

regional sci policy practiceWe’re going to get a little meta here, so be warned.

Take a look at the headline of this post. For those of you unfamiliar with the symbols to the left and right of the words, those are quotation marks. What that means is that we’ve taken those two sentences from another source. And here is that other source, a blog post from Tahseen Consulting titled — yes, you guessed it, “Is Imitation the Sincerest Form of Flattery? Not Without Proper Attribution.”

Apparently, the last group of authors who liked Tahseen’s words enough to use them did so without that whole attribution thing. Here, let us demonstrate attribution again, this time using the WordPress block-quote function. From the post: Continue reading “Is Imitation the Sincerest Form of Flattery? Not Without Proper Attribution.”

Faked figure sinks paper on potential new MRI contrast agent

langd5_v030i025.inddSurface chemistry journal Langmuir has retracted an article on a new MRI contrast agent — but only one of the authors agreed.

According to the notice:

Continue reading Faked figure sinks paper on potential new MRI contrast agent

Humbert, Humbert: Duplication topples matrix function paper

jemsA pair of mathematicians from Egypt has lost their 2012 article in the Journal of the Egyptian Mathematical Society because they reused some of the material from a previous publication.

The article, with the Nabokovian title, “On Humbert matrix functions,” was written by A. Shehata and  M. Abul-Dahab. According to the introduction: Continue reading Humbert, Humbert: Duplication topples matrix function paper

Authorship dispute topples anesthesia paper

anesthessayresearchAn authorship dispute between a pair of Egyptian physicians has led to the retraction of their 2012 article on anesthetic technique for laparoscopic colon surgery.

The article, “General anesthesia versus segmental thoracic or conventional lumbar spinal anesthesia for patients undergoing laparoscopic cholecystectomy,” appeared in Anesthesia Essays and Researches — a publication of the Pan Arab Federation of Societies of Anesthesiologists. It written by Gamal Yousef and Ahmed E. Lasheen, both of Zagazig University (which, we’re guessing, would hold the record for institution of higher learning with the most possible points in Scrabble — with a triple word tile that’s at least 131 points, including the seven-letter bonus!).

According to the retraction notice: Continue reading Authorship dispute topples anesthesia paper

Duplication leads to recall of toxicology paper

toxinvitroA group of researchers from Egypt and the United States has lost their 2010 paper in the journal Toxicology in Vitro for recycling many of their own words from a previously published manuscript.

The article, “Bacterial lipopolysaccharide-induced oxidative stress in adult rat Sertoli cells in vitro,” was written by Hamdy A.A. Aly, Hany A. El-Shemy and David A. Lightfoot,  a professor of biotechnology and genomics at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale. El-Shemy, now of Cairo University, was a visiting scholar at SICU a few years ago, and he and Lightfoot have published together several times. Continue reading Duplication leads to recall of toxicology paper

Say “Argh!” Dental journal extracts paper for plagiarism

hindawiA group of authors from Saudi Arabia and Egypt has lost their 2012 paper in the International Journal of Dentistry for what appears to be a case of large-scale lifting of text from a previously published paper.

The now-retracted article was titled “A Prospective Study of Early Loaded Single Implant-Retained Mandibular Overdentures: Preliminary One-Year Results,” and has yet to be cited, according to Thomson Scientific’s Web of Knowledge.

From the abstract: Continue reading Say “Argh!” Dental journal extracts paper for plagiarism

Study on douches and delivery retracted for authorship issue

jlgtdThe Journal of Lower Genital Tract Disease is retracting a paper it published online in April by a group of Egyptian researchers in the wake of a dispute they couldn’t resolve.

The article, “The Patterns and Criteria of Vaginal Douching and the Risk of Preterm Labor Among Upper Egypt Women,” came from a team at Assiut University. According to the abstract: Continue reading Study on douches and delivery retracted for authorship issue