Category: switzerland

Swiss funding agency cuts off Voinnet, bans him for 3 years

Olivier Voinnet
Olivier Voinnet

The Swiss National Science Foundation has stopped funding prominent plant scientist Olivier Voinnet, following months of questions about his work that have culminated in multiple retractions and corrections.

The agency confirmed to us that it has also banned Voinnet from seeking funding from the SNSF for three years.

We asked the SNSF the amount of funding Voinnet was receiving from SNSF at the time of this decision. They told us it was 1.25 million Swiss francs, equivalent to roughly the same in U.S. dollars.

By our count, Continue reading Swiss funding agency cuts off Voinnet, bans him for 3 years

Science publishes Voinnet’s 19th, 20th, and 21st corrections

351-6271-coverProminent plant biologist Olivier Voinnet has issued three more corrections in this week’s issue of Science.

Collectively, the papers have earned more than 1400 citations, according to Thomson Scientific’s Web of Knowledge.

By our count, he’s now at 21 corrections and seven retractions, following months of questions about his work. He’s been the subject of an investigation that found he “breached his duty of care,” and another which found evidence of scientific misconduct.

One correction goes against the recommendation of the ETH Commission to retract the paper for “well documented intentional manipulations.” According to the correction note, the incorrect figures did not “alter the data in any material way that could be construed to benefit the results and their conclusions.” That correction is the only one of the three for which Voinnet takes full responsibility.

The other two corrections place the responsibility on  Continue reading Science publishes Voinnet’s 19th, 20th, and 21st corrections

Communications researcher regrets “severe shortcomings” in three publications

3A communications researcher in Switzerland has made a few errors in his efforts to communicate his research.

Peter J. Schulz, who works at the University of Lugano, has lost a paper which did not “appropriately acknowledge” another paper as its primary source. He has also corrected a paper with “severe shortcomings in the references.” Both papers were published in the journal Argumentation. 

In addition, he is facing allegations that a book chapter contains some unattributed material.

Schultz acknowledged the problems in a statement he emailed to us:

I regret very much the severe shortcomings in the three publications.

Here’s the retraction note for “Comments on ‘Strategic Manoeuvring with the Intention of the Legislator in the Justification of Judicial Decisions’”: Continue reading Communications researcher regrets “severe shortcomings” in three publications

Voinnet’s notice count grows, as he notches his 18th correction

home_coverOlivier Voinnet, a high-profile plant scientist at ETH Zurich, has earned a mega-correction. It wrapped up a rough year for the biologist, which included his seventh retraction, and a CNRS investigation that found evidence of misconduct.

This latest correction, to a paper on the mechanisms behind RNA silencing in Arabidopsis, was published in RNA. The 2007 paper has been cited 101 times, according to Thomson Scientific’s Web of Knowledge. The corrigendum modifies three figures in total.

The notice is long, so we’re not going to post the whole thing here. The first error in “Transitivity in Arabidopsis can be primed, requires the redundant action of the antiviral Dicer-like 4 and Dicer-like 2, and is compromised by viral-encoded suppressor proteins” is a clarification to a legend:

Continue reading Voinnet’s notice count grows, as he notches his 18th correction

Breakfast study mischaracterized funding by cereal group

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PLOS ONE has quickly corrected an October analysis of what children in Malaysia eat for breakfast, after the study neglected to note it benefited from mistakenly noted an unrestricted research grant from cereal companies supported author salaries. The grant supported the salaries of research assistants, according to the correction note.

Per the authors’ request, the journal has noted that the study received financial support from Nestlé R&D Center in Singapore and Cereal Partners Worldwide, a collaboration between General Mills Inc. and Nestlé S.A., with the goal of selling cereal outside the US and Canada. These funders provided “salaries for research assistants” for the MyBreakfast study, on which the analysis is based, according to the note.

The paper includes authors affiliated with Nestlé and Cereal Partners Worldwide, as well as a detailed “Competing interests” section, which outlines the relationships with these companies.

The correction note explains the information that should have appeared in the funding section of the article:

Continue reading Breakfast study mischaracterized funding by cereal group

Voinnet retracts highly cited paper, bringing his total to 7

coverOlivier Voinnet, a well-known plant scientist at the ETH in Zurich, has notched his 7th retraction for a highly cited paper. The 2003 paper was pulled when “additional image manipulations” came to light after The Plant Journal issued a correction earlier this year.

The retraction follows an investigation into — and then retraction of — several other papers co-authored by Voinnet. The authors originally corrected the paper after they learned one image had been duplicated, and repeating the experiment found the “same interpretation and conclusions” held true. But when the corresponding author learned of additional “data manipulation,” they decided to retract the paper altogether.

Here’s the retraction notice for “An enhanced transient expression system in plants based on suppression of gene silencing by the p19 protein of tomato bushy stunt virus:”

Continue reading Voinnet retracts highly cited paper, bringing his total to 7

Mol bio paper pulled by PLOS following investigation into figures

Screen Shot 2015-11-17 at 11.58.47 AMPLOS Biology has retracted a paper about the molecular details of β-catenin expression following an investigation by the first author’s institution in Italy.

The investigation, by the Istituto Nazionale per la Ricerca sul Cancro, found that there were multiple “figure anomalies.” According to the note:

An explanation of inadvertent error was given for some of the issues identified, while for two issues, a satisfactory explanation could not be provided.

First author Roberto Gherzi says none of his co-authors helped prepare the figures. The authors maintain that the conclusions are unaffected, but that assurance wasn’t enough for the journal. Here’s more from the lengthy retraction note, which provides some backstory on the “serious concerns” regarding the data:

Continue reading Mol bio paper pulled by PLOS following investigation into figures

Authors withdraw two papers from JBC — and that’s all we know

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Two sets of authors have withdrawn their papers from the Journal of Biological Chemistry. We’re telling you about the both together because, true to JBC form, there’s not too much to say.

The retraction notices for both papers — about the molecular underpinnings of cardiac fibroblasts and melanoma cells — are identical:

Continue reading Authors withdraw two papers from JBC — and that’s all we know

Investigation ends in 6th retraction for Voinnet

PLOS PathogensA sixth paper co-authored by plant researcher Olivier Voinnet has been retracted by PLOS Pathogens “following an investigation into concerns.”

The investigation found “several band duplications” in one figure provided by fifth author, Patrice Dunoyer, who took it from “the Master thesis of a former student working under his supervision, without the prior consultation or consent of this student,” according to the notice. There was also an incorrect “loading control” in another figure, attributed to first author Raphael Sansregret and last author Kamal Bouarab. 

Voinnet and Bouarab, the study’s corresponding authors, took full responsibility for “the publication of this erroneous paper.”

Although investigators found that the raw data in the duplicated figure backed up its conclusions, “given the nature and extent of data manipulation,” the authors asked the journal to retract the paper .

Continue reading Investigation ends in 6th retraction for Voinnet

5th retraction for Voinnet follows correction, EoC to PLOS Genetics paper

PLOS GeneticsAfter correcting a paper due to problematic figure panels, researchers led by high-profile biologist Olivier Voinnet have now retracted it, after “further analysis of the paper revealed flaws in the interpretation of” another figure.

PLOS Genetics published the retraction notice September 3 for the 2013 paper on the molecular details of embryonic stem cells in mice. First author Constance Ciaudo and Voinnet assume “full responsibility for the mistakes on this paper,” according to the note.

Continue reading 5th retraction for Voinnet follows correction, EoC to PLOS Genetics paper