In 2009, Donald Williamson made what many biologists said was an extraordinary claim: The reason caterpillars become butterflies is that two different species accidentally mated with one another. As Brendan Borrell explained at the time in Scientific American: Continue reading A flying what? Symbiosis retracts paper claiming new species arise from accidental mating
Category: by journal
Science expresses “concern” about Stapel paper
A day after Tilburg University released its preliminary report on psychologist Diederik Stapel, Science has issued an “expression of concern” about one of his papers.
The 2011 article, titled “Coping with Chaos: How Disordered Contexts Promote Stereotyping and Discrimination,” was written by Stapel and Siegwart Lindenberg, a Tilburg colleague with an appointment at the University of Groningen.
Here’s the notice, signed by Science editor Bruce Alberts: Continue reading Science expresses “concern” about Stapel paper
How do Croatian scientists deal with retractions and misconduct? A guest post by Mico Tatalovic
Today, we have the pleasure of presenting a guest post from Mico Tatalovic, who has just published a piece in the monthly magazine Tehnopolis on retractions in journals in his home country, Croatia. Here, he describes the reporting that went into that feature, which he says was inspired by Retraction Watch.
You may think that in a country with regular plagiarism scandals there would be many retractions. But a search for ‘retractions’ in the open-access depository of academic journals, Hrcak Srce, shows only two retraction notices among more than 70,000 articles in 271 journals indexed there.
There may be several reasons for this. Continue reading How do Croatian scientists deal with retractions and misconduct? A guest post by Mico Tatalovic
A retraction as a group’s papers on smoking and weight loss are too close for comfort
The American Journal of Physiology Endocrinology and Metabolism is retracting a 2009 article by Japanese researchers who appeared to be so fond of their data they published them thrice.
The paper, “Dual suppression of adipogenesis by cigarette smoke through activation of the aryl hydrocarbon receptor and induction of endoplasmic reticulum stress,” by Masanori Kitamura and colleagues, looked at the biochemical mechanism by which cigarette smokers seem to be able to keep weight off. It has been cited eight times, according to Thomson Scientific’s Web of Knowledge.
But according to the retraction notice: Continue reading A retraction as a group’s papers on smoking and weight loss are too close for comfort
Cancer journal retracts herbal medicine paper, citing misconduct probe
The journal Cancer Prevention Research has retracted a 2009 article by a group of scientists from the University of Kentucky after the institution determined that one of the figures in the article wasn’t kosher.
The article, “Psoralidin, an Herbal Molecule, Inhibits Phosphatidylinositol 3-Kinase–Mediated Akt Signaling in Androgen-Independent Prostate Cancer Cells,” has been cited 9 times, according to Thomson Scientific’s Web of Knowledge. Earlier iterations of the research were presented at two cancer meetings in 2008.
Continue reading Cancer journal retracts herbal medicine paper, citing misconduct probe
Retracted retraction leaves Genomics paper intact — but authors wonder if anyone will know
Last March, the journal Genomics retracted a paper, “Discovery of transcriptional regulators and signaling pathways in the developing pituitary gland by bioinformatic and genomic approaches,” for reasons that don’t really fit into a tight lede sentence. Let’s just say that at times the problems involved both questions of authorship and the validity of the research. More on all that in a moment.
Meanwhile, things change. Now the journal, an Elsevier title, is un-retracting (that can’t be a real word, can it?) the retraction. You’d think that would please the authors, and it does to an extent. But they also wonder, legitimately, whether the original retraction will refuse to relinquish its grip on the resurrected article and consign it to database oblivion.
First, some background. Continue reading Retracted retraction leaves Genomics paper intact — but authors wonder if anyone will know
Remaining Zhiguo Wang retractions will be in the Journal of Cellular Physiology
We’ve been following the case of Zhiguo Wang, the former Montreal Heart Institute researcher who was forced to resign his post in early September following an investigation into his work. At the time of that announcement, two retractions of the Wang group’s papers — which we had reported on in August — had appeared. The Institute said they had requested three more.
We figured that meant a total of five, although the Institute wouldn’t say which they were. So when we found out about a third retraction, in the Journal of Cell Science, we said it was the first of the remaining three.
We were wrong. Continue reading Remaining Zhiguo Wang retractions will be in the Journal of Cellular Physiology
Concerns over language in PLoS One autism paper lead to brief withdrawal and correction
On September 28, PLoS One published a paper, “The Level and Nature of Autistic Intelligence II: What about Asperger Syndrome?”
But rather than celebrate another publication for her CV, one of the authors, Michelle Dawson, of Centre d’Excellence en Troubles Envahissants du Développement de l’Université de Montréal (CETEDUM) in Montréal, wasn’t happy. The PLoS One editors had made some changes she didn’t like. And she let everyone on Twitter know: Continue reading Concerns over language in PLoS One autism paper lead to brief withdrawal and correction
ExpungedBob? Algae journal pulls phytoplankton paper with unwitting co-author
While looking at a recent retraction notice in the Journal of Phycology, the one of us with small children at home couldn’t help but imagine a conversation between cartoon character SpongeBob and his nemesis, Plankton:
SpongeBob: You used me … for land development! That wasn’t nice.
Sheldon J. Plankton: Haven’t you figured it out, SpongeBob? Nice guys finish last. Only aggressive people conquer the world. Ha ha ha ha!
SpongeBob: Well … what about aggressively nice people?
Who knew the world of phytoplankton could be so cutthroat? (Spoiler alert: we did.)
Consider: The Journal of Phycology — phycology is the study of algae and related organisms — is retracting a paper after learning that one of the three co-authors, well, wasn’t. Cyanobacteria may be the oldest known life form on earth, but the hyper-ambitious aren’t far behind.
Here’s the notice: Continue reading ExpungedBob? Algae journal pulls phytoplankton paper with unwitting co-author
Two detailed retraction notices appear in PNAS
We’ve fallen a bit behind in our coverage of retractions in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), so we wanted to call attention to two very helpful ones from recent months.
Here’s one notice, which appeared online on August 5: Continue reading Two detailed retraction notices appear in PNAS