What should happen to the millions of dollars publishers rake in from authors whose work is later retracted?
Guillaume Cabanac, one of the developers of the Problematic Paper Screener, has repeatedly suggested publishers donate such revenue to charity.
And now one is doing just that.
Continue reading Publisher donating author fees from retracted articles to charity
A nanotechnology journal has retracted two papers coauthored by a scientist in France who is accused of manipulating or reusing graphs and figures in nearly two dozen instances, Retraction Watch has learned.
The scientist, Jolanda Spadavecchia (pictured), is research director at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS). In December, an article in the newspaper Le Monde described allegations of misconduct in Spadavecchia’s lab.
Spadavecchia is second author of one of the retracted papers, “Interaction of Thermus thermophilus ArsC enzyme and gold nanoparticles naked-eye assays speciation between As(III) and As(V);” she is senior author of the other, “One-pot synthesis of a gold nanoparticle–Vmh2 hydrophobin nanobiocomplex for glucose monitoring.”
Continue reading Journal pulls papers by embattled scientist at national research center in France
Last August 12th, Nick Wise came across a Facebook post advertising the first, third, and fifth author positions for sale on a scientific paper with the same title as a recently published article.
Wise, a scientific sleuth whose work has resulted in more than 850 retractions, posted a comment on PubPeer with a screenshot of the advertisement and contacted the publisher of the journal.
Six months later, the article, “Potential application of AlP nanosheet semiconductor in the detection of toxic phosgene, thiophosgene, and formaldehyde gases,” has been retracted. It had appeared in Semiconductor Science and Technology, an IOP Publishing title, and has been cited once.
Meanwhile, the authorship broker says he has left the business.
Continue reading After a sleuth reveals a paper with authorships advertised for sale, it’s retracted
A physics publisher is retracting 494 papers after an investigation “indicated that some papers may have been created, manipulated, and/or sold by a commercial entity” – aka a paper mill.
The vast majority – 463 articles – are from the Journal of Physics: Conference Series, while 21 are from IOP Conference Series: Materials Science & Engineering, and 10 are from IOP Conference Series: Earth & Environmental Science. A bit less than a third – 142 – are appearing today.
In a statement, Kim Eggleton, Head of Peer Review and Research Integrity at IOP Publishing, tells Retraction Watch:
Continue reading Physics publisher retracting nearly 500 likely paper mill papers
Sometimes leaving well-enough alone is the best policy. Ask Teja Santosh Dandibhotla.
Upset that a paper of his had been retracted from the Journal of Physics: Conference Series, Santosh, a computer scientist at the CVR College of Engineering in Hyderabad, India, contacted us to plead his case. (We of course do not make decisions about retractions, we reminded him.)
Santosh’s article, “Intelligent defaulter Prediction using Data Science Process,” had been pulled along with some 350 other papers in two conference proceedings because IOP Publishing had “uncovered evidence of systematic manipulation of the publication process and considerable citation manipulation.”
Continue reading The author of a retracted paper learns to be careful what he wishes for
A publisher is retracting five papers from one of its conference series after discovering what it says was “clear evidence” that the articles were generated by a computer.
The five papers were published from 2018 to 2020 in IOP Publishing’s “Conference Series: Earth and Environmental Science.” According to an IOP spokesperson, the retraction notices will all read:
Continue reading Publisher retracting five papers because of “clear evidence” that they were “computer generated”
A physicist and a radiation health expert have had two papers about people’s exposure to radiation following the Fukushima nuclear plant disaster subject to expressions of concern.
The authors of the two papers are Makoto Miyazaki, a of the department of radiation health management at Fukushima Medical University, and Ryugo Hayano, a professor of physics emeritus at the University of Tokyo. As the Asahi Shimbun put it last week, referring to one of the two papers: Continue reading Journal flags papers about radiation exposure following Fukushima disaster
A physics journal has retracted a 2011 paper by a group of scientists based in Italy, noting it’s “literally copied” from a paper by the same authors.
This is the 12th retraction for the paper’s first author Alberto Carpinteri, who is known in the engineering community for championing some controversial ideas, such as that the Shroud of Turin is as old as Jesus (contradicting carbon dating). In 2015, a journal he used to edit — Meccanica — retracted 11 of his papers, noting that “the editorial process had been compromised.”
In the latest notice, the Journal of Statistical Mechanics: Theory and Experiment (JSTAT) says its investigation found a substantial portion of the paper—including the main analysis and conclusion—had been lifted from a paper published in another journal several months before.
Last author of the latest paper to be retracted, Amedeo Manuello Bertetto from Polytechnic University of Turin, told us the authors strongly opposed the journal’s decision: Continue reading Controversial researcher loses 12th paper that’s “literally copied;” authors object
An engineering student in South Korea and a professor have retracted five papers from four different journals for reasons ranging from figure duplication to manipulated or fraudulent data.
Jae Hyo Park, who is pursuing his PhD, and Seung Ki Joo, a professor in the department of material science and engineering at Seoul National University in South Korea, appear on all five papers as first and last author, respectively.
According to an official at IOP Publishing, the retractions began when a third party contacted them last March about “potential misconduct” in a paper published earlier that year in one of its journals—Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics. The IOP official Simon Davies explained: Continue reading Five retractions for engineering duo in South Korea over duplication, fraudulent data
Not again.
That’s the sound of learning that a third scientist you worked with committed misconduct.
In the last two years, we reported on two retractions for neuroscientist Stanley Rapoport, the result of misconduct by two different first authors. We’ve since discovered more retractions resulting from those cases — and a new retraction stemming from the actions of yet another co-author.
Although the latest retraction notice doesn’t reveal the reason for retraction, both the journal editor and Rapoport — based at the National Institute on Aging (NIA), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) — confirmed to us that it is the result of misconduct by the last author, Jagadeesh Rao. According to Rapoport, a “number of retractions [for] Rao are still in the works.”
We asked Rapoport for his reaction to multiple cases of misconduct by his colleagues, including the two first authors we’ve already reported on, Fei Gao and Mireille Basselin:
Continue reading More co-author misconduct raises NIH neuroscientist’s retraction count to 8