Category: duplication retractions

Oh, the irony: Paper on “Ethics and Integrity of the Publishing Process” retracted for duplication

manage org reviewIn a case whose irony is not lost on those involved, an article about publishing ethics has been retracted because one of the authors re-used material he’d written for an earlier piece. But the authors and the journal’s editors have turned the episode into a learning opportunity.

Here’s the notice for “Ethics and Integrity of the Publishing Process: Myths, Facts, and a Roadmap,” published in 2011 by Marshall Schminke and Maureen L. Ambrose: Continue reading Oh, the irony: Paper on “Ethics and Integrity of the Publishing Process” retracted for duplication

Sports columnist Reilly loses ESPN.com gig after replaying his work

Rick Reilly
Rick Reilly

Rick Reilly, a noted sports columnist, once wrote about football replays:

Tell me if I’m a crank, but do you notice that every time a football replay comes up—and I mean every time—the color guy goes, “OK, now watch this!” I mean, what else are we gonna do? Suddenly start knitting a sweater? Start collecting for UNICEF? You don’t need to tell us to watch the TV set we’re already watching! OK, maybe I am a crank.

But readers of Reilly might well have wondered why they were being subjected to replays of his work. His bosses at ESPN.com evidently did, because they’ve unplugged the writer’s keyboard in the wake of a self-plagiarism scandal, according to news reports. Such self-plagiarism — more accurately referred to as duplication — is of course a frequent reason for retractions.

Deadspin offers a nice side-by-side of the similarities between a recent Reilly column — titled, ironically, “Don’t act like you’ve been there” — and one from 2009, brought to the publication’s attention by a reader. Some examples: Continue reading Sports columnist Reilly loses ESPN.com gig after replaying his work

Researchers invent time machine! (But too late to avoid retraction for duplication)

compinterfaceA common theme in movies involving time travel is that if you meet yourself in the past, you’ll upset the time-space continuum, and cause all sorts of problems. Well, a group of materials scientists in Hong Kong seems to have invented a time machine, and learned that if if you publish a paper that appears to have been published in the future, you’ll suffer a retraction (and correction) for duplicating your own data.

We’ll (try to) explain.

The group in 1997 published a paper in Composite Interfaces titled “Reliability of fiber Bragg grating sensors embedded in textile composites.”

But now comes the following — inscrutable — Corrigendum: Continue reading Researchers invent time machine! (But too late to avoid retraction for duplication)

Not-so-tiny ethics issues as Micron retracts first-ever paper, and authors apologize for five duplicates

micronThe editors of the journal Micron — an Elsevier title — have retracted its first paper ever, and in an editorial marking the occasion, take on a number of issues in scientific publishing misconduct.

The beginning of the editorial (which is paywalled): Continue reading Not-so-tiny ethics issues as Micron retracts first-ever paper, and authors apologize for five duplicates

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

Figure duplication kills cell death paper

cdd_cimageA pair of researchers at the University of Maryland have retracted a paper in Cell Death & Differentiation after it became clear that one of the figures had been duplicated from an earlier paper.

Here’s the notice, dated December 13, 2013, for “INrf2 (Keap1) targets Bcl-2 degradation and controls cellular apoptosis,” by Suryakant Niture and Anil Jaiswal: Continue reading Figure duplication kills cell death paper

Paper on refolded mountain range a reproduction, now retracted

JAESThe Journal of Asian Earth Sciences has retracted a 2004 article by a scholar in India who resused text from a previous work on which he was a co-author.

The article, “Finite strain and deformation from a refolded region of the Dudatoli-Almora Crystalline, Kumaun Lesser Himalaya,” was written by Hari B. Srivastava, of Banaras Hindu University in Varanasi. Here’s what it had to say: Continue reading Paper on refolded mountain range a reproduction, now retracted

Seeing triple: Optics paper proves to be one of three, retracted

joptA team of physicists has lost their 2013 paper in the Journal of Optics after the publisher learned that the article had already appeared in print twice before.

The article, “Inscription of narrow bandwidth Bragg gratings in polymer optical fibers,” came from researchers at the Instituto de Telecomunicacoes, in Portugal, and the Aston Institute of Photonic Technologies, in Birmingham, England. Per the abstract: Continue reading Seeing triple: Optics paper proves to be one of three, retracted

Author blames “young coworker” for duplication as paper is retracted

doveDoes anyone know how to say “thrown under the bus” in Italian?

A group of researchers in Italy has retracted a paper after it became clear that they had duplicated some of their previous work. Or, as one of the senior authors put it, as a “young coworker” had reused their material.

Here’s the notice from Biologics: Targets and Therapy: Continue reading Author blames “young coworker” for duplication as paper is retracted

“Copyright violation” fells tapeworm paper

jparadisWe have a report about a case report of a “rare presentation” that doesn’t seem to be as rare as the authors would like is to think it is.

Here’s what we’re talking about:

Continue reading “Copyright violation” fells tapeworm paper