Search Results for: compromised peer review

Wiley paused Hindawi special issues amid quality problems, lost $9 million in revenue

Hindawi, the open access publisher that Wiley acquired in 2021, temporarily suspended publishing special issues because of “compromised articles,” according to a press release announcing the company’s third quarter financial results.  Brian Napack, Wiley’s president and CEO, specifically noted the “unplanned publishing pause at Hindawi” as a factor that “challenged” the company this year.  The … Continue reading Wiley paused Hindawi special issues amid quality problems, lost $9 million in revenue

Ob-gyn loses PhD after committee finds he made up research

It was déjà vu last month when a university in Belgium stripped Egyptian physician Hatem Abu Hashim of his doctorate after he was found to have fabricated data in his thesis.  Just weeks earlier, another Egyptian doctor, Ahmed Badawy, lost the PhD degree he had earned at a Dutch university in 2008. Abu Hashim and … Continue reading Ob-gyn loses PhD after committee finds he made up research

An editor on why he ignores anonymous whistleblowers – and why authors are free to publish ‘bullshit and fiction’

Just over a decade ago, in the second year of Retraction Watch’s existence, we wrote a column in the now-defunct Lab Times urging journal editors to stop ignoring complaints from anonymous whistleblowers. The Committee on Publication Ethics didn’t think anonymity was a problem as long as the complaints were evidence-based, so why should editors?  And … Continue reading An editor on why he ignores anonymous whistleblowers – and why authors are free to publish ‘bullshit and fiction’

Journal about ‘ambient intelligence’ retracts more than 50 papers at once

Perhaps the Journal of Ambient Intelligence and Humanized Computing needs to look for a different kind of smarts. The journal – a Springer Nature title – has just retracted 51 papers. The episode is the latest in a string of high-volume retractions by major publishers of papers included in special issues. In at least five … Continue reading Journal about ‘ambient intelligence’ retracts more than 50 papers at once

Kale ‘miracle food’ paper retracted for being ‘word salad’

Kale may be a superfood, but for one paper on the vegetable, Twitter proved to be its Kryptonite. We’ll explain. Last November, Food Science & Nutrition published an article titled “Kale (Brassica oleracea var. sabellica) as miracle food with special reference to therapeutic and nutraceuticals perspective.” How miraculous? As the authors, from Government College University … Continue reading Kale ‘miracle food’ paper retracted for being ‘word salad’

Journal retracts three papers — including two on COVID-19 — because ‘trainee editor’ committed misconduct

A psychiatry journal has retracted two papers on Covid-19 and mental health, and a third on racism, after concluding that an author on the articles rigged the peer-review process.  The papers, which appeared in the International Journal of Social Psychiatry (IJSP), were co-authored by Debanjan Banerjee, then geriactric psychiatrist at the National Institute of Mental … Continue reading Journal retracts three papers — including two on COVID-19 — because ‘trainee editor’ committed misconduct

Anatomy journal retracts 13 papers

The Anatomical Record is correcting itself in a big way, pulling 13 articles, including several linked to paper mills.  The papers, all by authors in China, were published between 2019 and 2021.  Some were flagged in a September 2021 report on research misconduct by the Chinese government. They join a slew of articles The Anatomical … Continue reading Anatomy journal retracts 13 papers

Springer Nature slaps more than 400 papers with expressions of concern all at once

A total of 436 papers in two Springer Nature journals are being subjected to expressions of concern, in the latest case of special issues — in this case, “topical collections” — likely being exploited by rogue editors or impersonators. The move follows the discovery, as we reported in August, of more than 70 papers in … Continue reading Springer Nature slaps more than 400 papers with expressions of concern all at once

WHO COVID-19 library contains hundreds of papers from hijacked journals

A World Health Organization (WHO) database of papers about COVID-19 contains hundreds of articles published in hijacked journals whose publishers have stolen titles and legitimacy from the original publications.  That’s what I found when I analyzed the WHO’s “COVID-19 Global literature on coronavirus disease,” which as of August 1 included more than 318,000 papers sourced … Continue reading WHO COVID-19 library contains hundreds of papers from hijacked journals

How hijacked journals keep fooling one of the world’s leading databases

It keeps happening.  There was the case of Talent Development and Excellence, which cloned an existing journal and managed to index hundreds of articles in Scopus, one of the world’s leading databases for scholarly literature. The Transylvanian Review did the same thing, and so did Test Engineering and Management. These journals — which can make … Continue reading How hijacked journals keep fooling one of the world’s leading databases