Biotech company agrees to pay $4 million to settle data falsification allegations

A biotech company whose CEO faced allegations of manipulating data in papers used in NIH grant applications will pay a settlement of $4 million to resolve those allegations, the Department of Justice announced January 6.  The settlement is the latest installment in a series of allegations surrounding research by Leen Kawas, the former CEO of … Continue reading Biotech company agrees to pay $4 million to settle data falsification allegations

Journals investigating dozens of papers by leading Canadian urologists

A high-profile Canadian urologist received an editorial expression of concern for one of his papers this month, after anonymous comments on PubPeer flagged suspected data duplication in dozens of his articles.  By our count, sleuths have flagged 30 papers co-authored by Martin Gleave, a professor at the University of British Columbia in Canada and co-founder … Continue reading Journals investigating dozens of papers by leading Canadian urologists

19 months and counting: Former Hindawi journal still hasn’t marked paper

A journal formerly published by Hindawi has yet to publish any sort of notice on a paper sleuths reported for containing duplicated images 1.5 years ago.  According to Kevin Patrick, the sleuth who contacted the publisher in mid-2023, the episode “might be a useful case study” of the issues facing Wiley, which acquired Hindawi in … Continue reading 19 months and counting: Former Hindawi journal still hasn’t marked paper

Science places expressions of concern on two articles as Toronto’s Sinai Health investigates

Science has issued expressions of concern for two articles from the lab of Daniel Durocher, a professor of molecular genetics at the University of Toronto.  The notices, and two more editor’s notes on Nature articles, follow PubPeer comments on several of Durocher’s papers pointing out potentially duplicated images, as described by ForBetterScience. Durocher has responded … Continue reading Science places expressions of concern on two articles as Toronto’s Sinai Health investigates

Weekend reads: When Dr. Oz appeared in Retraction Watch in 2014; Didier Raoult in the news again; superconductivity researcher out

Would you consider a donation to support Weekend Reads, and our daily work? The week at Retraction Watch featured: Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up past 400. There are more than 50,000 retractions in The Retraction Watch Database — which is now part of Crossref. The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker now contains more than 300 titles. And have … Continue reading Weekend reads: When Dr. Oz appeared in Retraction Watch in 2014; Didier Raoult in the news again; superconductivity researcher out

Cancer specialist faked data in at least ten papers, VA and UCLA find

A multiple myeloma specialist “recklessly“ falsified data in at least 10 published articles, according to a joint investigation by the University of California, Los Angeles David Geffen School of Medicine and Veterans Affairs Greater Los Angeles Healthcare System.  The institutions found Alan Lichtenstein, a former staff physician at the VA, committed research misconduct by reusing … Continue reading Cancer specialist faked data in at least ten papers, VA and UCLA find

Wiley corrects retraction notices for ‘inaccurate’ description of why articles were pulled

The Journal of Biochemical and Molecular Toxicology, a Wiley title, has corrected a pair of retraction notices in which “the reasons for the retraction were described inaccurately,” according to the corrections. The original notices also did not include “the authors’ disapproval of the retraction.”  The retracted articles, “The cardioprotective effects of a combination of quercetin … Continue reading Wiley corrects retraction notices for ‘inaccurate’ description of why articles were pulled

Weekend reads: Top Alzheimer’s researcher on leave; president calls for superconductivity researcher to be fired; continued citation of retracted papers

Would you consider a donation to support Weekend Reads, and our daily work? The week at Retraction Watch featured: Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up past 400. There are more than 50,000 retractions in The Retraction Watch Database — which is now part of Crossref. The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker now contains more than 300 titles. And have … Continue reading Weekend reads: Top Alzheimer’s researcher on leave; president calls for superconductivity researcher to be fired; continued citation of retracted papers

University of Newcastle investigating top melanoma researchers

The University of Newcastle in Australia is investigating the work of two prominent skin cancer researchers, Retraction Watch has learned.  Commenters on PubPeer have posted questions about the data in 42 papers by Peter Hersey and Xu Dong Zhang, both well-known in Australian melanoma research. So far, two of the papers have been retracted and … Continue reading University of Newcastle investigating top melanoma researchers

Highly cited engineer offers guaranteed publication, citations in return for coauthorship

Last year, a researcher at a U.S. university received an email offering what the subject line described as a “great opportunity to publish an article.” The author of the email, Mahdi Shariati, an adjunct professor of civil engineering at Ton Duc Thang University, in Vietnam, said he had read one of the researcher’s papers and … Continue reading Highly cited engineer offers guaranteed publication, citations in return for coauthorship