Search Results for: sting

You’ve been dupe’d: Meet authors who like their work so much, they publish it twice

When our co-founders launched the site in 2010, they wondered whether there would be enough retractions to write about on a regular basis. Five+ years and three full-time staffers later, and we simply don’t have the time to cover everything that comes across our desk. In 2012, we covered a group of duplication retractions in a … Continue reading You’ve been dupe’d: Meet authors who like their work so much, they publish it twice

“We gave you the wrong information.” An apology from the CBC

Whenever we see someone step forward and admit their mistakes, along with a clear explanation so others can avoid the same, we applaud them. Today, our digital hands are clapping for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), whose Marketplace has issued a lengthy explanation for why they reported incorrect results from tests of popular vitamins and … Continue reading “We gave you the wrong information.” An apology from the CBC

Lawsuit against Ole Miss for rescinded Sarkar job offer dismissed; briefs filed in PubPeer case

We recently obtained court documents showing that, in September, a judge dismissed a lawsuit filed by cancer researcher Fazlul Sarkar against the University of Mississippi after it rescinded a job offer after reviewing concerns raised about his research on PubPeer. Sarkar’s connection to PubPeer will be familiar to many readers — he has also taken the site … Continue reading Lawsuit against Ole Miss for rescinded Sarkar job offer dismissed; briefs filed in PubPeer case

Anonymous complaint about Dutch economist is “unfounded”: Report

Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (VU) has dismissed an anonymous accusation against economist Peter Nijkamp and two of his colleagues, including one of his graduate students, regarding issues related to “data acquisition and data processing.” The announcement, released last week, determined the latest complaint was “unfounded:”

Paper claiming GMO dangers retracted amid allegations of data manipulation

A nutrition journal is retracting a paper about potential dangers of eating food containing genetically modified organisms (GMOs) for duplicating a figure, as news stories from Italy are reporting accusations that the last author falsified some of his research. In the paper, Federico Infascelli, an animal nutrition researcher at the University of Naples, and his colleagues showed modified genes … Continue reading Paper claiming GMO dangers retracted amid allegations of data manipulation

“Totally crappy:” Library magazine adds quotes from vendor without authors’ consent

Two librarians who wrote a feature story for the magazine American Libraries say that editors added quotes from an educational company without their consent. The feature, “Special Report: Digital Humanities in Libraries,” was included in the Jan/Feb 2016 issue of the magazine, published by the American Libraries Association. It includes some data from a survey conducted by the ALA and Gale — a … Continue reading “Totally crappy:” Library magazine adds quotes from vendor without authors’ consent

Second of 3 retractions appears for biologist, the result of “a substantial number of falsifications”

A cell biologist who falsifed Western blots has notched a second retraction, with one more expected after a investigation at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. First author Sudarsanareddy Lokireddy, now apparently a research fellow at Harvard, did not agree to the retraction, the result of “a substantial number of falsifications.” In December, we covered the results of the NTU … Continue reading Second of 3 retractions appears for biologist, the result of “a substantial number of falsifications”

Data dispute forces journal to pull paper about rare bird on valuable land

The authors of a paper about the density of an endangered bird on valuable Texas lands are disputing the journal’s decision to pull the paper after other scientists objected to some of its contents. The paper, published online in August by the Journal of Field Ornithology, compared different models for estimating the number of golden-cheeked warblers that nest … Continue reading Data dispute forces journal to pull paper about rare bird on valuable land

Romanian law shortens jail time for prisoners who write books. (They may ax it.)

Romanian officials are taking a stand against a long-standing oddity in the law that entitles prisoners to 30 days off their jail sentence for every piece of academic writing they author. The crackdown is occurring after a surge in jail literature in the last two years— approximately 200 inmates have authored around 400 scientific works … Continue reading Romanian law shortens jail time for prisoners who write books. (They may ax it.)

Weekend reads: A celebrity surgeon’s double life; misconduct in sports medicine; researcher loses honor

This week at Retraction Watch featured a literally bullshit excuse for fake data, a new record for time from publication to retraction, and news of an upcoming retraction from Science. Here’s what was happening elsewhere: