Search Results for: elsevier

‘Mistakes were made’: Paper by department chair earns expression of concern as more questioned

A 14-year-old paper has earned an expression of concern after an anonymous whistleblower found evidence of image duplication in the work.  The authors have had images from several more papers flagged on PubPeer. The corresponding author, Kelly McMasters, is chair of the Hiram C. Polk, Jr., MD Department of Surgery at the University of Louisville … Continue reading ‘Mistakes were made’: Paper by department chair earns expression of concern as more questioned

Supplement maker sues critic for defamation, spurring removal of accepted abstract

A Frontiers journal has taken down the abstract of a “provisionally accepted” article about harms from an herbal supplement after the company that sells the products sued the first author for defamation.  The author of the paper, Cyriac Abby Philips, a hepatologist at Rajagiri Hospital in Kerala, India, has over 266,000 followers on his X … Continue reading Supplement maker sues critic for defamation, spurring removal of accepted abstract

The wolf in Scopus’ clothing: Another hijacked journal has indexed nearly 900 articles

A prolific hijacked journal has managed to breach the defenses of Scopus, one of the world’s leading academic databases. This time, the target is the award-winning journal Community Practitioner, the official publication of the UK-based organization Unite-CPHVA. On July 7, 2023, I reported via 𝕏 that the journal’s homepage in Scopus had been compromised and … Continue reading The wolf in Scopus’ clothing: Another hijacked journal has indexed nearly 900 articles

Weekend reads: A ‘star botanist’ has a retraction; the ‘bizarro world of law reviews’; AI and fake 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 The week at Retraction Watch featured: Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up past 400.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 49,000 retractions in The Retraction Watch Database — which is now part of Crossref. The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker now contains more than 250 titles. And have … Continue reading Weekend reads: A ‘star botanist’ has a retraction; the ‘bizarro world of law reviews’; AI and fake papers

Seventeen journals lose impact factors for suspected citation manipulation

Clarivate, the company that calculates Journal Impact Factors based on citations to articles, didn’t publish the metric for 17 journals this year due to suspected citation manipulation. That’s a substantial increase from last year, when only four were excluded.  The increase is, in part, case of rising tides lifting (sinking?) all boats: In its 2024 … Continue reading Seventeen journals lose impact factors for suspected citation manipulation

Weekend reads: A researcher explains how he publishes every three days; scientific bounty hunters; criminalizing scientific misconduct

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 49,000 retractions in The Retraction Watch Database — which is now part of Crossref. The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker now contains more than 250 titles. And have … Continue reading Weekend reads: A researcher explains how he publishes every three days; scientific bounty hunters; criminalizing scientific misconduct

Journal hijackers still infiltrate Scopus despite its efforts

Last December, Elsevier’s Scopus index deleted all links to journal homepages in response to the widespread issue of journal hijacking, when a legitimate title, website, ISSN, and other metadata of a journal are taken over without permission.  Scopus has been a major target. I’ve cataloged 67 cases since 2013 of hijacked journals penetrating the database.  … Continue reading Journal hijackers still infiltrate Scopus despite its efforts

How a widely used ranking system ended up with three fake journals in its top 10 philosophy list

Recently our philosophy faculty at Jagiellonian University in Kraków, like many institutions around the world, introduced a ranking of journals based on Elsevier’s Scopus database to evaluate the research output of its employees for awards and promotions. This database is also used by our institution in the hiring process.  The database provides three main measures: … Continue reading How a widely used ranking system ended up with three fake journals in its top 10 philosophy list

Editor and authors refuse to share data of paper containing alleged statistical errors

Last July, David Allison and his students identified what they considered to be fatal errors in a paper that had appeared in Elsevier’s Diabetes Research and Clinical Practice. The authors of the article, led by Sergio Di Molfetta, of University of Bari Aldo Moro in Bari, Italy, used a cluster randomized controlled trial, but did … Continue reading Editor and authors refuse to share data of paper containing alleged statistical errors

Two papers retracted for plagiarizing a 50-year-old thesis

A math professor in Poland has lost two papers because she plagiarized a doctoral thesis written before the United States had put a man on the moon. The articles by Daria Michalik, “The decomposition uniqueness for infinite Cartesian products” and “Some remarks on the uniqueness of decomposition into Cartesian product,” published in 2017 and 2016, … Continue reading Two papers retracted for plagiarizing a 50-year-old thesis