Retraction Watch

Weekend reads: Coronavirus meets scientific publishing; publish or perish loses in court; retractions in cancer research

Before we present this week’s Weekend Reads, a question: Do you enjoy our weekly roundup? If so, we could really use your help. Would you consider a tax-deductible donation to support Weekend Reads, and our daily work? Thanks in advance.

Sending thoughts to our readers and wishing them the best in this uncertain time.

The week at Retraction Watch featured:

JAMA sounding the alarm about coronavirus data;
the retraction of a paper claiming a link between statins and lowered glaucoma risk;
a journal frustrated by a university’s inaction.

Here’s what was happening elsewhere:

Frustrated by a university’s lack of action, a journal retracts

Expression of concern, meet expression of frustration.

Eight months ago, in the wake of skepticism about the data in a 2017 paper it had published, the Obstetrics & Gynecology issued an EoC about the article. At the time, the journal, an official title of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, said it had contacted the authors’ institution — Menoufia University in Shibin Al Kawm, Egypt — about the article.

Those efforts evidently met with silence. Now the journal has retracted the paper, “Sildenafil citrate therapy for oligohydramnios: a randomized controlled trial,” with a swipe at the school’s apparent lack of interest in the misdeeds of its faculty members:

Researcher loses PhD after investigation finds he faked data

Researchers in Singapore have lost a 2011 paper in Gene Therapy after an institutional investigation found that some of their data had been fabricated by a PhD student on the project.

Most of the authors were affiliated with the Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, a unit of the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR).

The article, “Targeted suicide gene therapy for glioma using human embryonic stem cell-derived neural stem cells genetically modified by baculoviral vectors,” purported to show that:

Journal slaps 13 expressions of concern on papers suspected of being from a paper mill

The journal Artificial Cells, Nanomedicine, and Biotechnology has attached expressions of concern to 13 papers published in 2019 that a group of sleuths have flagged for potentially being from a paper mill.

In February, Elisabeth Bik wrote on her blog:

Based on the resemblance of the Western blot bands to tadpoles (the larval stage of an amphibian, such as a frog or a toad), we will call this the Tadpole Paper Mill.

Bik explains in her post that she and her colleagues — including pseudonymous sleuths @MortenOxe, @SmutClyde, and @TigerBB8 — had been working on a set of 17 papers that Jennifer Byrne and Jana Christopher had also been scrutinizing:

Cleveland Clinic heart researchers earn two expressions of concern

A team of heart researchers at Cleveland Clinic in Ohio has received expressions of concern for two papers in the Journal of Biological Chemistry, which says the images in the articles appear suspect.

The papers, both of which appeared in 2004, come from the lab of Subha Sen, a highly-funded scientist who has received millions in NIH grants over the past decade. Sen’s work also has drawn scrutiny on PubPeer, with comments cropping up on the site roughly three years ago for many of her papers.

In 2016, Sen’s group retracted a 2009 article in JBC titled “A unique microRNA profile in end-stage heart failure indicates alterations in specific cardiovascular signaling networks.” According to the notice:

Keeping coronavirus numbers straight: JAMA sounds an alarm

As Retraction Watch readers know, reporting on the same data more than once — without notifying editors and readers — is bad for the scientific record and can lead to a retraction. Apparently, in the rush to publish findings about the coronavirus pandemic, some researchers are doing just that.

According to an editorial in JAMA today by editor in chief Howard Bauchner and two deputy editors, Robert Golub and Jody Zylke:

“Statins May Cut Glaucoma Risk,” said a New York Times headline. But is that true?

Last year, JAMA Ophthalmology published a study that claimed to find a link between using cholesterol-lowering drugs known as statins and a reduced risk of glaucoma. In a New York Times story on the paper, lead author

Jae H. Kang, an assistant professor of medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, suggested that statins reduce pressure in the eye, help maintain good blood flow and may help protect the optic nerve.

But Kang came to realize, while reviewing the results for another study, that her research had a major error, as she writes in a letter accompanying the retraction and replacement of the study. Kang tells Retraction Watch:

Weekend reads: Museum director sues after suspension; Nobelist ’embroiled in research scandal;’ spider biologist lawyers up after retractions

The week at Retraction Watch featured:

a three-part series on what happened when some researchers tried to correct the sports science literature;
a story of how flawed science involving panthers led to policy decisions;
a journal that declined to retract a retraction.

Here’s what was happening elsewhere:

A ‘Cat Tale’: A story of how flawed science formed the basis of policy

On the surface, it would seem like a good thing when science undergirds policy decisions. But what if that science is deeply flawed? Craig Pittman, an award-winning journalist at the Tampa Bay Times and author of 4 books, writes that his new book Cat Tale: The Wild, Weird Battle to Save the Florida Panther is “a tale of raw courage, of scientific skulduggery and political shenanigans, of big-money interests versus what’s right for everyone.” In this excerpt, Pittman explains what happened — and what didn’t — after a group of scientists known as the Science Review Team (SRT) found serious problems in research used to support regulatory policies involving panthers.

In 2003, the SRT released a report containing its verdict. As you might guess, it ripped apart Maehr’s work, piece by piece, and yes, they called him out by name. They didn’t label him a fraud, but they made it clear that Dr. Panther had done some pretty shady things.

Because they were scientists, they didn’t scream out their findings in impassioned prose. They were cool and calm—but there was no mistaking what they were saying.

‘I shot at my own foot with my own gun’: Journal rebuffs attempt at un-retraction

An Elsevier journal has denied the efforts of a group of researchers — well, most of them, anyway — to reverse a retraction after having agreed to the move in the first place.

The dispute centers on a 2018 paper in Preventive Medicine Reports titled “Association between low-testosterone and kidney stones in US men: The national health and nutrition examination survey 2011–2012” — which, as the title implies, found that:

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