A researcher who studied natural products for cancer at the University of Alabama, Birmingham (UAB), had six papers retracted last month, bringing him to a total of 12. Four of the recently retracted papers by Santosh Katiyar had appeared in PLOS ONE, and two had been published in Cancer Research. They have together been cited … Continue reading Former UAB natural products researcher up to a dozen retractions
On June 25, 2015, following an investigation into the work of a then-graduate student at University College Cork in Ireland, the senior author of a 2014 paper in PLOS ONE requested its retraction. The paper, said senior author Zubair Kabir in an email to Iratxe Puebla, the journal’s managing editor, was “fundamentally flawed.” Puebla responded … Continue reading The waiting game: A university requests a retraction. Then it waits three years.
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. The week at Retraction Watch featured a retraction for a prominent psychologist at Cornell, more … Continue reading Weekend reads: Tenured professor in Illinois fired; should journals publish CRISPR babies paper?; retracted vaccine-autism paper reappears
Welcome to the Top 10, Fazlul Sarkar. Sarkar, the cancer researcher formerly of Wayne State University who once tried to sue critics on PubPeer, has had another seven papers retracted. That makes a total of 40, and places him in the Top 10 of our leaderboard of authors with the most retractions. Three of the … Continue reading Cancer researcher who once tried to sue critics is up to 40 retracted papers
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. This week at Retraction Watch featured the retraction of happiness, an apology from a journal, and … Continue reading Weekend reads: An article on a controversial topic just disappears; mass resignations from a nutrition journal; the likely mistaken history of the vibrator
Less than two weeks ago, PLOS ONE published a paper about the parents of teenagers who appeared to immediately start questioning their gender identity around the time of puberty. Then the critiques flooded in. The paper — about a highly contentious issue — surveyed parents who felt that their children had suddenly started to question … Continue reading Reader outcry prompts Brown to retract press release on trans teens
A professor specializing in the health of children and pregnant women has left her post at the University of Glasgow, and issued three retractions in recent months. All three notices — issued by PLOS ONE — mention an investigation at the university, which found signs of data manipulation and falsification. Fiona Lyall, the last author … Continue reading Glasgow professor leaves post amidst multiple retractions
In early 2011, less than six months after we launched Retraction Watch, we came across a retraction from a surgery journal. The notice was scant on details, so co-founder Adam Marcus called the editor to ask why the paper had been retracted. The answer: “It’s none of your damn business.” It turns out that’s still … Continue reading Journal editors still don’t like talking about misconduct. And that’s a problem.
Evelyne Decullier & Hervé Maisonneuve have been studying retractions for a long time. They’ve looked at how long retractions take to show up in PubMed, and five years ago they published a paper on the quality of retraction notices — and how well they were disseminated — in 2008. Now, they’ve repeated that analysis for … Continue reading Have retraction notices improved over time?
A probe into the work of a researcher who studied natural products for cancer had many stops and starts along the way — including five extensions granted by the U.S. Office of Research Integrity — according to documents obtained by Retraction Watch. Following a public records request, we recently obtained a copy of the report … Continue reading A misconduct probe — which led to 20 retraction requests — took four years. Why?