A few days after Clinical Infectious Diseases published a set of guidelines for using antibiotics in patients with cancer and dangerously compromised immune systems, we noticed that they had retracted the paper. The Medline notice read:
Jatinder Ahluwalia apparently did some pretty bad things as a researcher at University College London. As we reported in November, in an investigation related to a Nature retraction, a research misconduct panel at UCL found that: Ahluwalia “renumbered the files to deceive [another coauthor,] Professor [Lucie] Clapp as to the results of his patch clamping … Continue reading Researcher found to have deceived colleague — and perhaps sabotaged others — decides to study plagiarism
About two weeks ago, we reported on the first retraction of a paper co-authored by Silvia Bulfone-Paus, whose work at her Research Center Borstel lab is being investigated for misconduct. On Friday, Borstel announced that journals had accepted four more retractions of papers by Bulfone-Paus’s group. Three of those papers are in the Journal of … Continue reading Four more Bulfone-Paus paper retractions accepted
Salon today retracted a controversial 2005 story by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. about an alleged link between autism and thimerosal, the mercury-based preservative formerly used in vaccines. As Salon explains in their retraction notice, the online magazine had co-published the piece with Rolling Stone. The notice reads, in part:
As readers of this blog have no doubt sensed by now, the number of retractions per year seems to be on the rise. We feel that intuitively as we uncover more and more of them, but there are also data to suggest this is true. As if to demonstrate that, we’ve been trying to find … Continue reading Is scientific fraud on the rise?
A quick post this Sunday morning to draw your attention to two must-read items for anyone interested in the Anil Potti case or in how one goes about checking data. (A second paper by Potti et al was officially retracted on Friday.) First, a terrific profile of Joyce Shoffner in the Charlotte News & Observer. … Continue reading Update on Anil Potti: A patient in a trial based on retracted research speaks out; Baggerly on how to prevent the next fiasco
At least one of the dominoes may be falling from a scandal at Research Center Borstel. Retraction Watch has learned that one of six papers that an investigation found to include data manipulation will be retracted by the Journal of Leukocyte Biology. The paper, “ATP induces P2X7 receptor-independent cytokine and chemokine expression through P2X1 and … Continue reading Paper by Silvia Bulfone-Paus to be retracted
Yesterday, we reported on the retraction of a 2004 study in the Annals of Thoracic Surgery. As we noted, the notice’s language was, um, fuzzy, referring vaguely to an investigation by the University of Florida, which uncovered instances of repetitious, tabulated data from previously published studies. Today, we are slightly more clear, although what we … Continue reading Why was that paper retracted? Editor to Retraction Watch: “It’s none of your damn business”
2010 was a busy year at Retraction Watch. (Well, actually the first seven months of it weren’t busy at all, since we didn’t launch until August.) We’ve published 88 posts, an average of about four per week. We no longer wonder whether we’ll have enough material to post frequently, as Adam told The New York … Continue reading Top Retraction Watch posts of 2010, and a short wish list for 2011
A leading Japanese virologist has received a 10-year publishing ban from the American Society of Microbiology after many of his published articles were found to have evidence of data manipulation. In its January 2011 issue, Infection and Immunity, an ASM title, is retracting five articles by the researcher, Naoki Mori, of the University of Ryukyus … Continue reading Japanese virologist hit with publishing ban after widespread data manipulation