A deluge of bizarre and malicious emails targeting a professor at Harvard Medical School has left him reeling, while raising questions about the smear campaign’s use of a popular online forum where scientists publicly critique research. Joseph Loscalzo sent a letter to PubPeer, the online forum, in September describing an “aggressive cyberstalking and harassment campaign” … Continue reading Cyberstalking pits Harvard professor against PubPeer
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 The week at Retraction Watch featured: Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up to over 375. There are more than 45,000 retractions in The Retraction Watch Database — which is now part of Crossref. The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker now contains well over 200 titles. … Continue reading Weekend reads: Hijacked journals polluting an index; special issues take a hit; a data breach at a megajournal
Purdue University has reached a settlement with the federal government to pay back grant money the institution received through applications submitted with falsified data, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Indiana. The settlement resolves allegations under the False Claims Act related to the case of Alice C. Chang (who also … Continue reading Purdue agrees to pay feds back $737,000 for grant submissions with fake data
It’s almost Giving Tuesday. 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 The week at Retraction Watch featured: Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up to over 375. There are more than 44,000 retractions in The Retraction Watch Database — which is now part of Crossref. The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker now contains … Continue reading Weekend reads: ‘A scientific fraud epidemic’; censorship by retraction; buying and selling articles
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 The week at Retraction Watch featured: Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up to over 375. There are more than 44,000 retractions in The Retraction Watch Database — which is now part of Crossref. The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker now contains well over 200 titles. … Continue reading Weekend reads: ‘What’s wrong with peer review?’; ‘how to catch a scientific fraud’; superconductor research falls apart
A radiology professor in France who plagiarized others’ work in a review article has resigned from his role as deputy editor of a medical journal amid new concerns about his publications, Retraction Watch has learned. The professor, Romaric Loffroy of CHU Dijon Bourgogne, was first and corresponding author of the offending review, which included large … Continue reading Exclusive: Editor caught plagiarizing resigns as more concerns emerge
“These findings are unjustified.” That’s how a biologist at the Jesse Brown Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Chicago described the conclusions of a federal investigation that found she had faked images and inflated sample sizes in published papers and a grant application. The biologist, Hee-Jeong Im Sampen, has been banned from conducting VA research. Sampen, … Continue reading ‘A travesty’: A researcher found guilty of misconduct by federal U.S. government responds
A researcher who sued the publisher PLOS to prevent it from posting an expression of concern for one of her papers has dropped her suit, and the publisher tells us it will add a correction to the article instead – but may “revisit this case” to deal with “unresolved issues.” We’ve previously reported on the … Continue reading PLOS backs down from expression of concern after author’s lawsuit
A research biologist at the Jesse Brown Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Chicago faked images and inflated sample sizes in published papers and a grant application, the federal agency has determined. Hee-Jeong Im Sampen, also a research professor of biomedical engineering at the University of Illinois, Chicago, “engaged in research misconduct by intentionally, knowingly and/or … Continue reading US VA scientist banned from agency research for faking data
The director of one the nation’s premier cancer centers has been suspended amid concerns over several of his papers – but he tells Retraction Watch it is unrelated to comments about that work on PubPeer. An email Wednesday to employees at New York University’s medical center – and a subsequent message to staff at the … Continue reading Exclusive: NYU cancer center director suspended