Researchers in Iran have lost a paper on Covid-19 infection in a two-month-old boy after the journal learned that they’d fabricated ethics approval for the article. It’s the 250th Covid-19 retraction by our count. “Coronavirus disease 2019 in a 2-month-old male infant: a case report from Iran” appeared in December 2020 in Clinical and Experimental … Continue reading 250th COVID-19 retraction is for faked ethics approval
Has Springer Nature’s Scientific Reports been targeted with an authorship for sale scheme? At least one expert in such matters thinks so. The journal has issued two recent expressions of concern for papers by researchers from Indonesia, Iran and Russia with highly unusual – and oddly similar – constellations of authors. One 2021 article, “Numerical … Continue reading Papers in Scientific Reports – and their expressions of concern – raise questions
Would you consider a donation to support Weekend Reads, and our daily work? Thanks in advance. The week at Retraction Watch featured: Author objects to “irrelevant reviewers” as journal retracts four papers Meet the hijacked journal that keeps rising from the ashes Engineering researcher who cast blame on co-author will soon have 12 retractions Lawsuit prompts retraction … Continue reading Weekend reads: How to fix peer review; a research ethics oath; papers become less readable
Would you consider a donation to support Weekend Reads, and our daily work? Thanks in advance. The week at Retraction Watch featured: Japanese university recommends five retractions after investigating botany researcher ‘Our deepest apology’: Journal retracts 30 likely paper mill articles after investigation published by Retraction Watch Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up to … Continue reading Weekend reads: Retracted papers that keep getting cited; ivermectin retractions; publishing peer reviews
Would you consider a donation to support Weekend Reads, and our daily work? Thanks in advance. The week at Retraction Watch featured: The Lancet more than doubles its impact factor, eclipsing NEJM for the first time ever Author demands a refund after his paper is retracted for plagiarism Seven months after an author request, journal retracts February: … Continue reading Weekend reads: Retracted COVID-19 papers keep being cited; “‘difficult’ name penalty”; economist accused of plagiarism
A Springer Nature journal has retracted a paper on hepatitis C infection it had previously corrected for problematic data – but in between the editors declared the case closed. The paper, “The interaction between microRNA-152 and DNA methyltransferase-1 as an epigenetic prognostic biomarker in HCV-induced liver cirrhosis and HCC patients,” was published in July 2019 … Continue reading February: ‘we don’t agree there is an issue here.’ June: Retracted.
The Lancet has overtaken the New England Journal of Medicine as the medical journal with the highest impact factor, according to Clarivate’s 2022 update to its Journal Citation Reports. And the jump wasn’t subtle: The Lancet’s impact factor – a controversial measure of how often a journal’s papers are cited on average – more than … Continue reading The Lancet more than doubles its impact factor, eclipsing NEJM for the first time ever
A med-tech journal whose editor-in-chief is the president-in-waiting of the American Medical Association has retracted six papers for compromised peer review and related problems. The Journal of Medical Systems, led by Jesse Ehrenfeld – an anesthesiologist in Wisconsin who this week became president-elect of the AMA – said the articles were part of a special … Continue reading Journal run by new AMA president-elect caught in special issue scam
A cancer journal has retracted a 2016 paper by a group in China after deciding – more than five years after publication – it couldn’t stand behind the work. The article, “The preoperative platelet–lymphocyte ratio versus neutrophil–lymphocyte ratio: which is better as a prognostic factor in oral squamous cell carcinoma?”, appeared in Therapeutic Advances in … Continue reading Retraction leads to review change at SAGE journal
Would you consider a donation to support Weekend Reads, and our daily work? Thanks in advance. The week at Retraction Watch featured: A stolen manuscript, part two: The plagiarist begs for forgiveness as another group plagiarizes the same work A paper claimed to describe ‘the first potent and specific anti-COVID-19 drug.’ Now it’s retracted. Medical school dean … Continue reading Weekend reads: ‘Foul play’ among protective scholars; how to increase rigor; science and a ‘culture of misinformation’