Search Results for: press release

Danish neuroscientist Penkowa, found guilty of misconduct, reappears as Scientology group headliner

Milena Penkowa, the Danish neuroscientist who has had four papers retracted and was found to have committed misconduct, is in the news again, this time for speaking at a museum exhibition by a Scientology-founded group. Titled ““Psykiatri – Dödens industri“ — “Psychiatry, Industry of Death” — the exhibition is at the museum of the Commission … Continue reading Danish neuroscientist Penkowa, found guilty of misconduct, reappears as Scientology group headliner

Aussie university asks for retraction, investigates former neurology researcher for fraud

The University of Queensland has decided to get out in front of a serious research misconduct scandal by issuing a press release about the item even before, well, we could get a hold of the story. The affair involves Bruce Murdoch (all of his links at UQ are defunct), an expert in movement disorders such … Continue reading Aussie university asks for retraction, investigates former neurology researcher for fraud

Leiden University fires employee for research fraud, two retractions to follow

A researcher at Leiden University Medical Center in the Netherlands has been fired for research fraud, and the university is retracting two papers, the Dutch press is reporting. But don’t ask us who the employee was. That information is conspicuously absent from the medical center’s communications on the subject. Here’s a press release from Leiden, … Continue reading Leiden University fires employee for research fraud, two retractions to follow

Retraction of 19-year-old Nature paper reveals hidden cameras, lab break-in, evidence tampering

We’ve often found that when some authors refuse to sign retraction notices, there’s a much bigger story than terse notices let on. And a retraction in this week’s Nature of a 19-year-old paper is a shining example of that. Here’s the brief notice for “Oligosaccharide ligands for NKR-P1 protein activate NK cells and cytotoxicity,” a … Continue reading Retraction of 19-year-old Nature paper reveals hidden cameras, lab break-in, evidence tampering

Authors retract already-corrected Nature malaria paper

Nature is retracting a 2010 paper by a team from Princeton and Drexel on the workings of Plasmodium falciparum, which causes malaria in people. How that came about seems to have been a winding road. The article — a research letter — titled “Branched tricarboxylic acid metabolism in Plasmodium falciparum,” came from the Princeton lab … Continue reading Authors retract already-corrected Nature malaria paper

UK researcher who faked data gets three months in jail

Steven Eaton, a UK scientist who cooked experiments while at the U.S.-based contract research outfit Aptuit, has been given a three-month prison term, making him the first person to serve time under a 1999 British law called the Good Laboratory Practice Regulations, according to the BBC. As the BBC reported:

Geneticists take HeLa sequence off-line after Lacks family notes they hadn’t given consent

HeLa — the cell line that has apparently taken over any number of others commonly used in science, suggesting that many researchers may not have been studying what they thought they were studying — is back in the news. This weekend, it was the DNA sequence of the cells that’s made headlines, with a quiet … Continue reading Geneticists take HeLa sequence off-line after Lacks family notes they hadn’t given consent

Charge of “scientific yellow journalism” has supervisor seeing red, leads to retraction

Last October, Anica Klockars, a neuroscience researcher at Uppsala University in Sweden, and a colleague published a controversial comment in the journal Small GTPases, a Landes Bioscience title. The title of the letter was meant to provoke: “Scientific yellow journalism.” As the authors wrote:

Cardiologist accused of misconduct strikes back in a journal

Retraction Watch readers may recall the case of Don Poldermans, a prominent Dutch cardiology researcher who left a research position in late 2011 amid an investigation into his work. In a letter in the American Journal of Medicine titled “Scientific Fraud or a Rush to Judgement?” Poldermans — three of whose papers are subject to … Continue reading Cardiologist accused of misconduct strikes back in a journal

Toothless wonder? Paper on “oldest human fossil in Europe” temporarily removed from journal’s site

A paper about a high-profile human fossil has been mysteriously removed from the journal that published it just two weeks ago. Here’s the notice for “The oldest human fossil in Europe dated to ca. 1.4 Ma at Orce (Spain),” originally published on March 5: