When science writer Vito Tartamella noticed a physics paper co-authored by Stronzo Bestiale (which means “total asshole” in Italian) he did what anyone who’s written a book on surnames would do: He looked it up in the phonebook. What he found was a lot more complicated than a funny name. It turns out Stronzo Bestiale doesn’t … Continue reading Should papers be retracted if one of the authors is a total asshole?
Three physicists at Imperial College London have retracted a paper on Coulomb collisions, a kind of fender bender between two charged particles, after realizing their equations were written wrong. The mistake resulted in an erroneous conclusion about the strength of the collisions. Here’s the notice for “Effects of Large-Angle Coulomb Collisions on Inertial Confinement Fusion Plasmas”:
The authors of a 1997 paper on macular degeneration have lost the article after readers noticed uncanny similarities with a 1996 publication from several of the same authors. The retracted article, “Radiation therapy for macular degeneration: Technical considerations and preliminary results,” appeared in the International Journal of Radiation Oncology*Biology*Physics — otherwise known as the “Red … Continue reading Double dipping on trial data topples 17-year-old macular degeneration article
A physics graduate student at the University of Coimbra in Portugal attacked a professor with an axe earlier this month after losing a grant. The student, Colin Paul Gloster, attacked physics lecturer Maria Filomena Santos, who according to the Irish Mirror will “require reconstructive surgery as the axe cut very close to the tendons.” Speaking of … Continue reading “I am not a monster and I am not unreasonable:” Student attacks professor with axe after grant is cut
The authors of a paper on anesthetic waste gases in the operating room have pulled the article for plagiarism. The paper, titled “Further Pieces of Evidence to the Pulmonary Origin of Sevoflurane Escaping to the Operating Room During General Anaesthesia,” appeared in Cell Biochemistry and Biophysics and came from a group at various institutions in … Continue reading Wasted breath: Cribbing earns retraction of anesthesia paper
Here’s a physics retraction whose use of an exclamation point — the only one we’ve ever seen in a retraction notice! — makes the editors’ exasperation palpable. It’s also the the fourth retraction for R. K. Singhal, of the University of Rajasthan, Jaipur, India. Behold the notice for “Magnetic behavior of functionally modified spinel Ni0.4Ca0.6Fe2O4 … Continue reading Enthusiastic retraction and retracted correction mark loss of researcher’s fourth and fifth papers
After earning an erratum shortly after publication in 2009, a paper in Applied Physics Letters has now been retracted for the “regrettable mistake” of duplicating an earlier paper by the researchers. Here’s the notice for “Broadband and omnidirectional antireflection from conductive indium-tin-oxide nanocolumns prepared by glancing-angle deposition with nitrogen:”
Sometimes plagiarism, like an onion, has layers. That appears to be the case in a paper brought to our attention by sharp-eyed reader Vladimir Baulin, whose work was copied in a 2006 paper that Journal of Biological Physics retracted for plagiarism. But you can’t keep a good thief down: the plagiarizing authors just popped up in a new … Continue reading Recursive plagiarism? Researchers may have published a duplicate of a study retracted for plagiarism
This one deserves a “wow.” SAGE Publishers is retracting 60 articles from the Journal of Vibration and Control after an investigation revealed a “peer review and citation ring” involving a professor in Taiwan. [Please see an update on this post.] Here’s the beginning of a statement from SAGE:
In September, we wrote about the retraction of a physics paper for “a pattern that was unphysical.” The team, whose first author, R.K. Singhal refused to sign the notice, has had another paper retracted, this one in the Journal of Applied Physics. Here’s the notice for “Study of electronic structure and magnetization correlations in hydrogenated … Continue reading Physicists with retraction for a “pattern that was unphysical” lose another for manipulation