Last week, an environmental journal published a paper on the use of renewable energy in cleaning up contaminated land. To read it, you would have to pay 40 euros. But you still wouldn’t know for sure who wrote it. Ostensibly authored by researchers in China, “Revitalizing our earth: unleashing the power of green energy in … Continue reading Signs of undeclared ChatGPT use in papers mounting
In the midst of a tumultuous year, the journal Concurrent Engineering: Research and Applications, a Sage title, is retracting 21 papers after an investigation identified signs of “compromised” peer review. Clarivate delisted the journal from its Web of Science index in March for failing to meet editorial quality criteria. Founding editor Biren Prasad, who managed … Continue reading Turmoil at Sage journal as retractions mount
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 The week at Retraction Watch featured: Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up to more than 350. There are now 42,000 retractions in our database — which powers retraction alerts in Edifix, EndNote, LibKey, Papers, and Zotero. The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker now contains 200 titles. And have you … Continue reading Weekend reads: When scholars sue; why university rankings reward bad science; AI making its way into publishing
Hundreds of conference papers published by the U.S.-based Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) show signs of plagiarism, citation fraud and other types of scientific misconduct, according to data sleuths. “I am concerned that the issue with these particular conferences is widespread enough such that it indicates systemic issues with their peer review systems,” … Continue reading Plague of anomalies in conference proceedings hint at ‘systemic issues’
Nick Wise had always been “slightly interested” in research integrity and fraud, just from working in science. Then, last July, from following image sleuth Elisabeth Bik on Twitter, he learned about the work of Guillaume Cabanac, Cyril Labbé, and Alexander Magazinov identifying “tortured phrases” in published papers. Such phrases – such as “bosom peril,” meaning … Continue reading Meet a sleuth whose work has resulted in more than 850 retractions
A physics publisher is retracting 494 papers after an investigation “indicated that some papers may have been created, manipulated, and/or sold by a commercial entity” – aka a paper mill. The vast majority – 463 articles – are from the Journal of Physics: Conference Series, while 21 are from IOP Conference Series: Materials Science & … Continue reading Physics publisher retracting nearly 500 likely paper mill papers
The tip came from the leadership of another scientific conference. Did the Association for Computing Machinery know that they had published the proceedings of a conference with essentially the same name as that organization, IEEE, on the same dates, in the same venue, and with lots of overlapping authors? The two versions of the meeting … Continue reading More than 300 at once: Publisher retracts entire conference proceedings
Sometimes leaving well-enough alone is the best policy. Ask Teja Santosh Dandibhotla. Upset that a paper of his had been retracted from the Journal of Physics: Conference Series, Santosh, a computer scientist at the CVR College of Engineering in Hyderabad, India, contacted us to plead his case. (We of course do not make decisions about retractions, … Continue reading The author of a retracted paper learns to be careful what he wishes for
IOP Publishing has retracted a total of 350 papers from two different 2021 conference proceedings because an “investigation has uncovered evidence of systematic manipulation of the publication process and considerable citation manipulation.” The case is just the latest involving the discovery of papers full of gibberish – aka “tortured phrases” – thanks to the work … Continue reading Publisher retracts 350 papers at once
The National Institute for Ocean Science (Ifremer) in France has flagged 11 papers on PubPeer for concerns including faked authorship and plagiarism, and has blasted the journals involved for their failure to adequately address the unethical work. In some cases, for example the International Journal of Innovative Computing, Information and Control, editors have removed the … Continue reading French ocean institute goes public about authors who forged their researchers’ names