A chemistry journal has retracted a nanoparticle paper following heavy outcry from readers, who alleged the paper contained signs of obvious manipulation. After the paper appeared in 2017, one critic lamented it contained “obviously fabricated” images, and asked the journal to retract it. Another suggested the presence of one image merited “an instant lifetime ban.” … Continue reading Chemistry journal retracts highly criticized paper
We seem to be past the worst of our technical issues, so thanks for your patience with us over the past few weeks. (Some of the fixes came at a cost, so we would be remiss if we did not ask readers to consider a donation to support our work.) The week at Retraction Watch featured … Continue reading Weekend reads: Automated image duplication detection?; journal editor frustrations; cash for catching errors
Last October, David Hawkes read a letter to the editor that shocked him: It alleged Hawkes and a colleague had lied about their professional affiliations. Hawkes told Retraction Watch that he contacted the journal Toxicology on October 19 to complain that the letter contained “numerous factual errors that could adversely affect our professional standing,” and … Continue reading Retracted letter about vaccine safety made potentially “slanderous” claims
Here’s an unusual way to allege plagiarism: Do it in the reference list. That’s what Brian Levine, a professor in the College of Information and Computer Sciences at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst, did when he came across a paper he wanted to cite but suspected of plagiarism. When Levine published his 2017 paper, he … Continue reading Unusual: Author uses a reference list to accuse a paper of plagiarism
We’ve been having some technical issues with the site, which may have kept some readers from accessing our content this week. We think we’ve figured out what was wrong, and fixed it, but in the meantime here’s what we were up to this week, in case you missed it:
The week at Retraction Watch featured a look at whether scientists in industry or academia admit to more misconduct, another strange publication twist for a vaccine study, and the correction of a study that claimed anti-gay attitudes could take more than a decade off of gay peoples’ lifespans. Here’s what was happening elsewhere:
The U.S. National Institutes of Health is closing PubMed Commons, the feature that enabled readers to post comments on abstracts indexed in PubMed. NIH announced it will be discontinuing the service — which allowed only signed comments from authors with papers indexed in PubMed, among other restrictions — after more than four years, due to … Continue reading PubMed shuts down its comments feature, PubMed Commons
Title: Dysferlin Interacts with Histone Deacetylase 6 and Increases alpha-Tubulin Acetylation What Caught Our Attention: After losing three articles for data manipulation, Michael Sinnreich has retracted another paper in PLoS ONE. All four retractions share some of the same authors, including Bilal Azakir and Sabrina Di Fulvio, who is listed as the first author on … Continue reading Caught Our Notice: Swiss group loses 4th paper for data manipulation
A university in Switzerland has come to the defense of a communications researcher found guilty of plagiarism — and sanctioned after facing additional allegations, including plagiarizing a former Pope. On Jan. 18, the Swiss newspaper, Ticinonline, published a statement from the University of Lugano in response to recent allegations that Peter J. Schulz had plagiarized … Continue reading University defends researcher accused of plagiarizing former Pope
Two researchers with a troubled publication history about vaccine safety have withdrawn their third paper. Along with several other co-authors, Christopher Shaw, of the University of British Columbia, and Lucija Tomljenovic, of the Neural Dynamics Research Group, recently withdrew a 2017 paper about a controversy over a tetanus vaccination program in Kenya. The paper … Continue reading For the second time, researchers retract — then republish — a vaccine paper