News bulletin: Ivan is scheduled to appear on CNN today with Kyra Phillips to discuss a recent case we covered involving faked results of an HIV vaccine. Details can always change, but as of now the interview will appear at 2:40 p.m. Eastern.
Doing the right thing: Yale psychology lab retracts monkey papers for inaccurate coding
In the midst of the holiday season, it’s a pleasure to be able to share the story of a scientist doing the right thing at significant professional cost — especially a researcher in psychology, a field that has been battered lately by scandal.
Sometime after publishing two papers — one in Developmental Science and another in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology — Yale’s Laurie Santos and her students realized there were problems with their data. We’ll let Santos — who made sure to respond to our request for comment immediately, in the midst of holiday travel, so that we had all the details and could help get the word out — tell the story: Continue reading Doing the right thing: Yale psychology lab retracts monkey papers for inaccurate coding
“Not suitable in this context” means retraction in pharmacology journal
Pharmacology Biochemistry and Behavior had a curious retraction notice in September that we’re just now getting around to, but we think you’ll find it to have been worth the wait.
The article, “Interaction of Somatostatin Receptor-2 and Neuropeptide Y Receptor-1 in mice dorsal root ganglion neurons on the Pinch-Nerve injury model,” came from a group in Harbin, China, and Frieburg, Germany, and was published in April 2013.
According to the notice: Continue reading “Not suitable in this context” means retraction in pharmacology journal
Authorship dispute topples anesthesia paper
An authorship dispute between a pair of Egyptian physicians has led to the retraction of their 2012 article on anesthetic technique for laparoscopic colon surgery.
The article, “General anesthesia versus segmental thoracic or conventional lumbar spinal anesthesia for patients undergoing laparoscopic cholecystectomy,” appeared in Anesthesia Essays and Researches — a publication of the Pan Arab Federation of Societies of Anesthesiologists. It written by Gamal Yousef and Ahmed E. Lasheen, both of Zagazig University (which, we’re guessing, would hold the record for institution of higher learning with the most possible points in Scrabble — with a triple word tile that’s at least 131 points, including the seven-letter bonus!).
According to the retraction notice: Continue reading Authorship dispute topples anesthesia paper
Former Iowa State researcher faked HIV vaccine findings: ORI
A former researcher at Iowa State University (ISU) faked results of experiments to make tests of a vaccine against HIV in animals look more powerful, according to the Office of Research Integrity (ORI).
Specifically, ORI and ISU found that Dong-Pyou Han Continue reading Former Iowa State researcher faked HIV vaccine findings: ORI
Weekend reads: How to be a good peer reviewer, the replication backlash
Another busy week at Retraction Watch. Here’s a taste of scientific publishing news from elsewhere: Continue reading Weekend reads: How to be a good peer reviewer, the replication backlash
None for all, as selfish co-author loses adhesion paper by cutting out colleagues
Authors should stick together, right?
A materials scientist in France has learned that lesson the hard way, having been forced to retract his 2012 paper in the Journal of Adhesion Science and Technology because he neglected to list any of his co-authors.
The paper, “A generalized cure model for one-part room temperature vulcanizing sealants and adhesives,” was written — ostensibly, at least — by François de Buyl, whose LinkedIn page says is a lighting engineer at Dow Corning Europe. (He worked as a materials scientist at Dow prior to that.) de Buyl is the sole author on the paper, which is why we’re reading the following notice from the journal: Continue reading None for all, as selfish co-author loses adhesion paper by cutting out colleagues
Chip off the old block: Pregnancy paper yanked for plagiarism
The Journal of Pregnancy has retracted a 2012 article by a pair of researchers in Iran who lifted the contents from an article published 10 years previous.
The paper, “The Effects of Fetal Gender on Serum Human Chorionic Gonadotropin and Testosterone in Normotensive and Preeclamptic Pregnancies,” was written by Nahid Lorzadeh and Sirous Kazemirad, OBs at Lorestan University of Medical Sciences. It has yet to be cited, according to Thomson Scientific’s Web of Knowledge.
Here’s the notice: Continue reading Chip off the old block: Pregnancy paper yanked for plagiarism
Danish commitee finds Klarlund Pedersen, Penkowa guilty of scientific dishonesty
Two researchers in Denmark are guilty of scientific dishonesty, the Danish Committees on Scientific Dishonesty (DCSD, Danish acronym UVVU) has concluded.
In July, the DCSD said in a draft report that Bente Klarlund Pedersen had acted in a “scientifically dishonest” and “grossly negligent” manner. She — and many of her defenders — responded by saying that while she had made mistakes, she had not committed misconduct. Here’s a key quote from a letter her attorney wrote to the committee: Continue reading Danish commitee finds Klarlund Pedersen, Penkowa guilty of scientific dishonesty
“This unfortunate incident”: Resubmission leads to retraction of readmission paper
The Journal of Surgical Oncology has retracted a 2007 paper on hospitalizations of breast cancer patients for being a duplicate of another, presumably earlier, article. Although the usable information in the retraction notice ends just about there.
The article, “Factors Affecting Hospital Readmission Rates for Breast Cancer Patients in Western Australia,” appeared online in January 2007 in the journal and came from a group at the School of Finance and Applied Statistics at Australian National University in Canberra.
According to the notice: Continue reading “This unfortunate incident”: Resubmission leads to retraction of readmission paper