Search Results for: elsevier

What publishers and countries do most retractions for fake peer review come from?

A new analysis — which included scanning Retraction Watch posts — has identified some trends in papers pulled for fake peer review, a subject we’ve covered at length. For those who aren’t familiar, fake reviews arise when researchers associated with the paper in question (most often authors) create email addresses for reviewers, enabling them to … Continue reading What publishers and countries do most retractions for fake peer review come from?

Renewable energy researcher with troubled record loses another paper

A renewable energy researcher who recycled material in several papers — and has already agreed to withdraw 10 studies — has lost another paper. In January, we reported that six of 10 papers flagged by an investigation into author Shyi-Min Lu have either been retracted or withdrawn. Now, Lu has lost another paper that was not … Continue reading Renewable energy researcher with troubled record loses another paper

Weekend reads: How to create tabloid science headlines; sugar industry buys research; the citation black market

The week at Retraction Watch featured a look at whether we have an epidemic of flawed meta-analyses, and the story of a strange case involving climate research and pseudonyms. Here’s what was happening elsewhere:

U.S. gov’t researchers withdraw climate paper after using pseudonyms

Climate scientists from the U.S. Department of Agriculture have withdrawn a study they wrote under eyebrow-raising pseudonyms. The withdrawn paper, about predicting surface temperatures of planets, appeared in Advances in Space Research in August, 2015, and is authored by Den Volokin and Lark ReLlez. Normally, a withdrawal wouldn’t raise our eyebrows, but climate scientist Gavin Schmidt pointed out on Twitter … Continue reading U.S. gov’t researchers withdraw climate paper after using pseudonyms

Peer review manipulation fells another study

A spectroscopy journal has retracted a 2016 study after concluding that its editors had been misled by a fake review. According to the retraction notice, the journal — Spectrochimica Acta Part A: Molecular and Biomolecular Spectroscopy — accepted the paper due to positive feedback from someone assuming the identity of an expert reviewer, using an … Continue reading Peer review manipulation fells another study

Cancer researcher logs 5th retraction

A cancer researcher has added a fifth retraction to his name — but the notice doesn’t mention any problems with the paper itself.  Rather, the Journal of Mammary Gland Biology and Neoplasia decided to retract the paper because it referenced other papers that had been retracted as a result of data manipulation. The notice doesn’t … Continue reading Cancer researcher logs 5th retraction

A plagiarism loop: Authors copied from papers that had copied from others

Note to self: If you’re going to duplicate your own work, don’t copy from papers that plagiarize others’ research. Just such a mistake has cost a PhD candidate three papers — although his co-author argues that a company is in part to blame. Hossein Jafarzadeh, who is studying mechanical engineering at the University of Tehran, apparently asked a … Continue reading A plagiarism loop: Authors copied from papers that had copied from others

You’ve been dupe’d: Results so nice, they’re published twice

With retraction notices continuing to pour in, we like to occasionally take the opportunity to cover several at a time to keep up. We’ve compiled a handful of retractions that were all issued to papers that were published twice by at least one of the same authors — known as duplication. (Sometimes, this can be … Continue reading You’ve been dupe’d: Results so nice, they’re published twice

7th retraction for Ohio researcher who manipulated dozens of figures

A pharmacology researcher at Ohio State University has added his seventh retraction, four years after a finding of misconduct by the U.S. Office of Integrity (ORI). An analysis of the work of Terry Elton determined that he had falsified and/or fabricated Western blots in eighteen (18) figures and in six (6) published papers.  In 2012, the ORI … Continue reading 7th retraction for Ohio researcher who manipulated dozens of figures

Uranium study pulled after author says data were falsified

A researcher has pulled a paper about uranium oxide fuel pellets after notifying the journal the data had been falsified — and, what’s more, the publisher can’t verify the identities of the co-authors.  Originally, the Journal of the European Ceramic Society paper suggested a way to increase the compatibility of uranium oxide fuel pellets, which are … Continue reading Uranium study pulled after author says data were falsified