Ever wonder how editors figure out whether a paper should be corrected, retracted, or left as-is? For a window into that crucial decision-making process, the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) publishes a number of anonymized cases per year, in which they weigh in on a dilemma faced by a journal editor. The organization has weighed … Continue reading What happens before a retraction? A behind-the-scenes look from COPE
In an interesting letter printed in today’s Nature, biologists Sophien Kamoun and Cyril Zipfel suggest that “failure by authors to correct their mistakes should be classified as scientific misconduct.” They note that this policy is already in place at their institute, The Sainsbury Laboratory (TSL). We contacted Kamoun to ask what constituted a mistake, given that numerous papers have received queries, such … Continue reading Poll: If authors don’t address mistakes, is that misconduct?
A highly cited paper by a well-known scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who studies longevity could have aged better: The ten-year-old paper has earned its second correction. It’s one of multiple papers by lead author Leonard Guarente that have been questioned on PubPeer. Guarente has already retracted one, and plans to address another.
A promising early career researcher has been dismissed from her post at the National Center for Cardiovascular Research (CNIC) in Spain, following “an alleged ongoing fraud,” according to El Pais. We don’t know what exactly the internal investigation into Susana González’s work found; El Pais relied on anonymous sources, and the CNIC confirmed only that they dismissed her on February 29th. … Continue reading Stem cell researcher in Spain dismissed following investigation
The week at Retraction Watch was dominated by the retraction of “the Creator” paper, but we also reported on a scientist under investigation losing a grant, and a case brewing at a New Jersey university. Here’s what was happening elsewhere:
Sonia Melo, the recipient of an early career award from the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) who fell under investigation after one of her papers was retracted, has now lost the grant. On the EMBO release announcing the nine awardees of the 2015 Installation Grants, there now appears an asterisk beside Melo’s name. At the bottom of … Continue reading EMBO awardee under investigation loses grant
Mike Rossner has made a name for himself in academic publishing as somewhat of a “manipulation detective.” As the editor of The Journal of Cell Biology, in 2002 he initiated a policy of screening all images in accepted manuscripts, causing the journal to reject roughly 1% of papers that had already passed peer review. Other … Continue reading Don’t trust an image in a scientific paper? Manipulation detective’s company wants to help.
A 2006 paper investigating the effects of docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) and celecoxib on prostate cancer cells has been retracted because it appears to contain panels that were duplicated, and the authors could not provide the raw data to show otherwise. This is the second paper the authors have lost because they couldn’t furnish the original data … Continue reading “We are living in hell:” Authors retract 2nd paper due to missing raw data
The week at Retraction Watch featured a peer review nightmare come true, and a look at why publishing negative findings is hard. Here’s what was happening elsewhere:
An investigation at Johns Hopkins University has uncovered several issues with the figures in two papers on a lung disease linked to smoking, one of which is highly cited. The American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine is retracting both papers, which examine the role of protein NRF2 in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. But both contain spliced … Continue reading Johns Hopkins investigation leads to retraction of two lung papers, one highly cited