How does it feel to have your scientific paper plagiarized? Part 2

On May 11 of this year, Juan Antonio Baeza, an environmental engineering researcher at Universitat Autonoma Barcelona was looking for papers in Water Research about knowledge-based systems, the subject of his 1999 PhD thesis. As he tells Retraction Watch, when he came across “Improving the efficiencies of simultaneous organic substance and nitrogen removal in a multi-stage loop membrane bioreactor-based PWWTP using an on-line Knowledge-Based Expert System”:

I started to read this paper and some sentences of the abstract were interesting,  well, really I thought that I would have written that with the same words! But after reading some parts of the paper I realized that those were really my words of a previous paper published in the same journal in 2002.

I started to compare it and around 40-50% of the paper was a direct copy of my paper without changing even a comma.

So he wrote to the journal on May 14: Continue reading How does it feel to have your scientific paper plagiarized? Part 2

Two Moriguchi stem cell papers being retracted

It was, as Nature News wrote last month, a story that “seemed too good to be true:”

Stem-cell transplant claims debunked

Transplant of induced pluripotent stem cells to treat heart failure probably never happened

Hisashi Moriguchi, a visiting researcher at the University of Tokyo, had claimed a result that would have put him years ahead of researchers toiling in stem cell research. But the claims were met with a great deal of doubt — to say the least — and the story began to unravel when Harvard, where Moriguchi said he’d done the work, denied it had ever taken place.

And as expected, the retractions have now started. Today, a Nature Publishing Group journal said they would be retracting two papers, “A therapeutic method for the direct reprogramming of human liver cancer cells with only chemicals” and “Successful cryopreservation of human ovarian cortex tissues using supercooling.” The notices for the Scientific Reports papers will both say the same thing: Continue reading Two Moriguchi stem cell papers being retracted

Intent was there, but not the intention-to-treat analysis: Breast cancer study retracted

A group of Dutch researchers has retracted a paper they published in March after apparently learning that they’d bungled their statistical analysis in the study.

The article, “Effects of a pre-visit educational website on information recall and needs fulfilment in breast cancer genetic counselling, a randomized controlled trial,” was published in Breast Cancer Research by Akke Albada of the Netherlands Institute for Health Services Research and colleagues.

But according to the notice, Utrecht, we have a problem: Continue reading Intent was there, but not the intention-to-treat analysis: Breast cancer study retracted

Make it a double: Alcohol treatment study pulled for duplication

European Child & Adolescent Psychiatry has retracted a 2003 paper on the treatment of alcoholism for a vague “copyright violation.” But the reason appears to be that the article was largely identical to a 2002 report from one of the authors and other colleagues.

The offending paper, “Acamprosate and its efficacy in treating alcohol dependent adolescents,” appeared in June 2003 and has been cited 51 times, according to Google Scholar. The authors were Helmut Niederhofer and Wolfgang Staffen, of the Christian Doppler-Klinik, in Salzburg.

According to the rather uninformative notice: Continue reading Make it a double: Alcohol treatment study pulled for duplication

You’ve been dupe’d: Catching up on authors who liked their work enough to use it again

photo by Mark Turnauckas via Flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/marktee/

As we’ve noted before, we generally let duplication retractions make their way to the bottom of our to-do pile, since there’s often less of an interesting story behind them, duplication is hardly the worst of publishing sins, and the notices usually tell the story. (These are often referred to — imprecisely — as “self-plagiarism.”)

But that skews what’s represented here — boy, are there a lot of duplication retractions we haven’t covered! — and we might as well be more comprehensive. Plus, our eagle-eyed readers may find issues that we won’t see on a quick scan.

So with this post, we’re inaugurating a new feature here at Retraction Watch, “You’ve been dupe’d.” Every now and then, we’ll gather five of these duplication retractions at a time, and post them so they get into the mix, and into our category listing (see drop-down menu in right-hand column if you haven’t already). Here are the first five: Continue reading You’ve been dupe’d: Catching up on authors who liked their work enough to use it again

And then there were 28: Two more retractions for Diederik Stapel

Achtentwintig.

That’s 28 in Dutch, and is the number of retractions so far racked up by Diederik Stapel, according to our count.

The latest two to come to our attention are in the British Journal of Social Psychology, where Stapel has already had a retraction.

Here’s one notice: Continue reading And then there were 28: Two more retractions for Diederik Stapel

PLoS ONE retracts paper on treatment of tissue disease for lack of ethical approval, erroneous data

PLOS ONE has retracted an article it published earlier this year by a group from Australia who failed to receive adequate ethics approval for their study.

The paper, “Late Complications of Clinical Clostridium Histolyticum Collagenase Use in Dupuytren’s Disease,” came from Warren M. Rozen, Yasith Edirisinghe and John Crock (sorry, irony machine not working today). Dupuytren’s causes thickening of the fascia in the hands and often requires surgery.  In 2011 the FDA approved a treatment for the ailment that involves injections of an enzyme — Clostridium Histolyticum Collagenase, or CHC — into the affected area.

The Aussie article looked at the effects of CHC injections in 12 patients over one year, finding that two of the patients suffered Continue reading PLoS ONE retracts paper on treatment of tissue disease for lack of ethical approval, erroneous data

Hydrogen study has “merit” — just not enough to avoid retraction

The International Journal of Hydrogen Energy has retracted a paper by a group from Malaysia and India who, reading between the lines, couldn’t quite get the low notes to overcome what the high notes lacked. Or something like that.

The paper, “Hydrogen production from sea water using waste aluminium and calcium oxide,” appears to have come out of the quaintly named 7th Petite Workshop on the Defect Chemical Nature of Energy Materials, held in March 2011 in Norway.

According to the notice: Continue reading Hydrogen study has “merit” — just not enough to avoid retraction

Update: Data fabricator had masters’ degree revoked

On Friday, we reported on the case of a retraction in the American Journal of Physiology — Cell Physiology by kinesiology researchers at Canada’s University of Waterloo for data fabrication by a graduate student, Sara Michelle Norris. We heard back from Waterloo yesterday, and have more details.

In our Friday post, we wondered whether Norris’s 2009 masters’ thesis,“Contribution of Sarcoplasmic Reticulum Calcium Pumping to Resting Mouse Muscle Metabolism,” might have been compromised. Waterloo tells us Norris is no longer at the university: Continue reading Update: Data fabricator had masters’ degree revoked

Data fabrication fells muscle physiology paper

Kinesiology researchers at the University of Waterloo in Canada have been forced to retract a 2010 paper in the American Journal of Physiology — Cell Physiology in the wake of revelations that the first author, then a graduate student, fabricated her data.

The paper, “ATP consumption by sarcoplasmic reticulum Ca2+ pumps accounts for 50% of resting metabolic rate in mouse fast and slow twitch skeletal muscle,” was written by Sarah Michelle Norris and colleagues and published in March 2010.

According to the retraction notice: Continue reading Data fabrication fells muscle physiology paper