Search Results for: stem cell

Science publishes Voinnet’s 19th, 20th, and 21st corrections

Prominent plant biologist Olivier Voinnet has issued three more corrections in this week’s issue of Science. Collectively, the papers have earned more than 1400 citations, according to Thomson Scientific’s Web of Knowledge. By our count, he’s now at 21 corrections and seven retractions, following months of questions about his work. He’s been the subject of an investigation that found he “breached his … Continue reading Science publishes Voinnet’s 19th, 20th, and 21st corrections

Fast-tracked PNAS papers are cited less often — but gap is shrinking

An analysis of more than 50,000 papers submitted to Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) shows that those published using its “contributed track” — in which academy members can fast-track their own papers by coordinating the peer-review process themselves — have been cited less often than regular submissions, but that gap is shrinking. … Continue reading Fast-tracked PNAS papers are cited less often — but gap is shrinking

List of retractions, corrections grows for Duke researchers

Duke researcher Michael Foster and his former co-author Erin Potts-Kant are adding to their notice count with a major correction from late last year to a paper on how certain cells in mice respond to a pneumonia infection, citing “potential discrepancies in the data.” The correction is actually a partial retraction: The note explains that parts of three figures should … Continue reading List of retractions, corrections grows for Duke researchers

Romanian law shortens jail time for prisoners who write books. (They may ax it.)

Romanian officials are taking a stand against a long-standing oddity in the law that entitles prisoners to 30 days off their jail sentence for every piece of academic writing they author. The crackdown is occurring after a surge in jail literature in the last two years— approximately 200 inmates have authored around 400 scientific works … Continue reading Romanian law shortens jail time for prisoners who write books. (They may ax it.)

Misidentified DNA leads authors to retract zebrafish cholesterol paper

Authors are retracting a 2012 paper on cholesterol metabolism in zebrafish after realizing it included a case of mistaken identity in a DNA sequence crucial to some aspects of the experiment.   A postdoc misidentified the plasmid in question after failing to fully sequence it before including it in the experiment. A technician in the lab found … Continue reading Misidentified DNA leads authors to retract zebrafish cholesterol paper

Suspicions of data manipulation lead to correction of testicular cancer paper

The corresponding author of a paper on testicular cancer is telling readers to discount a figure after she learned it may have been manipulated. Although that one figure in the 2005 paper in the British Journal of Cancer may be problematic, the authors found data to support the other figures, and its conclusions. This isn’t the first … Continue reading Suspicions of data manipulation lead to correction of testicular cancer paper

Four retractions follow Swedish government findings of negligence, dishonesty

A Swedish ethical review board has censured two biologists and their employer, Uppsala University, for events related to “extensive image manipulations” in five papers published between 2010 and 2014. The case has led to criticism from an outside expert — who brought the allegations to Uppsala — over the current system in Sweden for handling … Continue reading Four retractions follow Swedish government findings of negligence, dishonesty

Voinnet’s notice count grows, as he notches his 18th correction

Olivier Voinnet, a high-profile plant scientist at ETH Zurich, has earned a mega-correction. It wrapped up a rough year for the biologist, which included his seventh retraction, and a CNRS investigation that found evidence of misconduct. This latest correction, to a paper on the mechanisms behind RNA silencing in Arabidopsis, was published in RNA. The 2007 paper has been cited … Continue reading Voinnet’s notice count grows, as he notches his 18th correction

Eight retractions for fake reviews lead journal to suspend author nominations

An investigation has uncovered fake reviews on 21 papers submitted to the Journal of the Renin-Angiotensin Aldosterone System. After taking a second look at accepted papers with an author-nominated reviewer, the journal discovered that the listed reviewers on the 21 papers, though real people, had never submitted a report. Eight of the papers have been retracted by … Continue reading Eight retractions for fake reviews lead journal to suspend author nominations

E. coli gene paper falls to mistaken mutation

Researchers in Germany have retracted their 2011 article in the Journal of Bacteriology after another lab pointed out a fatal error in the paper. The article, “Escherichia coli Exports Cyclic AMP via TolC,” came from a group at Tübingen University led by Klaus Hantke. The paper focuses on the crucial role of the membrane channel … Continue reading E. coli gene paper falls to mistaken mutation