Retraction Watch
@retractionwatch.com
A project of The Center For Scientific Integrity https://centerforscientificintegrity.org/
Daily newsletter http://eepurl.com/bNRlUn
Database http://retractiondatabase.org
Tips team@retractionwatch.com (better than @ replies)
Daily newsletter http://eepurl.com/bNRlUn
Database http://retractiondatabase.org
Tips team@retractionwatch.com (better than @ replies)
The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker, developed and maintained by @abalkina.bsky.social, now has 400 entries.
The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker now has 400 entries
Sham journals that mimic real ones can fool unsuspecting authors who are submitting a manuscript, researchers looking for references for papers — and even indexing services aiming to be comprehensi…
retractionwatch.com
December 26, 2025 at 11:32 AM
The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker, developed and maintained by @abalkina.bsky.social, now has 400 entries.
A federal court has terminated a former researcher’s lawsuit against the U.S. government agency that barred her from receiving federal funds following an agency investigation that lasted 10 years.
Court tosses out researcher’s bid to overturn funding ban
A federal court has terminated a former researcher’s lawsuit against the U.S. government agency that barred her from receiving federal funds following an agency investigation that lasted 10 years. …
retractionwatch.com
December 23, 2025 at 6:59 PM
A federal court has terminated a former researcher’s lawsuit against the U.S. government agency that barred her from receiving federal funds following an agency investigation that lasted 10 years.
Earlier this year, Klaus Heese, a professor at Hanyang University in Seoul, noticed a review article he’d worked on had finally been published. But his name wasn’t on it, nor was that of another scientist who had also been involved in preparing the manuscript.
Professor in India adds coauthors who ‘kindly covered’ publication fee, removes others
Earlier this year, Klaus Heese, a professor at Hanyang University in Seoul, noticed a review article he’d worked on had finally been published. But his name wasn’t on it, nor was that of another sc…
retractionwatch.com
December 22, 2025 at 5:59 PM
Earlier this year, Klaus Heese, a professor at Hanyang University in Seoul, noticed a review article he’d worked on had finally been published. But his name wasn’t on it, nor was that of another scientist who had also been involved in preparing the manuscript.
Weekend reads: ‘How long does it take to kill zombie papers?’; ‘The H-Index of Suspicion’; former Springer editors launch new journal
Weekend reads: ‘How long does it take to kill zombie papers?’; ‘The H-Index of Suspicion’; former Springer editors launch new journal
Dear RW readers, we look forward to wrapping up the week with Weekend Reads. If you enjoy it too, please consider showing your support with a tax-deductible donation. Retraction Watch and the Retra…
retractionwatch.com
December 20, 2025 at 12:52 PM
Weekend reads: ‘How long does it take to kill zombie papers?’; ‘The H-Index of Suspicion’; former Springer editors launch new journal
Exclusive: A World Bank report on obesity trends with at least 14 fake references in the text has been removed from the website and is being reviewed by the organization following a Retraction Watch inquiry.
World Bank report ‘removed for review’ of nonexistent references after Retraction Watch inquiry
A World Bank report on obesity trends with at least 14 fake references in the text has been removed from the website and is being reviewed by the organization following a Retraction Watch inquiry.&…
retractionwatch.com
December 19, 2025 at 12:03 PM
Exclusive: A World Bank report on obesity trends with at least 14 fake references in the text has been removed from the website and is being reviewed by the organization following a Retraction Watch inquiry.
The U.S. Office of Research Integrity has been relatively quiet in 2025, releasing just two misconduct findings with only two weeks remaining in the year — the fewest the office has released since at least 2006. ORI typically releases an average of about 10 findings a year.
ORI has released just two misconduct findings this year
The U.S. Office of Research Integrity has been relatively quiet in 2025, releasing just two misconduct findings with only two weeks remaining in the year — the fewest the office has released since …
retractionwatch.com
December 18, 2025 at 8:01 PM
The U.S. Office of Research Integrity has been relatively quiet in 2025, releasing just two misconduct findings with only two weeks remaining in the year — the fewest the office has released since at least 2006. ORI typically releases an average of about 10 findings a year.
One journal editor in chief called the results “concerning,” while another thought the analysis was looking for problems on purpose.
‘Elite cohort’ of biz school scholars and editors scratch each others’ backs, study finds
Image: Mohamed Hassan/Pixabay Academics who publish frequently in two top business journals often have prior working relationships with the editors who handle their papers, according to a new analy…
retractionwatch.com
December 17, 2025 at 7:17 PM
One journal editor in chief called the results “concerning,” while another thought the analysis was looking for problems on purpose.
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute has settled a lawsuit filed under the False Claims Act, admitting researchers used images and data that were “misrepresented and/or duplicated." As part of the agreement, @sholtodavid.bsky.social will receive $2.63 million, or 17.5 percent of the $15 million settlement.
Dana-Farber settles suit alleging image manipulation for $15 million
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute has settled a lawsuit filed under the False Claims Act, admitting researchers used images and data that were “misrepresented and/or duplicated” in support of grant appl…
retractionwatch.com
December 17, 2025 at 1:22 AM
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute has settled a lawsuit filed under the False Claims Act, admitting researchers used images and data that were “misrepresented and/or duplicated." As part of the agreement, @sholtodavid.bsky.social will receive $2.63 million, or 17.5 percent of the $15 million settlement.
Three years after he was let off the hook by a government commission, a former university vice chancellor in Pakistan is facing sanctions for plagiarizing a student thesis in a paper from 2020, Retraction Watch has learned.
Exclusive: In reversal, former vice chancellor in Pakistan who was let off hook for plagiarism faces sanctions
Muhammad Suleman Tahir Three years after he was let off the hook by a government commission, a former university vice chancellor in Pakistan is facing sanctions for plagiarizing a student thesis in…
retractionwatch.com
December 15, 2025 at 4:19 PM
Three years after he was let off the hook by a government commission, a former university vice chancellor in Pakistan is facing sanctions for plagiarizing a student thesis in a paper from 2020, Retraction Watch has learned.
Weekend reads: Springer Nature retracts papers using ‘bonkers’ dataset; preprint server welcomes AI authors; ethics editors’ COI disclosures ‘insufficient’
Weekend reads: Springer Nature retracts papers using ‘bonkers’ dataset; preprint server welcomes AI authors; ethics editors’ COI disclosures ‘insufficient’
Dear RW readers, we look forward to wrapping up the week with Weekend Reads. If you enjoy it too, please consider showing your support with a tax-deductible donation. I support retraction wat…
retractionwatch.com
December 13, 2025 at 12:58 PM
Weekend reads: Springer Nature retracts papers using ‘bonkers’ dataset; preprint server welcomes AI authors; ethics editors’ COI disclosures ‘insufficient’
A Cell Press journal quietly removed part of a funding statement from a paper related to gender-affirming hormone therapy that the authors say was included in error. Experts called the move “worrying.”
Journal removes funding statement from hormone therapy paper without issuing correction
A Cell Press journal quietly removed part of a funding statement from a paper related to gender-affirming hormone therapy that the authors say was included in error. Experts called the move “worryi…
retractionwatch.com
December 12, 2025 at 3:23 PM
A Cell Press journal quietly removed part of a funding statement from a paper related to gender-affirming hormone therapy that the authors say was included in error. Experts called the move “worrying.”
COPE’s involvement leads to retraction of paper on homeopathy for lung cancer
COPE’s involvement leads to retraction of paper on homeopathy for lung cancer
A journal that last year corrected a paper claiming to show a homeopathic intervention improved quality of life and survival for people with advanced lung cancer has now retracted the article after…
retractionwatch.com
December 11, 2025 at 4:19 PM
COPE’s involvement leads to retraction of paper on homeopathy for lung cancer
One of Kazakhstan’s top nuclear physicists also leads his nation in retractions
One of Kazakhstan’s top nuclear physicists also leads his nation in retractions
Maxim ZdorovetsSource The head of a nuclear physics institute in Kazakhstan now has 21 retractions to his name — most of them logged in the past year — following dozens of his papers being flagged …
retractionwatch.com
December 9, 2025 at 4:20 PM
One of Kazakhstan’s top nuclear physicists also leads his nation in retractions
How to juice your Google Scholar h-index, preprint by preprint
How to juice your Google Scholar h-index, preprint by preprint
A screenshot of Yousaf’s Google Scholar profile before it was removed. Muhammad Zain Yousaf, a postdoc at Zhejiang University in Hangzhou, China, became a scholar of note overnight. Or so it …
retractionwatch.com
December 9, 2025 at 12:07 AM
How to juice your Google Scholar h-index, preprint by preprint
Weekend reads: ‘The fall of a prolific science journal’; Clinical trials by ‘super-retractors’; ‘How to Study Things That May Not Exist’
Weekend reads: ‘The fall of a prolific science journal’; Clinical trials by ‘super-retractors’; ‘How to Study Things That May Not Exist’
Giving Tuesday was this week, and, like many organizations, we asked for your support. The work we do is funded in part by your donations. If you value our work in rooting out scientific fraud and …
retractionwatch.com
December 6, 2025 at 4:21 PM
Weekend reads: ‘The fall of a prolific science journal’; Clinical trials by ‘super-retractors’; ‘How to Study Things That May Not Exist’
Nature paper retracted after one investigation finds data errors, another finds no misconduct
Nature paper retracted after one investigation finds data errors, another finds no misconduct
Nature has retracted a paper on melanoma after an investigation by the journal found issues with data that rendered certain results statistically insignificant. A separate institutional inves…
retractionwatch.com
December 5, 2025 at 6:25 PM
Nature paper retracted after one investigation finds data errors, another finds no misconduct
A review article concluding the weed killer Roundup--aka glyphosate--“does not pose a health risk to humans” has been retracted 8 years after documents released in a court case revealed employees of Monsanto, the company that developed it, wrote the article but were not named as coauthors.
Glyphosate safety article retracted eight years after Monsanto ghostwriting revealed in court
Credit: Mike Mozart/Flickr (CC BY 2.0) A review article concluding the weed killer Roundup “does not pose a health risk to humans” has been retracted eight years after documents released in a court…
retractionwatch.com
December 4, 2025 at 4:19 PM
A review article concluding the weed killer Roundup--aka glyphosate--“does not pose a health risk to humans” has been retracted 8 years after documents released in a court case revealed employees of Monsanto, the company that developed it, wrote the article but were not named as coauthors.
“In this case we are up against the seductive allure of claims we’d like to believe are true but aren’t – that tobacco is really not that harmful, at least not by itself, or that we can prevent and cure cancer with some kind of ‘mind work,’ and so on."
Number of ‘unsafe’ publications by psychologist Hans Eysenck could be ‘high and far reaching’
Hans Eysenck A “high and far reaching” number of papers and books by Hans Eysenck could be “unsafe,” according to an updated statement from King’s College London, where the psychologist was a profe…
retractionwatch.com
December 4, 2025 at 1:15 AM
“In this case we are up against the seductive allure of claims we’d like to believe are true but aren’t – that tobacco is really not that harmful, at least not by itself, or that we can prevent and cure cancer with some kind of ‘mind work,’ and so on."
"Retractions have become more common in recent years, according to Retraction Watch, an organization that tracks corrections in scientific journals. But they are still rare, amounting to about one in 500 articles published."
Top Journal Retracts Study Predicting Catastrophic Climate Toll
www.nytimes.com
December 3, 2025 at 11:15 PM
"Retractions have become more common in recent years, according to Retraction Watch, an organization that tracks corrections in scientific journals. But they are still rare, amounting to about one in 500 articles published."
The authors of a highly publicized study predicting climate change would cost $38 trillion a year by 2049 have retracted their paper following criticism of the data and methodology, including that the estimate is inflated.
Authors retract Nature paper projecting high costs of climate change
The authors of a highly publicized study predicting climate change would cost $38 trillion a year by 2049 have retracted their paper following criticism of the data and methodology, including that …
retractionwatch.com
December 3, 2025 at 10:28 AM
The authors of a highly publicized study predicting climate change would cost $38 trillion a year by 2049 have retracted their paper following criticism of the data and methodology, including that the estimate is inflated.
“I started reading this article and found some interesting references that I decided to read as well,” Moore told Retraction Watch. “To my surprise, those articles didn’t exist.”
The case of the fake references in an ethics journal
Many would-be whistleblowers write to us about papers with nonexistent references, possibly hallucinated by artificial intelligence. One reader recently alerted us to fake references in … an ethics…
retractionwatch.com
December 2, 2025 at 8:20 PM
“I started reading this article and found some interesting references that I decided to read as well,” Moore told Retraction Watch. “To my surprise, those articles didn’t exist.”
The influential citation database Scopus has delisted three journals from Iraq in a blow to recent government efforts to boost the standing of the country’s scholarly publications.
Iraqi journal suspected of coercion, two others dropped from major citation databases
The influential citation database Scopus has delisted three journals from Iraq in a blow to recent government efforts to boost the standing of the country’s scholarly publications. One of the title…
retractionwatch.com
December 1, 2025 at 1:45 PM
The influential citation database Scopus has delisted three journals from Iraq in a blow to recent government efforts to boost the standing of the country’s scholarly publications.
Weekend reads: How an MIT student’s AI study ‘Fell Apart’; Egyptian scientists, Russian affiliations; the ‘dangers’ of bibliometrics with ‘polluted data’
Weekend reads: How an MIT student’s AI study ‘Fell Apart’; Egyptian scientists, Russian affiliations; the ‘dangers’ of bibliometrics with ‘polluted data’
Exclusive: ‘Highly problematic’ policy has Saudi university pressuring faculty to cite its research Meet the researcher aiming to halt use of ‘fundamentally flawed’ database linking IQ and national…
retractionwatch.com
November 29, 2025 at 6:22 PM
Weekend reads: How an MIT student’s AI study ‘Fell Apart’; Egyptian scientists, Russian affiliations; the ‘dangers’ of bibliometrics with ‘polluted data’
Springer Nature tells @jacksonwryan.com that Scientific Reports paper about autism with the nonsensical figure will be retracted.
nobreakthroughs.substack.com
November 28, 2025 at 7:14 AM
Springer Nature tells @jacksonwryan.com that Scientific Reports paper about autism with the nonsensical figure will be retracted.
A team of researchers in Belgium got more than they expected when they tried to study potato pathogens: an unwelcome contaminant, a retraction, and a new paper the authors say is “an improvement over the first.”
After realizing a fungus contaminated their experiments, researchers retract and redo study
Late blight in potatoes Source (CC BY 4.0) A team of researchers in Belgium got more than they expected when they tried to study potato pathogens: an unwelcome contaminant, a retraction, and a new …
retractionwatch.com
November 26, 2025 at 7:15 PM
A team of researchers in Belgium got more than they expected when they tried to study potato pathogens: an unwelcome contaminant, a retraction, and a new paper the authors say is “an improvement over the first.”