Cheshire

Swedish fraudsters are funny.

I was delighted to learn that Elisabeth Bik (@elisabethbik.bsky.social) finds inspiration in my work. Thank you, Elisabeth, for the nomination. I truly appreciate your support!

www.nature.com/articles/d41...

but are they talking?

Someone (more patient than me) should go look at the citations to see if this materially changes the results of the citing paper. In a perfect world, the journal would do it.

I looked at one and the authors clearly didn’t know the case study was fiction.

Here's a nice indictment of the modern publishing system and a solution.

But surely the next generation will not have to find such limiting workarounds?

Not quite 2 years for a Wiley journal, Evidence-based Complementary and Alternative Medicine, to retract a couple of these papers.

pubpeer.com/publications...

Schneider Shorts 27.02.2026 – Nerd tunnel vision Schneider Shorts 27.02.2026 – men of science on Epstein’s island, how to profit from a personality cult in Harvard, with concerns for an Israeli genius, old men burdened with retraction…

Yeah yeah, it's Friday somewhere. 😺

forbetterscience.com/2026/02/27/s...

Announcing the Retraction Watch Research Accountability Reporting Fellowship - The Open Notebook The Open Notebook and Retraction Watch are thrilled to announce a new fellowship program funded by The Center for Scientific Integrity. This six-month program will equip up to six reporters and editor...

We and @theopennotebook.bsky.social are thrilled to announce The Retraction Watch Research Accountability Reporting Fellowship!

-- $7,500 in funding to support reporting
-- One-to-one mentoring support
-- Four virtual trainings

Find out more here:

TFW the clarifying "how to get out of the building" sign is now and forever a curling meme.

Heart researcher asked to attend remedial training after OSU misconduct finding, report reveals In a move one research ethics expert called “odd,” a university asked one of its professors to attend a remedial integrity course — despite their “significant concerns” the training would have any …

In a move one research ethics expert called “odd,” a university asked one of its professors to attend a remedial integrity course — despite their “significant concerns” the training would have any impact following findings of misconduct.

That’s really the only way to get value out of your car insurance too.

🕺

How easy is it to fudge your scientific rank? Meet Larry, the world’s most cited cat “Exercise in absurdity” reveals flaws in Google Scholar’s productivity metrics

Remember Larry, the #scholastic #cat?

2 y ago, but still shows how easy it is to fake #papers & #citations.

What can we do?

Maybe simply value #quality over (easily measurable) #quantity when assessing #scientists. It's more work, but surely pays.

#PaperMill #AI #ResearchIntegrity #FakeScience

a man talking on a phone with the words " oh there 's just one more thing sir " below him ALT: a man talking on a phone with the words " oh there 's just one more thing sir " below him

One can assume that the "originals" might actually confirm the original concerns. Nice detective work.

two cartoon characters are standing next to each other and one of them has a banana on his head ALT: two cartoon characters are standing next to each other and one of them has a banana on his head

Remarkable. And then they didn’t respond to the journal request for raw data?

Three panels from a scientific paper, showing horizontal strips, each with a blue fluorescent, sausage-shaped core surrounded by green fluorescent clouds, and a black background. The labels suggest three different experiment, but I added orange boxes to show that the middle and bottom panel overlap with a mirroring.

A good retraction by @frontiersin.bsky.social of Neurotrope/Synaptogenix / Thomas Jefferson U paper.

The $SNPX president/CSO called me a "sir", claimed figures were just 'illustrative examples', the senior author then dropped 200 hard-to-open, un-annotated 'lsm' files - fun times.

#ImageForensics

Congratulations are in store for Dr. El-Deiry’s ascension to the sole Editors-(sic)-in-Chief at Oncotarget.

Andrei V. Gudkov of Roswell Park is no longer sharing in that honor.

Major Chinese funder to stop paying fees for 30 pricey open-access journals Move comes amid effort to grow the country’s own journals

Are #openaccess fees that some journals charge authors too high? The Chinese Academy of Sciences, the world’s largest research institution, reportedly thinks so and plans to stop funding some, a move that could shake up #scientificpublishing. @science.org www.science.org/content/arti...

New research integrity technical term coined by @elisabethbik.bsky.social: “Paper mill hairball.”, e.g., “Where every paper that overlaps with another paper will lead to more papers with overlaps.” pubpeer.com/publications... 😸

Chemist nears three dozen retractions for image duplication, self-citation and more A screenshot of Louis’ LinkedIn profile before we reached out to him. Racking up 35 retractions in just 24 months, chemist Hitler Louis has scored a place on our leaderboard.  The papers…

Racking up 35 retractions in just 24 months, chemist Hitler Louis has scored a place on our leaderboard.

Concerns About Images Arise Over Multiple Papers From DRDO, CSIR Labs Many of these papers have some of the same authors – and they are affiliated with institutes overseen by DRDO.

Also here:

science.thewire.in/the-sciences...

80 research papers by DRDO scientists flagged for ‘image manipulation’, probe on, researchers say The papers were flagged by an anonymous commenter on online platform PubPeer, where scientists can raise concerns regarding research papers that have already been peer-reviewed & published.

Reported on:

theprint.in/science/80-r...

Some might remember the @DRDO_India research integrity fiasco from ~4 years ago. Another retraction just hit. Many still unaddressed.

pubpeer.com/publications...

Rumor is this journal was started in part to aid Chinese researchers efforts to publish in international journals. This seems consistent with their publication history.

I've been spending a bit more time rummaging through the trash heap known as the American Journal of Cancer Research (whose editorial board includes Dr. El-Deiry). China's MOST ♥️ stuff like this 👇

pubpeer.com/publications...

I stumbled over that too

Springer Nature adding new journals to the "Nature portfolio"

When more is less.