Research integrity

David Goltzman’s cowardice

"It is cowardly to be anonymous.  [...] This is harassment, for whatever benefit you will gain from this. Please cease and desist" - David Goltzman

by Leonid Schneider
Comments 21

Meet the Canadian bone researcher David Goltzman, chair of the departments of medicine and physiology and director of the Centre for Advanced Bone and Periodontal research at the McGill University in Montreal, and former Chair of Medicine and Physician-in-Chief of the McGill University Health Centre. The university informs us:

“His publications (more than 400 peer-reviewed original publications) have been cited over 29,000 times (over 16,000 since 2016) with an h-index of 102 (Google Scholar).”

Almost FIFTY of these papers are already flagged on PubPeer, thanks to Cheshire‘s sleuthing. Almost a quarter of Goltzman’s entire output, and Cheshire is still not done screening.

The bone researcher Goltzman held many top positions and received many awards in Canada, USA and elsewhere. In 2000, he was also appointed Officer of the Order of Canada, for being “an internationally-acclaimed clinical scientist, inspiring teacher and academic leader in the field of bone diseases“. According to McGill University, “Dr. Goltzman`s research has been unique“, and indeed it was.

We shall start with Goltzman’s paper with his McGill-whitewashed colleague Shafaat Rabbani because the Schneider Rule of finding bad scientists by following one of them applies. One of these common papers (Chen et al 2006) was already triumphantly whitewashed and corrected by McGill, read here:

Szyf and Rabbani: old gels evil, new genomics cool

Gel images are full of fraud and luckily a thing of the past. Science of today is digital, the figures are diagrams, charts and bar plots where image integrity sleuths can take a hike. Moshe Szyf and Shafat Rabbani of McGill University in Canada accomplished this transition.

by Leonid Schneider

Another co-author on that and the following paper is someone called Anil Potti. Anil Potti? Yes, the current University of North Dakota affiliation fits: it is the very same mega-fraudster, sacked by Duke and sanctioned by HHS-ORI in 2015 (read Retraction Watch, Science and the official governmental report). Here it that second paper by Potti, Rabbani and Goltzman now:

Gaoping Chen , Nicholas Shukeir , Anil Potti , Kanishka Sircar , Armen Aprikian , David Goltzman , Shafaat A. Rabbani Up‐regulation of Wnt‐1 and β‐catenin production in patients with advanced metastatic prostate carcinoma Cancer (2004) doi: 10.1002/cncr.20518 

Actinopolyspora biskrensis: “One of the images in Figure 3 seems to have two regions that have multiple similarities. They are not identical, however it is possible that they share the same source.”
“also be some repeated features in one of the images of Figure 4”

Goltzman has other fake papers with Rabbani, read the article above. But most of his bad papers have as a significant co-author his former mentee at McGill – Dengshun Miao, who in 2005 became professor at Nanjing Medical University in China. Which is also probably why Goltzman has an honorary professorship from this Chinese university.

Here is one example, flagged by an anonymous PubPeer user already in 2018 and published in a predatory journal by the predatory publisher e-Century:

Zengli Zhang , Shaomeng Yin , Xian Xue , Ji Ji , Jian Tong , David Goltzman, Dengshun Miao Transplantation of bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells rescues partially rachitic phenotypes induced by 1,25-Dihydroxyvitamin D deficiency in mice American journal of translational research (2016) pubmed: 27830022 

Fig 3

And here is one of Cheshire’s numerous recent finds:

Dengshun Miao, Bin He , Andrew C. Karaplis, David Goltzman Parathyroid hormone is essential for normal fetal bone formation Journal of Clinical Investigation (2002) doi: 10.1172/jci14817 

“some duplicated regions in Figures 3i (WT) and 3j (PTH -/-).”
“At least one of the images in Figure 1B seems to have a region that has been duplicated.”
“An image in Figure 1C seems to include some similar issues. There are additional duplications in this image which I did not annotate.”

Next to Miao, another important co-author is a close associate and likely a former mentee of Goltzman’s – Andrew Karaplis, He is also a McGill professor with his own lab at the Lady Davis Institute of the Jewish General Hospital, where he self-describes as:

“Among his principal objectives has been to provide his M.D. and Ph.D. trainees with a thorough grounding in the basic principles of biomedical investigation, including careful analysis of the biological problem under investigation, thoughtful design of the experimental approach, experience with a rigorous research methodology, and careful interpretation of data while emphasizing an imaginative research approach and strong sense of commitment..

You saw one example of how exactly that “imaginative research approach” by Karaplis works, and there will be much, much more.

But let’s first briefly talk about money. Goltzman, Karaplis and another McGill researcher named Ajay Gupta used to own a stock-traded theranostics company called Osta Biotechnologies, founded in 2004 and planned to sell therapies for Alzheimer’s, osteoporosis, osteoarthritis and cancer (archive here, also see news from 2006). Gupta was founder and CEO, Goltzman was Senior Vice President of Research and Development, and Karaplis was the company’s other founder, President & Chief Scientific Officer. In 2006, the company announced promising clinical trial data for its blood tests for Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s but six years later, it was dissolved in 2012. Apparently, also Miao was involved with Osta, as this announcement from 2005 indicates:

“Osta Biotechnologies Inc., of Montreal, said researchers David Goltzman, Andrew Karaplis and Dengshun Miao have discovered a key role of specific segments of the parathyroid hormone related peptide on growth retardation and early aging in mice. They found that the expression of tumor-suppressing genes p16 and p21 was significantly increased, but the expression of oncogene Bmi-1 was reduced in the skeleton of the animal model compared to the normal control.”

In 2007, cancer breakthrough results with the Heme oxygenase-1 inhibitor OB-24 were announced by Gupta and another McGill/Lady Davis Institute researcher, Osta’s Advisory Board member, stock and patent holder – Hyman M. Schipper. As the result, Osta stock soared:

“The June report showed a statistically significant reduction in tumour volumes in mice treated with OB-24, compared with untreated mice or mice treated with Dacarbazine, a drug widely used clinically for the treatment of metastatic melanoma.” (Toronto Star, June 2007)
“OB-24 was well-tolerated, with no apparent signs of toxicity, compared with standard chemotherapy that produced significant adverse effects. Robust anti-tumour activity was seen in models for human prostate cancer, human melanoma, metastatic mouse melanoma and human colo-rectal carcinoma.” (Toronto Star, October 2007)

Schipper and Gupta continued pushing OB-24 as a cancer miracle drug in subsequent publications, e.g. in Alaoui-Jamali et al 2009.

And what about Goltzman? Declaring his financial involvement with Osta was something he was never willing to do. I presume Goltzman applied the usual medical rule of thumb: your business is only a conflict of interests to declare if it earns you millions of dollars. But Osta was often struggling, so why revealing what the real purpose of your research papers was…

How to cure all diseases

“I have a passion to solve a problem that is facing millions. I could have a job that makes more money, has normal hours, but this is where I should be right now.” Dr Leen Kawas, CEO of Althira Pharma

by Leonid Schneider

Company founded one year ago, then proclaimed: “Conflict of Interest statement. None declared”:

Yingben Xue , Andrew C. Karaplis, Geoffrey N. Hendy , David Goltzman, Dengshun Miao Genetic models show that parathyroid hormone and 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D3 play distinct and synergistic roles in postnatal mineral ion homeostasis and skeletal development Human Molecular Genetics (2005) doi: 10.1093/hmg/ddi160 

“Two images in Figure 2E have some unexpectedly similar regions (not pixel perfect, but very similar).”
“Two images in Figure 3B seem to overlap, but appear to be described as representing different treatment groups.”

“Figure 4B appears to have a duplicated image.”

This horrible journal Human Molecular Genetics is a massive fraud factory where not the fraudsters but the whistleblowers are seen as mortal enemies to destroy:

Bologna cover-up at Oxford University Press

This is the second part of the Bologna whistleblower account. As the university was burying their own misconduct findings, Oxford University Press and their ignoble editor were busy punishing and gaslighting the whistleblower.

by Leonid Schneider

Goltzman’s paper from 2011, and “No conflicts of interest, financial or otherwise, are declared by the authors.”

Ji Ji , Ruinan Lu , Xiaojie Zhou , Yingben Xue , Chunmin Shi , David Goltzman, Dengshun Miao 1,25-Dihydroxyvitamin D3 contributes to regulating mammary calcium transport and modulates neonatal skeletal growth and turnover cooperatively with calcium AJP Endocrinology and Metabolism (2011) doi: 10.1152/ajpendo.00173.2011 

“One image in Figure 6A seems to have a duplicated region.”

Falsified microscopy data and dishonest secrecy from the three businessmen Goltzman, Karaplis and Miao here as well, “The authors declare no competing financial interests“:

Wen Sun , Weiwei Sun , Jingning Liu , Xichao Zhou , Yongjun Xiao , Andrew Karaplis, Martin R Pollak , Edward Brown , David Goltzman, Dengshun Miao Alterations in phosphorus, calcium and PTHrP contribute to defects in dental and dental alveolar bone formation in calcium-sensing receptor-deficient mice Development (2010) doi: 10.1242/dev.045898   

“Two images in Figure 5B seem to overlap, but they are described as representing different treatment groups.”

Maybe it is better that their Osta business went tits up. You can’t really cure diseases with Photoshop:

Dengshun Miao, Bin He , Beate Lanske , Xiu-Ying Bai , Xin-Kang Tong , Geoffrey N. Hendy , David Goltzman, Andrew C. Karaplis Skeletal Abnormalities in Pth-Null Mice Are Influenced by Dietary Calcium Endocrinology (2004) doi: 10.1210/en.2003-1097 

“One of the images in Figure 3C seems to have multiple regions that are duplicated.”

Although…. For 2004, the Photoshop job was quite good. Such a waste of talent!

Dengshun Miao, Jiarong Li , Yingben Xue , Hanyi Su , Andrew C. Karaplis, David Goltzman Parathyroid Hormone-Related Peptide Is Required for Increased Trabecular Bone Volume in Parathyroid Hormone-Null Mice Endocrinology (2004) doi: 10.1210/en.2003-1695 

“some unexpectedly similar regions in one of the images in Figure 3c.”
“some unexpectedly similar regions in an image in Figure 5b.”

And it continued in the same vein, as Osta was announcing medical breakthroughs and raising investment money, also from public sources:

Xiuying Bai , Qiu Dinghong , Dengshun Miao, David Goltzmanauthor has email , Andrew C. Karaplis Klotho ablation converts the biochemical and skeletal alterations in FGF23 (R176Q) transgenic mice to a Klotho-deficient phenotype AJP Endocrinology and Metabolism (2009) doi: 10.1152/ajpendo.90539.2008

“concerns about the images in Figure 5B and Figure 5C”
“At least one image in Figure 6 seems to have similar issues.
“

Was this the last Photoshop push to save the Osta business? And how defiant: “All the authors state that they have no conflicts of interest“:

Lei Shu , Ji Ji , Qi Zhu , Guofan Cao , Andrew Karaplis , Martin R Pollak , Edward Brown, David Goltzman, Dengshun Miao The calcium-sensing receptor mediates bone turnover induced by dietary calcium and parathyroid hormone in neonates Journal of Bone and Mineral Research (2011) doi: 10.1002/jbmr.300 

Fig 5A-B “Several assays and sets of assays seem unexpectedly similar and/or contain similar features and constellations of features. Some are rotated.”
“similar issues in Figure 3B.”

This is from Osta’s dying days, where you see that nothing of value was lost:

Jun Yan , Weiwei Sun , Jing Zhang , David Goltzman , Dengshun Miao Bone Marrow Ablation Demonstrates That Excess Endogenous Parathyroid Hormone Plays Distinct Roles in Trabecular and Cortical Bone American Journal Of Pathology (2012) doi: 10.1016/j.ajpath.2012.03.038 

“serious concerns about the images in Figure 2A and Figure 2B. It appears that some images may have been reused, but edited in a way so that they appear different. Some regions are very similar, but adjacent images are “empty,” or black. In one case the images are rotated 180° from each other.”

Years later, the team of the failed theranostics biotech Osta produced this masterpiece, where Gupta declared as his affiliations both his old McGill and Miao’s Nanjing Medical University:

Xiuying Bai , Dengshun Miao , Sophia Xiao , Dinghong Qiu , René St-Arnaud , Martin Petkovich , Ajay Gupta , David Goltzman, Andrew C. Karaplis CYP24 inhibition as a therapeutic target in FGF23-mediated renal phosphate wasting disorders Journal of Clinical Investigation (2016) doi: 10.1172/jci81928 

Actinopolyspora biskrensis: “Some of the images in Figure 3D seem to have duplicated regions. I think it is unlikely that I found them all”

Many years passed since Miao set up his own lab in China, and it’s still all fake and fraudulent. Goltzman was eager to put his name on anything Miao fabricated:

Renlei Yang , Jie Chen , Jiao Zhang , Ran Qin , Rong Wang , Yue Qiu , Zhiyuan Mao , David Goltzman, Dengshun Miao 1,25-Dihydroxyvitamin D protects against age-related osteoporosis by a novel VDR-Ezh2-p16 signal axis Aging Cell (2020) doi: 10.1111/acel.13095

“An image in Figure 1p and in Figure 6o seem to overlap, but they are described differently.”
“Images in Figure 2g and Figure 6g seem to overlap, however while both are H&E stained, they seem to be described and colored differently.”

“An image in Figure 4i seems to overlap with an image in Figure 6g, yet they are described differently.”

There are many, many more fake papers by Goltzman and Miao, and often is Karaplis on board. Like this, in those happy days authors were not always asked to declare their conflicts of interests:

Dengshun Miao, Hanyi Su , Bin He , Jianjun Gao , Qingwen Xia , Min Zhu , Zhen Gu , David Goltzman , Andrew C Karaplis Severe growth retardation and early lethality in mice lacking the nuclear localization sequence and C-terminus of PTH-related protein Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2008) doi: 10.1073/pnas.0805690105 

Fig 3P
Fig 3J
“An image in Figure 2A seems to have some regions that are unexpectedly similar.”

This one Goltzman, Karaplis and Miao had to correct four years ago, meaning they were all aware of the problems at least since then. The 2020 correction was hidden by the publisher Oxford University Press and is not accessible from the article landing page.

Yingben Xue , Zengli Zhang , Andrew C Karaplis, Geoffrey N Hendy , David Goltzman, Dengshun Miao Exogenous PTH-Related Protein and PTH Improve Mineral and Skeletal Status in 25-Hydroxyvitamin D-1α-Hydroxylase and PTH Double Knockout Mice Journal of Bone and Mineral Research (2005) doi: 10.1359/jbmr.050608

Erratum August 2020::”A reader of JBMR contacted the journal with concerns of duplicate images […] After conferring with the authors, they recognized that the data for the JBMR(1) and HMG(2) articles were harvested and prepared at the same period and the authors erroneously copied and pasted the above three images. […] The amended panels in Fig. 4B, C contain new representative images […] This error did not negate the data or undermine the conclusions of the article. The authors thank the editors for their assistance with this correction and hope that this has not unduly confused the readers of JBMR.”

But despite Goltzman knowing of Miao’s shenanigans, the collaboration continued. With predictable fake results.

Jun Wu , Rong Wang , Xuechun Kan , Jinghan Zhang , Wen Sun , David Goltzman , Dengshun Miao A Sonic Hedgehog-Gli-Bmi1 signaling pathway plays a critical role in p27 deficiency induced bone anabolism International Journal of Biological Sciences (2022) doi: 10.7150/ijbs.65954 

“As with another paper, the same colonies seem to appear in two sets of assays, yet the text explains that the cells were stained with methyl blue OR cytochemically for alkaline-phosphatase (ALP) to detect alterations of total CFU-f or ALP-positive CFU-f (CFU-fap), respectively.”
“Figure 1E, International Journal of Biological Sciences (2022), doi: 10.7150/ijbs.65954. […]
Figure 4A, International Journal of Biological Sciences (2022), doi: 10.7150/ijbs.63876″: (link)

“An image in Figure 4E seems to overlap with an image in a later preprint with at least one common author, but again it seems to be described differently.”

Another Goltzman paper, and no Miao or Karaplis to blame. Here, Goltzman was asked to disclose his Conflicts of Interests, but decided to lie again: “Disclosure Summary: The authors have nothing to disclose that is relevant to this manuscript.”

Rana Samadfam , Christian Richard , Loan Nguyen-Yamamoto , Isabel Bolivar , David Goltzman Bone Formation Regulates Circulating Concentrations of Fibroblast Growth Factor 23 Endocrinology (2009) doi: 10.1210/en.2009-0472 

“An image in Figure 1A seems to have a duplicated region. The areas are not identical, but unexpectedly share multiple similarities.”

Thing is, it was not only Osta which Goltzman kept shtumm about, but also his Big Pharma consulting fees which he disclosed in papers published before and afterwards. An earlier paper with same first and last authors, similar patch duplication issues. Again, Goltzman hid his Osta business, yet admitting that “D.G. consults intermittently for Amgen, Lilly, and Merck“:

Rana Samadfam , Qingwen Xia , David Goltzman Pretreatment with Anticatabolic Agents Blunts But Does Not Eliminate the Skeletal Anabolic Response to Parathyroid Hormone in Oophorectomized Mice Endocrinology (2007) doi: 10.1210/en.2006-1475 

“Some of the images in Figure 4 seem to have duplicated regions. They are not always identical, but it seems likely that these regions share the same source.”

The first author of both papers, Rana Samadfam, is currently Senior Principal Research Scientist at Charles River. This later paper of hers with Goltzman (and Miao’s) has been corrected already in 2018:

Christian Richard , Rujuan Huo , Rana Samadfam , Isabel Bolivar , Dengshun Miao , Edward M Brown , Geoffrey N Hendy , David Goltzman The calcium-sensing receptor and 25-hydroxyvitamin D–1α-hydroxylase interact to modulate skeletal growth and bone turnover Journal of Bone and Mineral Research (2010) doi: 10.1002/jbmr.58 

Erratum 13 August 2018:
“A reader of the JBMR informed the editors about concern regarding a possible duplicate image in Fig. 1 […] The authors provided an alternate version of Fig. 1 […]The error in the original figure did not negate the data or undermine the conclusions of the manuscript, but the authors regret any confusion and inconvenience this may have caused the readers of JBMR.”

Again, Goltzman kept the Osta business secret, disclosing only: “DG has served as a consultant to Abbott, Genzyme, Amgen, Lilly, and NPS Allelix.” Note that he lied in his other papers about all these financial conflicts.

Obviously there was a whistleblower more than 6 years ago who reported Goltzman and Miao to the journals, and likely to the McGill authorities. Knowing how McGill resolved the Rabbani and Moshe Szyf affair at around the same time (by a total whitewashing), it is safe to assume that the Goltzman-Miao affair was resolved in exactly the same way. Another total and unconditional whitewash, welcome to Canada. I don’t want to imagine what McGill did to the whistleblower.

Moshe Szyf demands an apology

“We demand that you publicly apologize to our clients and retract all your statements within one week from today. Failure to do so will result in our taking an action in both public and private law, against you and McGill University.” – Moshe Szyf and Michael Meaney, via lawyer

by Leonid Schneider

Miao replied on PubPeer once, 3 years ago:

Lulu Chen , Renlei Yang , Wanxin Qiao , Wei Zhang , Jie Chen , Li Mao , David Goltzman, Dengshun Miao 1,25‐Dihydroxyvitamin D exerts an antiaging role by activation of Nrf2‐antioxidant signaling and inactivation of p16/p53‐senescence signaling Aging Cell (2019) doi: 10.1111/acel.12951 

Gynanisa maja: “Why are indicated regions of different sections are so similar if not identical?” Fig 1
Actinopolyspora biskrensis: “Could the authors review the two marked images from Figure 3a and Figure 6j.”
Fig 5
“Some images in Supplemental Figure S4a, S4c, and S4e seem to have duplicated regions within images and one set seem to have a duplicated region between images that are described differently.”

In June 2019, Miao commented on PubPeer that there were no duplications whatsoever:

“After conferring with the other authors we confirm that […] It can be seen that the histological structure of skin in these samples was different.”

As reminder, we are talking about DOZENS of potentially fraudulent papers from those authors.

The last author of the next falsified study, the McGill professor Geoffrey N. Hendy, died in 2018; Goltzman wrote the obituary. Hendy had several problematic papers with Goltzman, possibly totally unaware what he got himself into. Like this:

Lucie Canaff , Jean-François Vanbellinghen , Hiroshi Kaji , David Goltzman, Geoffrey N. Hendy Impaired Transforming Growth Factor-β (TGF-β) Transcriptional Activity and Cell Proliferation Control of a Menin In-frame Deletion Mutant Associated with Multiple Endocrine Neoplasia Type 1 (MEN1) Journal of Biological Chemistry (2012) doi: 10.1074/jbc.m112.341958 

“The Flag band in Figure 3D seems to have a rectangular “blank” region in the last lane.”
“Figure 7C and Figure 7D […] the same control band appears in both figures, yet the accompanying FLAG band is different.”

This I believe is the equivalent of grave-pissing. But Hendy can’t explain or defend himself anymore:

Rana Samadfam , Qingwen Xia , Dengshun Miao, Geoffrey N Hendy , David Goltzman Exogenous PTH and Endogenous 1,25-Dihydroxyvitamin D Are Complementary in Inducing an Anabolic Effect on Bone Journal of Bone and Mineral Research (2008) doi: 10.1359/jbmr.080318 

“Some of the images in Figure 4A seem to have duplicated regions. The features outlined in red seem to have been resized.”

And again, from 2006, as Goltzman and Karaplis were elsewhere announcing clinical trial data for Osta, they declared “the authors have nothing to disclose“:

Yingben Xue , Andrew C. Karaplis, Geoffrey N. Hendy , David Goltzman, Dengshun Miao Exogenous 1,25-Dihydroxyvitamin D3Exerts a Skeletal Anabolic Effect and Improves Mineral Ion Homeostasis in Mice that Are Homozygous for Both the 1α-Hydroxylase and Parathyroid Hormone Null Alleles Endocrinology (2006)
doi: 10.1210/en.2006-0403 

“at least one image in Figure 3E seems to have two unexpectedly similar regions”

I just hope they won’t blame Hendy now for all those fakes.

Goltzman never commented on PubPeer, but he did reply to Cheshire. About this paper:

Valverde-Franco, Gladys, Liu, Hanlong, Davidson, David, Chai, Sen, Valderrama-Carvajal, Hector, Goltzman, David, Ornitz, David M., Henderson, Janet E. Defective bone mineralization and osteopenia in young adult FGFR3-/- mice Human Molecular Genetics (2003) doi: 10.1093/hmg/ddh034 

“The lower panel of Figure 7 seems to show differential splicing (there does not appear to be a splice in the Coll II band). In addition, the first two lanes of the OPN and OCN bands seem to share some common features, suggesting that they may be the same.”

Cheshire alerted Goltzman on 2 June 2024. the reply came right away:

“It is cowardly to be anonymous. 
At least 2 reviewers and the editors reviewed the data we submitted and accepted the paper. You AI seems to be artificial rubbish, not  artificial intelligence. This is harassment, for whatever benefit you will gain from this.
Please cease and desist“

It is cowardly to publish stupid artificial rubbish to enrich yourself and to lie about your financial conflicts, and then hide behind peer review and threaten with lawsuits. I also wrote to Goltzman then, he asked to meet me. I refused, and when I asked about Osta, Goltzman and Karaplis remained silent.

Mr ACE2 Josef Penninger, Greatest Scientist of Our Time

As a young Wunderkind, Josef Penninger discovered the ACE2 receptor. Now he invented the cure for the coronavirus which will work in his hands where Big Pharma failed. He was never found guilty of research misconduct and never retracted a paper. Dr Penninger is a Genius making a COVID-19 vaccine.

by Leonid Schneider

I lodged a notification of suspected research misconduct with the authorities of the McGill University. They never reacted, not really surprising. If they don’t reply, they never received it so they don’t have to investigate.

Tough guys.

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21 comments on “David Goltzman’s cowardice”

  1. omanbenson
    June 10, 2024

    Aha, why is it not a surprise to read that the fraud his university supports him? McGill University joins the group of most institutes that love their fraudulent paper mill authors!

    Like

    Reply
    • Cheshire
      June 10, 2024

      I haven’t seen anything that supports your contention that “his university supports him.” McGill has been unresponsive to my emails to them, and I didn’t see in the article above that they provided a comment to Leonid either. Perhaps in prior situations they were not as rigorous as we’d like, but this is hardly unique to McGill. For all I know they will be more rigorous in this situation than they have in the past.

      In addition, your comment uses the term “paper mill” in a way completely different than that I am familiar with. I don’t see evidence that the papers involved here were generated by a third party (i.e., someone other than the authors), which is how I usually see that term used.

      Personally, I will be curious to see if the Canadian funding agencies have any response to the many papers which seem to have issues and for which they seemingly providing funding.

      Like

      Reply
      • omanbenson
        June 10, 2024

        You pretty much summed it up: they don’t reply, nor act swiftly. For me that is already enough to state they ‘support’ him. These universities always try to sweep things under the rug or find a solution without admitting something bad/wrong was done. Lets hope they will become a bit more rigorous. The passiveness for me equals supporting….

        Regarding your comment on paper mills, for me a paper mill is more than the crap third parties sell. If you publish like crazy (and often bad papers) because you get your name on all sorts of papers, that is also paper milling to me. Or heck even someone that only publishes (him/herself) papers like crazy without many other authors, I regard that as paper mill crap too. The idea that a paper mill is only through a third party, is also not necessarily the real definition for a paper mill as far as I am up to date.

        Like

      • Multiplex
        June 11, 2024

        Paper mills can be seen as historical successors of diploma mills. Therefore it is usually assumed that third parties are involved.

        Like

      • omanbenson
        June 11, 2024

        But how do you define ‘third parties’? If you put your name on all sorts of papers from different labs (for which you didn’t contribute) and increase your out like that, then are you not a paper mill author?

        Like

      • Multiplex
        June 11, 2024

        If you can put your name on all sorts of papers from REAL labs, then you are, first of all, a “bigwig”. Simply because in the real academic world you need power and influence to make other, real work groups compliant.

        Paper mill products are usually created away from real research facilities. In this case, the third party involved is a pure counterfeiting workshop, just like in a classic diploma mill.

        However, the separation may not be so clear sometimes (i.e., state-recognized universities in totalitarian/highly corrupt states).

        Like

      • Leonid Schneider
        June 11, 2024

        Thanks for explaining.
        I am more and more convinced that papermills are used by totalitarian and terrorist regimes for the purposes of espionage.
        This is how I think it works.
        A loyal Iranian student from a reliable family is vetted by the secret services, and when selected, is provided with access to papermills so that this person can apply abroad and easily outcompete others with his mighty CV. Most likely this agent pretends to oppose the Iranian regime and even have a cover story as dissident. Western universities rejoice thinking they 1) help an Iranian dissident and 2) recruit a genius who published more before his PhD than many do as professors in their entire careers.
        In reality, this Iranian genius is a resident agent, a spy. He progresses the career ladder in the west spying and reporting back to Iran on everything and everyone. Very likely also on exile-Iranians in the country of his residence. He continues papermilling to make sure his academic employer adores his performance.
        Once the resident reaches tenure, he starts recruiting other Iranian geniuses. His university is happy, so many Iranian dissidents with stellar CVs recruited. So many papers published, which brings so much money.

        I am pretty sure this applies not just to Iranian superstars, but also to Chinese.

        Like

      • Multiplex
        June 11, 2024

        Yes, espionage theory sounds absolutely plausible.

        Who we gonna call? -> BETTINA STARK-WATZINGER 😅

        Like

      • N.R.
        June 12, 2024

        “Thanks for explaining.
        I am more and more convinced that papermills are used by …”

        What is said (above) should be considered as (seriously) “True”, and/or “Very True”!

        Like

      • Anonymous
        June 12, 2024

        As it is very well explained in detail, I am becoming more and more convinced of this every day. Because as far as I have observed and followed, the papermill business is very well used not only to increase the number of citations and the number of articles, but also to group itself in foreign universities. There are very well organized groups in Canada and then in Europe, especially in the Scandinavian countries, Germany and the Netherlands. They promote themselves when they get projects with a lot of citations and articles and they give priority to their own people in hiring.

        But the only thing I don’t understand here is why publishers so easily allow them to manipulate the submission and revision processes in their journals. Why do we see these names in journal administrations/guest editorial when these people should be banned? Why don’t the university administrations of the countries I mentioned speak out against this disgrace? They even embrace it?

        Supporting diversity, giving people from other geographies a chance and academic equality is not like that… On the contrary, the points mentioned above undermine these values irreversibly.

        Like

      • Leonid Schneider
        June 12, 2024

        Scholarly publishing is a business.
        Each paper means money for the publisher.
        That’s why publishers actively remove all quality contorl and undermine their own peer review process.
        They are however upset their papermill scam came out.

        Like

  2. Cheshire
    June 10, 2024

    Thank you once again for helping put a narrative to my flailing around.

    I do want to acknowledge that the blue/red staining of the colonies is probably a misunderstanding of mine. Below is a link to a possible explanation that addresses this concern. The caption of some of these figures may not have been precise, but if the methods are credible (see an expert, not me), then some of those particular issues are invalid.

    Color me (blue or red) appropriately chastised.

    See my comment here: https://pubpeer.com/publications/588E21D2CF6CD2E9E1BABC268B5858#3

    I did have advice that this probably was not the best method, but I personally cannot judge one way or another.

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    • Leonid Schneider
      June 10, 2024

      “After taking photos, the same dish was then stained with methylene blue to detect total colonies (blue, the lower panel). “
      Assuming this staining approach even makes sense how did they manage to orient the dishes exactly as in the first take and even achieve the exact same light reflections?

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      • Cheshire
        June 11, 2024

        I saw the PubPeer comment that you made and agree that the author reply seems less convincing now.

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      • Leonid Schneider
        June 11, 2024

        Yes, the authors replied that it was exactly their goal to make the light reflections match. Because this is how proper science is always done.

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  3. I.B.
    June 10, 2024

    Got goose bumps reading the article. Great work Cheshire. Revealing the figure manipulation is the work of art.

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  4. Zebedee
    June 10, 2024

    We can’t ask Mordecai Richler what he makes of it (sadly dead and gone), but we could ask Ted Kotcheff what he thinks about this appalling state of affairs.

    ‘Duddy Kravitz’ director on being Mordecai Richler’s roommate (youtube.com)

    McGill University in Montreal thinks it is a cut above, what a laugh, except it is not funny.

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  5. Multiplex
    June 11, 2024

    “he asked to meet me” –
    for giving a lesson in bone loss, including teeth 😆

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  6. williamblackfb841abf18
    June 11, 2024

    Sorry for wandering off trail here, but when I saw the Anil Potti link to the Federal Register I wanted to check out the original Case Summary from ORI but it is 404’d (original link as indexed on PSIref for this Case Summary @ https://www.psiref.com/publications/96828147 was https://ori.hhs.gov/content/case-summary-potti-anil.

    Does anyone here know why ORI washes the chalkboard – is it after the summary has been published in the Federal Register? is there a statute of limitations? or do they have a special secret archive that has escaped me? Sorry for the ignorance, still learning.

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