Schneider Shorts 13.10.2023 – Basta Cuzzate!

Schneider Shorts of 13 October 2023 – Sicilian fraudster rector sacked, Brazilian sexual harasser sacked, Wiley CEO sacked, Spanish vice-rector a victim of papermilling, great science by world leader in cardiology, editorial notes on dyslexic dementia, and finally, the Ultimate Question answered by a genius.

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Science Elites

Basta Cuzzate!

Remember the Sicilian mega-cheater Salvatore Cuzzocrea, rector on the University of Messina in Italy? He was just forced to resign, i.e. sacked.

No, not for his massive research fraud, even though Aneurus Inconstans flagged almost 120 of Cuzzocrea’s papers on PubPeer, and got exhausted because apparently every single one of the hundreds of Cuzzo-authored papers is fake. Read here:

The fraud is so bad that I heard Elsevier has a special team investigating only Cuzzo, expect retractions to rain. But this is not what Cuzzo was sacked for as university rector.

Are you surprised that he is not only a research cheater but a thief? According to Italian media reporting, Cuzzo stole whooping €2.2 Million from his university. A local newspaper wrote on 10 October 2023 (Google-translated):

“Salvatore Cuzzocrea resigns as rector of the University of Messina. The latest formalities and signed the resignation, followed by a letter to the academic community. As a result, he falls as president of Crui, the Conference of Rectors of Italian universities. The case of reimbursements, raised by the member of the Academic Senate Paolo Todaro, and of the 14 payments made to Divaga Srl have left their mark. It is a Sicilian agricultural company that belongs to 80% to the rector and 20% to his wife Valentina Malvagni, with sole administrator the mother of Cuzzocrea, Maria Eugenia Salvo.”

Here is Cuzzo’s resignation letter dated 9 October 2023. It is long, boring, and stupid, so I won’t bother quoting from it. The Italian national newspaper Il Manifesto wrote about Cuzzo’s fake science, in two articles from 10 and 11 October 2023. In the first one, the journalist Andrea Capocci writes (Google-translated):

“To defend himself, Cuzzocrea cited the enormous scientific activity that would justify those expenses: «The extent of the reimbursements – explained the rector before his resignation – is linked to the extent of the research: 261 publications in five years, over 20 professors, as many doctoral students and research assistants in the group”. In reality this defensive line risks turning into a new charge against him. In fact, many studies signed by the Rector contain “recycled” images. The case is similar to the one discovered by Il Manifesto regarding the Minister of Health (and also ex-rector) Orazio Schillaci. […]

The person who collected the substantial dossier is an expert who prefers to remain anonymous and who calls himself “Aneurus Inconstans” on Pubpeer. He is not a “mole” who wants to avenge some immediate wrong, he explains to the manifesto: he lives abroad, works for a chemical company but knows the world of research thanks to a past academic career. And, like many researchers, he is increasingly alarmed by the number of scientific frauds he comes across every day while sifting through publications. He too makes extensive use of artificial intelligence to discover recycled images. He collaborates with the Ukrainian Leonid Schneider, a blogger and free-lance science journalist and author of numerous investigations into scientists who “cheat” on his website “For Better Science”.  

The accusations against Cuzzocrea have only emerged in recent weeks but have already received some confirmation. The Hungarian Csaba Szabo, now professor of pharmacology at the University of Friborg (Switzerland) and co-author of one of the articles contested in Cuzzocrea, recognized the duplication of a figure and announced the withdrawal of the scientific article. On the other reports that emerged on Cuzzocrea, Szabo commented to Schneider: “It seems to me that many more retractions are on the horizon.”

I wrote about Csaba Szabo‘s exemplary decision to retract his own paper with Cuzzocrea in Friday Shorts from July 2023.

This is the second article in Il Manifesto about Cuzzocrea (Google-translated):

“Before him and Minister Schillaci , in 2019 it was the turn of his colleague from the University of Ferrara Giorgio Zauli , also suspected of having manipulated around forty publications but miraculously – and mysteriously – saved by the internal investigation conducted by the Emilian university. The recurrence of scandals without consequences involving the “Magnificents” signals the difficulty of academic institutions in monitoring risky behavior.

As in most countries, in Italy scientific fraud does not constitute a crime in itself and the police are not expected to deal with it, unless the fraud serves to divert public resources. Even in that case, to be honest, the outcome is uncertain. When last February another case of suspected fraud at the University of Messina – linked to a loan of 850 thousand euros in favor of professor Alessandra Bitto – emerged on the pages of Secolo XIX, the university ministry promised further investigations which, however, traces have been lost. Minister Anna Maria Bernini, contacted by manifesto , did not want to comment on the story of Schillaci and Cuzzocrea. “

Ah yes, Alessandra Bitto of the Francesco Squadrito gang:

Here is one of recent Cuzzo finds by Aneurus. In the 2011 paper, the data claims to show the effect of adrenomedullin (AM) in the lungs of BML-treated mice, and in the 2012 paper same image data is supposed to show AM effect in the lungs of CAR-treated mice:

Rosanna Di Paola , Elena Talero, Maria Galuppo , Emanuela Mazzon , Placido Bramanti , Virginia Motilva, Salvatore Cuzzocrea Adrenomedullin in inflammatory process associated with experimental pulmonary fibrosis Respiratory Research (2011) doi: 10.1186/1465-9921-12-41 

Talero Elena , Di Paola Rosanna , Mazzon Emanuela, Emanuela Esposito, Motilva Virginia, Cuzzocrea Salvatore Anti-Inflammatory Effects of Adrenomedullin on Acute Lung Injury Induced by Carrageenan in Mice Mediators of Inflammation (2012) doi: 10.1155/2012/717851 

Italy actively dismantled its research oversight, letting the fraudsters investigate themselves, as Il Manifesto writes:

“Until 2010, it was up to the National University Council (Cun) to investigate and sanction academic fraud. Then, the then minister Mariastella Gelmini delegated the task to the ethical codes of the individual universities. […] Between one ricochet of responsibility and another, in the end no one cares about scientific fraud.”

In Italy, science is always political:

“Among the co-authors of five of Cuzzocrea’s articles is the pharmacologist and former Grillina MP Angela Ianaro (who joined the Democratic Party in 2022). In total, eleven of her publications have been reported on Pubpeer, one of which has already been withdrawn from the journals. The vice-president of the Senate and health manager of the M5S Mariolina Castellone also earned four reports on Pubpeer: before entering politics, as a doctor and oncologist she collaborated with the professor of the University of Naples Alfredo Fusco, protagonist a few years ago of one of the most serious Italian scientific scandals regarding data manipulation and her name is also on some of the disputed research.”

Fusco is of course still fully employed as professor in Naples, despite being Italy most infamous research fraudster. Here some of Ianaro’s papers with Cuzzo:

Angela Ianaro , Pasquale Maffia , Salvatore Cuzzocrea, Elena Mazzon , Maria Gabriella Santoro , Massimo Di Rosa , Armando Ialenti 2‐Cyclopenten‐1‐one and prostaglandin J₂ reduce restenosis after balloon angioplasty in rats: role of NF‐κB FEBS Letters (2003) doi: 10.1016/s0014-5793(03)00873-1  

Salvatore Cuzzocrea , Barbara Pisano , Laura Dugo, Angela Ianaro , Michael Ndengele , Daniela Salvemini Superoxide-Related Signaling Cascade Mediates Nuclear Factor-κB Activation in Acute Inflammation Antioxidants & Redox Signaling (2004) doi: 10.1089/1523086041361659 

Bottom line: Cuzzo was sacked for not sharing what he stole.

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A new generation of raising stars

Another great Italian biomedical researcher, currently in UK. Meet Paolo Madeddu, Professor of Experimental Cardiovascular Medicine at the Bristol University. They sure know how to cover up fraud and abuse there.

The Bristol University informs us about Madeddu that he is “recognized as a world leader“, and:

“Madeddu has published 190 papers and obtained multimillion grants from the Medical Research Council, British Heart Foundation, Heart Research UK, Diabetes UK, and the European Community since his relocation to Bristol in 2005 through a exceptional talent recruitment scheme. He is Chief Editor of Frontiers in Cardiovascular Biologics and Regenerative Medicine, Past Chief Editor of Vascular Biology, and Associated Editor of ATVB. He sits several International Grants Committees.

Yet, the achievement Madeddu is mostly proud consists of having fostered a new generation of raising stars in cardiovascular research, who, following Madeddu’s mentoring in Bristol, have reached a professorial status in different countries, including Nicolle Kränkel (Germany), Luciola Barcelos (Brasil), Rajesh Katare (New Zealand), Marco Meloni (France), Paola Campagnolo (UK), Ajman Al Haj Zen (Qatar). This meaning Bristol past-fellows are acting as ambassadors of the Bristol Heart Institute’s excellence across the world.”

Here is Madeddu with the current University of Otago professor Rajesh Katare:

Rajesh Katare , Federica Riu , Kathryn Mitchell , Miriam Gubernator , Paola Campagnolo , Yuxin Cui , Orazio Fortunato , Elisa Avolio , Daniela Cesselli , Antonio Paolo Beltrami , Gianni Angelini , Costanza Emanueli , Paolo Madeddu Transplantation of human pericyte progenitor cells improves the repair of infarcted heart through activation of an angiogenic program involving micro-RNA-132 Circulation Research (2011) doi: 10.1161/circresaha.111.251546 

Like this? Here is more:

Rajesh Katare, Andrea Caporali , Lorena Zentilin , Elisa Avolio , Graciela Sala-Newby , Atsuhiko Oikawa , Daniela Cesselli , Antonio Paolo Beltrami, Mauro Giacca , Costanza Emanueli , Paolo Madeddu Intravenous gene therapy with PIM-1 via a cardiotropic viral vector halts the progression of diabetic cardiomyopathy through promotion of prosurvival signaling Circulation Research (2011) doi: 10.1161/circresaha.110.239111 

Of course there is more of those fake gels by Katare and Madeddu.

And another one!

Rajesh G Katare, Andrea Caporali , Atsuhiko Oikawa , Marco Meloni , Costanza Emanueli , Paolo Madeddu Vitamin B1 analog benfotiamine prevents diabetes-induced diastolic dysfunction and heart failure through Akt/Pim-1-mediated survival pathway Circulation Heart Failure (2010)  doi: 10.1161/circheartfailure.109.903450

Curiously, Katare claims these research interests on his university website:

• “Treatment of ischemic hearts with resident cardiac stem cells
• Development of engineered heart tissue using cardiac and mesenchymal stem cells“

Cardiac stem cells do not exist, they were fabricated by the Italian mega-fraudster Piero Anversa. What is Katare hinting at here? That all his research is just as fake? Neither he nor Madeddu replied to my emails.

And no, it is not only Katare-coauthored papers by Madeddu which are problematic. There’s more on PubPeer.

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I’m just a victim

In Spain, a (vice) rector was caught on papermilling, specifically buying authorships on fake papers from the mill of the elusive Indian data scientist Gunasekaran Manogaran (read about him and his Special Issues scam on Undark, which is based on Nick Wise’s investigation).

Manuel Ansede reports in El Pais (Google-translated):

“Computer engineer Rubén González Crespo, vice-rector of the International University of La Rioja (UNIR), already retracted four studies linked to this plot, including a work on fertilizers in vineyards signed with six Chinese co-authors whom he knows nothing. Gonzalez Crespo says he doesn’t know how his name ended there. He and three of his closest collaborators retracted in total at least 16 studies, eliminated forever by publishers after seeing bad practices. […]

The vice-rector and his three colleagues claim they have been victims of a hoax. González Crespo says Manogaran contacted him in early 2020, because the Spaniard runs a journal specializing in artificial intelligence, called the International Journal of Interactive Multimedia and Artificial Intelligence (IJIMAI). The Indian then presented himself as a prestigious researcher at the University of California in Davis, United States, and began collaborating. Manogaran was even appointed as associate editor of that Spanish magazine, published by UNIR, a private online education institution created in 2008, which has more than 50,000 students in Spain and Latin America. The owner of the UNIR, Miguel Arrufat, is already one of the 50 richest people in Spain, with a fortune of 600 million euros, according to Forbes magazine.”

Manohan approached the publishers offering to act as Special Issue editor, and then funnelled his papermill produce. But he did not act alone:

“González Crespo and his colleagues also participated in several of these contaminated special issues, such as guest editors or as co-authors of concrete works. The editorial office that retracted my articles [Springer Nature has retracted three and Elsevier has withdrawn another one] did so not due to any failure in its scientific content, but due to incorrect performance by Manogaran, of which we have been victims. Neither I nor the other participants in the articles were aware in the least of this gentleman’s inappropriate procedures, González Crespo explains to EL PAIS. […]

The complainant accused eight other scientists in her first message of collaborating with Manogaran’s plot, including the Spaniards, Óscar Sanjuán and Vicente García Díaz, and the Colombian Carlos Enrique Montenegro, according to the documentation provided to EL PAIS by British engineer Nick Wise, who investigates scientific fraud. The three mentioned are regular collaborators of Vice-Rector Rubén González Crespo and all have or have held positions in the UNIR magazine. The four friends, who have been collaborating for years, flatly deny having voluntarily participated in Manogaran’s plot.”

Garcia Diaz, who “already retracted five studies, including one on industrial operations programming, signed along with a co-author from Papua New Guinea and another from the Vellore Institute of Technology, the center where Manogaran studied“, told El Pais journalist about the scam:

“A friend of mine from another university told me that he had a colleague, that he was this Gunasekaran, who was looking for more collaborators. He told me they needed people from the West to sign the studies, because the journals reject the articles if all the coauthors are from countries like India, Pakistan and Iran. “I thought I didn’t lose anything and did him a favor“

Yes, white people in western universities get papermilled authorships for free. And when caught, they pretend to be victim from dark-skinned fraudsters.

In an interview with El Pais, Garcia Diaz openly admitted he never even read the papers he signed as co-author, and claimed he merely did this to help Indian authors get their papers accepted. White Man’s Burden, you know.

But after the UNIR vice-rector González Crespo claimed “I never allow my name to be added in a work where I have not participated” and UNIR professor Ecar Sanjuán proclaimed “I would never agree to collaborate in a fraudulent study. […] I am a victim“, García Díaz changed his tune also. He suddenly insisted that he “superficially participated” in his four retracted studies: “My conscience is very calm, because I have done nothing wrong. I’m just a victim in this story“.

Manogaran is, according to Clarivate, one of the most cited scientists in the world. Also:

“The vice-rector of UNIR boasts of being one of the most cited scientists in the world, according to the classification of Stanford University (USA). One of the reasons for his apparent success is that he is very productive. In 2021 he published a new study almost every week, with very diverse themes, such as genes associated with Alzheimer’s, traffic accident detection systems and underwater sensor networks. González Crespo and Manogaran together signed three works, related to digital video, 6G mobile phone technologies and artificial intelligence.”

Renaissance scholars, you know.

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Evolution of mammals

Michael Balter uncovered yet another #MeTooStem scandal:

“Until just a few days ago, Leonardo Avilla was a paleontologist at the Federal University of the State of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil (UNIRIO). He specialized in the evolution of mammals, and ran a lab at UNIRIO which has hosted a large number of students.

Two years ago, I was approached by Brazilian colleagues who asked me to help expose Avilla’s long history of sexual harassment, assault, bullying, and degrading of students going back more than a decade. They provided me with painful and very detailed testimonies from nine students who had either worked closely with Avilla or stopped working with him as soon as his behavior became clear.

Given the detail and obvious credibility of these first hand accounts (no rumors or second hand accounts were included in the dossier) I published a Twitter thread stating that I was investigating the matter and inviting others to contact me. In response to that thread and a couple of others, I heard from two more victims of Avilla’s alleged misconduct, for a total of eleven detailed accounts.

Not long afterwards, UNIRIO suspended Avilla and announced it was beginning an investigation of the allegations. I am happy to say that late last month, UNIRIO announced that it had found the allegations supported and dismissed Avilla. Brazilian reporters for the site “Fantastico” were eventually able to interview more than 20 survivors of Avilla’s abuses”

Avilla sexually harassed and humiliated his students, and extorted sex from them. Balter describes some details, and writes:

“Some students, who were already well along in their studies and had nowhere else to go, gave in to these demands and suffered lasting shame and psychological harm as a result. A number of them left paleontology, a field that had been the dream of many.”

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Retraction Watchdogging

Unintentionally confused

Aneurus Inconstans also has a strong interest in Argentina, maybe because many researchers there have historically Italian names. He reported this paper on PubPeer, and it was now retracted:

The Retraction notice was published on 10 October 2023:

“The Editor-in-Chief has retracted this article. After publication, concerns were raised regarding the western blot images presented in the figures. Specifically:

• Fig. 4c appears to present duplicated Actin bands (top, lanes 2 and 3; bottom, lanes 3 and 4).
• Fig. 7c p-ERK blot appears to contain vertical breaks between the bands.

The authors have been unable to retrieve the original raw data for Fig. 4c, and stated that two lanes were switched around in Fig. 7c p-ERK blot. The Editor-in-Chief therefore no longer has confidence in the presented data.

The authors have repeated the experiments and have been offered to submit a revised manuscript for further peer review.

María Alejandra Paulazo, Alicia Juana Klecha, Helena Andrea Sterle, Florencia Cayrol and Graciela Alicia Cremaschi do not agree to this retraction. Eduardo Valli, Horacio Torti and María Laura Barreiro Arcos have not responded to any correspondence from the editor or publisher about this retraction.”

The last author Graciela Alicia Cremaschi is a CONICET funded professor at the University of Buenos Aires. She has more on PubPeer, and previously she corrected another paper:

In January 2023, Cremaschi informed on PubPeer that no conclusions were ever affected:

“We re-analyzed the data and arrived at the conclusion that we could have unintentionally confused one of the actin bands of the images included in the manuscript. Based on this mistake, we have published a corrigendum to the manuscript…”

The Corrigendum from 17 December 2022 stated:

“After the publication of the article the authors have realized that in Fig. 3B they have unintentionally confused the actin bands that were shown. This error was introduced during the assembly of the figure.

The corrected version of Fig. 3, with the correct bands for active-caspase 3 and actin, are show here. Note that the revised data do not affect the results and conclusions reported in the paper. The authors thank the editor of The Journal of Molecular Medicine for the opportunity to publish the corrigendum, and apologize the readership for any inconvenience they might have caused.”

A brief Google search about Cremaschi led to this document from July 2023, where it is stated that she resigned “from the position of regular associate professor“:

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Knife errors

A fish processing expert at Faculty of Fisheries Sciences and Aquaculture of Kafrelsheikh University in Egypt, complains about her retraction:

Zizy I. Elbialy , Doaa H. Assar , Aml Abdelnaby , Samah Abu Asa , Ehab Y. Abdelhiee , Samar S. Ibrahim , Mohamed M. Abdel-Daim, Rafa Almeer , Ayman Atiba Healing potential of Spirulina platensis for skin wounds by modulating bFGF, VEGF, TGF-ß1 and α-SMA genes expression targeting angiogenesis and scar tissue formation in the rat model Biomedicine & Pharmacotherapy (2021) doi: 10.1016/j.biopha.2021.111349 

An unnamed author, likely associate professor Zizy Elbialy, explained on PubPeer:

“this misuse of stamp Photoshop tool was not used to alter the expression level but to remove the knife artifact from the image. The pathology technician who performed this work declared this to us.“

Nevertheless, a Retraction was published on 5 October 2023:

“The journal was alerted to an associated PubPeer post in which suspected duplicated features were identified within Figure 4 B1, and the histological image in Figure 3 A1 appears to have been previously published in another article, as detailed here: https://pubpeer.com/publications/E5658B7B735FF993AA795A5F14C086. The journal performed independent analysis and identified additional suspected image duplications between the images of mice in Figure 1A+B and images of mice in Figure 6 A+B from Elbialy et al., BMC Veterinary Research (2020). The journal requested the authors provide an explanation to these concerns and associated raw data, but this request was not satisfactorily fulfilled. The Editor-in-Chief assessed the case and decided to retract the article.”

Zizy I. Elbialy arrived to complain on PubPeer:

“As the corresponding author, I discussed with all coauthors the raised issue, and we all decided to contact the pathologist who is responsible for processing the Pathology and Immunohistochemistry figures to ask him for the original figures of our research. Our request is to give us a chance to get the original pictures and figures, reprocess them into new plates and resend your reputable journal to correct our manuscript and gain your kindness for the correction of our article instead of retraction.”

She also offered “new figures to replace the old ones which contain knife errors“.

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Scholarly Publishing

How the graphs were generated

In the following case, PLOS chickened out of retractions, maybe because the data integrity expert Dror Kolodkin-Gal, owner of Proofig, has succeeded convincing the publisher that his wife Ilona Kolodkin-Gal was not a compulsive cheater, but an eccentric bumbling genius, and a victim of dyslexia.

These two PLOS One papers contained both fudged gels and dodgy graphs, as described in detail in earlier Friday Shorts. I show just some examples of the graphs, because those are the main joke:

Ilana Kolodkin-Gal , Boaz Sat , Alex Keshet , Hanna Engelberg- Engelberg-Kulka The communication factor EDF and the toxin-antitoxin module mazEF determine the mode of action of antibiotics PLoS Biology (2008) doi: 10.1371/journal.pbio.0060319 

These graphs are obviously hand-made in some drawing program, and not generated from datasets in Excel or another suitable tool, as sane scientists do it. Why?

Well, the SECOND lengthy Expression of Concern this paper received on 18 September 2023 attempts to explain (highlights mine):

“Readers have raised concerns about quantitative results published in bar graphs in Figures S1, S2, S4, and S5 of this article [1, 2]. Specifically, it was noted that the bars are not consistently spaced within the bar graphs; some data annotations (values) on the graphs do not agree with bars’ alignment with values on the Y axis; and some bars have lower edges that appear slightly above or below the X axis line.

The authors stand by the results and commented that these issues are due to the method(s) used to prepare the graphs. They stated that they used an early illustrator program into which they copied the values of calculated results (means and standard deviations) of three independent experiments for plotting on electronic millimeter grid paper [3].

The authors also stated that in instances where data annotations within the graphs differ from bars’ alignment with the Y axis, the data labels within the graphs (i.e., above the bars) provide the correct results.

The authors stated that the original raw data underlying the graphs of concern are not fully available at this time given the time elapsed. In light of this issue, PLOS has been unable to verify the results and the article does not currently comply in full with the applicable version of the PLOS Data Availability policy*. Nevertheless, the editors consider that the explanation provided by the authors sufficiently clarifies how the graphs were generated.”

Reference 3 goes to a “Graph paper or grid lines paper texture pattern background” website:

3. “https://www.freepik.com/premium-photo/graph-paper-grid-lines-paper-texture-pattern-background_16750172.htm#from_view=detail_alsolikehttps://www.123rf.com/photo_10222285 (Accessed 9 Aug 2023)”

This is of course utterly insane. A “my cat ran over keyboard” excuse would have been more credible.

Here is the other amended paper which I also discussed in earlier Shorts before. It laso had duplciated microscopy images, but I only show one example of hand-drawn graphs, which were again originally posted on PubPeer by Elisabeth Bik:

Ilana Kolodkin-Gal, Reut Verdiger , Ayalla Shlosberg-Fedida , Hanna Engelberg-Kulka A differential effect of E. coli toxin-antitoxin systems on cell death in liquid media and biofilm formation PLoS ONE (2009) doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0006785

Also here, the SECOND editorial note from 13 September 2023 educated the readers that all is well:

“Readers have raised concerns about quantitative results published in bar graphs in Figs 2–3, S3-S7, and S9 of this article [1, 2]. Specifically, it was noted that the bars and axes demarcations are not consistently spaced within the bar graphs; there are some misalignments between error bars and data points, or between axes and their demarcations; some bars have lower edges that appear slightly above or below the X axis line; and some bars are similar to each other.

Also, in Figs 2A, 2B, 2C, S3A, S3B, S3C, S3D, S5B, S5C, and S6B, some data annotations (values) on the graphs do not agree with bars’ alignment with values on the Y axis. The authors stated that the data annotations within the graphs (i.e., above the bars) provide the correct results.

In addition, in Fig S5C, the data values on top of the bars are tenfold higher than the scale on the Y axis. The authors stated that the measured population size was 106 for stained population size and the Y axis for Fig S5C should be labelled, ‘Absolute number of dead cells (x 106)’.

The authors stand by the results and commented that these issues are due to the method(s) used to prepare the graphs. They stated that they used an early illustrator program into which they copied the values of calculated results (means and standard deviations) of three independent experiments for plotting on electronic millimeter grid paper [3].

The authors stated that the original raw data underlying the graphs of concern are not fully available at this time given the time elapsed. In light of this issue, PLOS has been unable to verify the results and the article does not currently comply in full with the applicable version of the PLOS Data Availability policy*. Nevertheless, the editors consider that the explanation provided by the authors sufficiently clarifies how the graphs were generated.”

I presume the gel and microscopy image duplications also happened because electronic millimetre grid paper was used.

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Papermills for Dummies

Wiley’s CEO has been sacked. A press release:

“John Wiley & Sons Chief Executive Brian Napack has exited the company, months after laying out a turnaround plan for the book publisher that included selling non-core businesses and reining in costs.

Matthew Kissner, a former Wiley chairman who stepped in as interim CEO in 2017, has returned to the CEO post on an interim basis. The company said Kissner will execute on the restructuring plan laid out by Napack in June.

Wiley, which publishes the For Dummies series and other educational books, also canceled its investor day, which was scheduled for Thursday.”

The reason for the sack might be the SEVEN THOUSANDS RETRACTIONS (according to Parashorea tomentella), with no end in sight. All from special issues. That’s because Wiley bought the open access publisher Hindawi and turned it into, well, a papermill.

In fact, Hindawi’s problem with special issues is so bad that they started to dissolve and delete those, turning problematic papers into “regular” submissions, only to retract them later. Or not!

Po Hu , Suofang Shi , Li Liu , Shuomiao Yin , Lingfu Wang Qu Feng Xuan Bi Formula Alleviates Airway Inflammation and Guides Clinical Treatment by Improving Bronchial Immune Balance in the Asthma Model Scientific Programming (2021) doi: 10.1155/2021/6648834 

You can think what you want about the scientific validity of Traditional Chinese Medicine, but even the most dedicated believers will concur this specific TCM study has very little to do with this journal’s scope of “scientific and engineering computing”. To address this confusion and to reduce the need for retraction, Wiley pulled this paper out of the Special Issue, which has been otherwise erased.

Maybe Napack was sacked for allowing these thousands of retractions to happen, instead of doing what equally papermill-infested MDPI does. Nothing.

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Science Breakthroughs

Assembly Theory of Alien Life

Science has been revolutionised by a genius: Lee Cronin, chemistry professor at the University of Glasgow in UK.

A press release from Arizona State University:

“An international team of researchers has developed a new theoretical framework that bridges physics and biology to provide a unified approach for understanding how complexity and evolution emerge in nature. This new work on “Assembly Theory,” published today in Nature, represents a major advance in our fundamental comprehension of biological evolution and how it is governed by the physical laws of the universe. […]

“Assembly Theory provides a completely new lens for looking at physics, chemistry and biology as different perspectives of the same underlying reality,” explained lead author professor Sara Walker, a theoretical physicist and origin of life researcher from Arizona State University. “With this theory, we can start to close the gap between reductionist physics and Darwinian evolution – it’s a major step toward a fundamental theory unifying inert and living matter.” […]

“Assembly Theory provides an entirely new way to look at the matter that makes up our world, as defined not just by immutable particles but by the memory needed to build objects through selection over time,” said professor Lee Cronin, a chemist from the University of Glasgow and co-lead author. “With further work, this approach has the potential to transform fields from cosmology to computer science. It represents a new frontier at the intersection of physics, chemistry, biology and information theory.”

This is the Nature paper:

Abhishek Sharma , Dániel Czégel , Michael Lachmann , Christopher P. Kempes , Sara I. Walker , Leroy Cronin Assembly theory explains and quantifies selection and evolution Nature (2023) – doi: 10.1038/s41586-023-06600-9 

To help the posterity put this masterpiece in perspective, its references include:

3. Darwin, C. On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or, The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (Natural History Museum, 2019).

7. Newton, I. Newton’s Principia. The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy (Daniel Adee, 1846).

Basically, here is your Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. Needless to say, Lee Cronin’s name transcribed in Kabbalistic numerology is 42.

The study ends with this reference:

“For molecules, computing the assembly index is not explicitly necessary, because the assembly index can be probed directly experimentally with high accuracy with spectroscopy techniques including mass spectroscopy, infrared and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy²⁹.”

Reference 29 goes to an interestingly-themed Cronin preprint, soon probably also in Nature:

Michael Jirasek , Abhishek Sharma , Jessica R. Bame , Nicola Bell , Stuart M. Marshall , Cole Mathis , Alasdair Macleod , Geoffrey J. T. Cooper , Marcel Swart , Rosa Mollfulleda , Leroy Cronin Multimodal Techniques for Detecting Alien Life using Assembly Theory and Spectroscopy arXiv (2023) doi: 10.48550/arxiv.2302.13753 

Speaking of aliens, Cronin’s Twitter/X profile modestly states:

“Trying to digitize chemistry & make alien life.”

The Nature paper also says:

“The authors declare no competing interests.”

Which is not exactly true, Cronin owns a digital chemistry company: Chemify, which just raised $43 million in investment funding. Sara Walker is paid to sit on its advisory board. But rules about COI were made for simple mortals, not geniuses like Cronin.

Look what bio he posted on hiscompany’s webpage:

“Since the age of 9 Lee has wanted to explore chemistry using electronics to control matter. His research spans many disciplines and has four main aims: the construction of an artificial life form; the digitization of chemistry; the use of artificial intelligence in chemistry including the construction of ‘wet’ chemical computers; the exploration of complexity and information in chemistry. His recent work on the digitization of chemistry has resulted in a new programming paradigm for matter and organic synthesis and discovery – chemputation – which uses the worlds first domain specific and universal programming language for chemistry. He has published over 450 papers, given over 500 lectures and has written extensively on all aspects of science from the origin of life to artificial intelligence. His research group is organised and assembled transparently around ideas, avoids hierarchy, and aims to mentor researchers using a problem-based approach. Nothing is impossible until it is tried.”

To be fair, Cronin ticks all boxes: white, male, wealthy, and dashingly good-looking (at least on official photos, maybe less so IRL). Here he talks about “Origin of Life, Aliens, Complexity, and Consciousness“, I didn’t watch it, but you go ahead:

The lecture is apparently about nanotechnology and includes points like “Life on Mars” (Cronin singing David Bowie song?)), “UFOs”, “Free will“, and ends with “Meaning of life” (hopefully not Cronin re-enacting the sex ed scene by Monty Python).

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Spirituality of Science

A press release by the University of Warwick in UK:

“Scientists illuminated a compelling link between experiencing science spiritually and enhanced wellbeing, akin to the psychological uplift often linked to religious beliefs.

The research delves into the “Spirituality of Science,” exploring its association with profound feelings of transcendence, awe, and interconnectedness, thus positioning science as a potent source of meaningful, awe-inspiring experiences. A pivotal discovery reveals that even amidst atheists and agnostics, a spiritual approach to science correlates with markers of psychological wellbeing, such as happiness and a sense of life’s meaning.

This novel intersection of science and spirituality not only redefines perspectives on wellbeing but also implies that evoking a sense of wonder in science education could fortify engagement and retention, sculpting enriched educational outcomes.

Key Facts:

1. Spirituality of Science: The concept explores profound feelings of transcendence, connection, and meaning derived from engaging with science, paralleling aspects of religious spirituality.
2. Wellbeing Correlation: Among atheists and agnostics, a spiritual relationship with science is correlated with markers of positive psychological wellbeing, such as happiness and a sense of purpose.
3. Educational Implications: Experiences of awe and meaning in science predicted heightened engagement and improved recall of scientific information, suggesting that spiritual experiences in science may foster better educational outcomes.”

Yes, I believe spirits were involved in the making of this:

Jesse L. Preston , Thomas J. Coleman , Faith Shin Spirituality of Science: Implications for Meaning, Well-Being, and Learning Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin (2023) doi: 10.1177/01461672231191356 

Again, from the press release:

“Dr Jesse Preston, Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Warwick and lead author of the study said: “Spirituality is most often associated with religion, but science can be a powerful source of awe and wonder for many. It can provide a meaningful source of understanding oneself and the universe, and it can foster a sense of connection to others and our place in the world.””

I trust the study’s significant conclusions were in no way impeded by the minor shortcoming that people who experience science “spiritually” do not exist, certainly not in the way the authors use the word “spirit”.

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