Science journalism by Leonid Schneider, on research integrity and academic publishing in life sciences and biomedicine
An investigation by Elisabeth Bik, Smut Clyde, Morty and Tiger BB8 reveals the workings of a paper mill. Its customers are Chinese doctors desperate for promotion. Apparently even journal editors are part of the scam, publishing fraudulent made-up science.
A breast cancer foundation celebrates its research heroes. Read now here about how great US scientists from Harvard, MIT, Weill Cornell and MD Anderson cure cancer.
The prion researcher Adriano Aguzzi used to describe his Pubpeer critics as “lowlifes”, and himself as a victim of a lynch mob. But after Elisabeth Bik helped him find even more mistakes in his papers, Aguzzi changed his stance.
Catherine Verfaillie is a zombie scientist: her past stem cell research long discredited, but she still is an influential and very well funded star of Belgian science. Now Elisabeth Bik had a fresh new look at Verfaillie’s papers
A dishonest cancer researcher. A dud cancer drug based on rigged lab data. A clinical trial in The Lancet. A greedy university which finds no misconduct. And a medical journal which tramples over patients.
Johan Thyberg discusses the Macchiarini affair in the context of ethical shortcomings of Karolinska’s own leadership.
Ashutosh Tiwari and his patron Tony Turner were found guilty of research misconduct by Linköping University. Turner is to be sacked as EiC of his Elsevier journal Biosensors and Bioelectronics, a paper he tried to correct there will be retracted. Meanwhile, Tiwari and his LiU colleague Mikael Syväjärvi started a new business: they offer heart surgeries in India.
Liverpool professor Patricia Murray continues investigating shady dealings of the regmed company Celixir, owned by struck-off dentist Ajan Reginald and Nobelist Sir Martin Evans
Two old gynaecology professors in Milan decided to racially profile, then rate their misinformed young patients for sexual attractiveness. Their even published this as an evo-psych study in a respected society journal.
Patricia Murray uncovers the business secrets of the Nobelist Martin Evans and his partner Ajan Reginald. It seems the magic iMP cells used to treat patients in Greece were drawn from the blood of patients in Swansea, for the purpose of a secret PhD thesis. There is no serious science behind it, only serious investor money and a fraudulent patent.
