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Hindustan Times
4 days ago
- Science
- Hindustan Times
Fraudulent scientific papers are booming
SCIENTIFIC JOURNALS exist to do one thing: provide accurate, peer-reviewed reports of new research to an interested audience. But according to a paper published in PNAS on August 4th, that lofty goal is badly compromised. Scientific fraud, its authors conclude, happens on a massive scale and is growing quickly. In fact, though the number of scientific articles doubles every 15 years or so, the number thought to be fraudulent is doubling every 1.5 years (see chart). It has long been clear that publication fraud rarely comes from lone fraudsters. Instead, companies known as paper mills prepare fake scientific papers full of made-up experiments and bogus data, often with the help of artificial-intelligence (AI) models, and sell authorship to academics looking to boost their publication numbers. But the analysis conducted by Dr Amaral and his colleagues suggests that some journal editors may be knowingly waving these papers through. Their article suggests that a subset of journal editors are responsible for the majority of questionable papers their publications produce. To arrive at their conclusion, the authors looked at papers published by PLOS ONE , an enormous and generally well-regarded journal that identifies which of their 18,329 editors is responsible for each paper. (Most editors are academics who agree to oversee peer review alongside their research.) Since 2006 the journal has published 276,956 articles, 702 of which have been retracted and 2,241 of which have received comments on PubPeer, a site that allows other academics and online sleuths to raise concerns. When the team crunched the data, they found 45 editors who facilitated the acceptance of retracted or flagged articles much more frequently than would be expected by chance. Although they were responsible for the peer-review process of only 1.3% of PLOS ONE submissions, they were responsible for 30.2% of retracted articles. The data suggested yet more worrying patterns. For one thing, more than half of these editors were themselves authors of papers later retracted by PLOS ONE . What's more, when they submitted their own papers to the journal, they regularly suggested each other as editors. Although papers can be retracted for many causes, including honest mistakes, Dr Amaral believes these patterns indicate a network of editors co-operating to bypass the journal's usual standards. Dr Amaral does not name the editors in his article, butNature, a science magazine, subsequently made use of his analysis to track down five of the relevant editors. PLOS ONE says that all five were investigated and dismissed between 2020 and 2022. Those who responded toNature's enquiries denied wrongdoing. Compelling as Dr Amaral's analysis is, it does not conclusively prove dishonest behaviour. All the same, the findings add to a growing body of evidence suggesting some editors play an active role in the publication of substandard research. An investigation in 2024 by RetractionWatch, an organisation that monitors retracted papers, and Science, another magazine, found that paper mills have bribed editors in the past. Editors might also use their powers to further their own academic careers. Sleuths on PubPeer have flagged papers in several journals which seem to be co-written by either the editor overseeing the peer review or one of their close collaborators—a clear conflict of interest. Detecting networks of editors the way Dr Amaral's team has 'is completely new', says Alberto Ruano Raviña of the University of Santiago de Compostela in Spain, who researches scientific fraud and was not involved with the study. He is particularly worried about fake papers remaining part of the scientific record in medical fields, where their spurious findings might be used to conduct reviews that inform clinical guidelines. A recent paper in the BMJ , a medical journal, found that 8-16% of the conclusions in systematic reviews that included later-retracted evidence ended up being wrong. 'This is a real problem,' says Dr Ruano Raviña. Yet the incentives for fraud continue to outweigh the consequences. Measures including a researcher's number of publications and citations have become powerful proxies for academic achievement, and are seen as necessary for building a career. 'We have become focused on numbers,' says Dr Amaral. This is sometimes made explicit: staff at Indian medical collegesare required to publisha certain number of papersin order to progress. Some journals, for their part, make more money the more articles they accept. Breaking either trend will take time. In the meantime, publishers are rolling out new screening tools for suspicious content, including some which spot 'tortured phrases'—nonsensical plagiarism-evading paraphrases generated by AI models such as 'colossal information' instead of 'big data'—or citations in the wrong places. There is also increasing pressure on publishers to root out bad papers. Databases of reputable journals, such as Scopus or Web of Science, can 'de-list' journals, ruining their reputations. It's up to the publishers to bring about a relisting, which means tidying up the journal. 'If we see untrustworthy content that you're not retracting, you're not getting back in,' says Nandita Quaderi, editor-in-chief of Web of Science. But whether publishers and the many editors who work hard to keep bad science out of their journals can keep up with the paper mills remains to be seen.
Observer
5 days ago
- Science
- Observer
Fraudulent scientific papers are rapidly increasing
For years, whistleblowers have warned that fake results are sneaking into the scientific literature at an increasing pace. A new statistical analysis backs up the concern. A team of researchers found evidence of shady organisations churning out fake or low-quality studies on an industrial scale. And their output is rising fast, threatening the integrity of many fields. 'If these trends are not stopped, science is going to be destroyed,' said Luís A Nunes Amaral, a data scientist at Northwestern University and an author of the study, which was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on Monday. Science has made huge advances over the past few centuries only because new generations of scientists could read about the accomplishments of previous ones. Each time a new paper is published, other scientists can explore the findings and think about how to make their own discoveries. 'Science relies on trusting what others did, so you do not have to repeat everything,' Amaral said. As more graduate students were trained in labs, the competition for a limited number of research jobs sharpened. High-profile papers became essential for success, not just for landing a job, but also for getting promotions and grants. Organisations known as paper mills are now turning scientific fraud into a lucrative business. Scientists eager to pad out their resumes can pay hundreds to thousands of dollars to be named as an author of a paper that they had nothing to do with, according to Anna Abalkina, a social scientist at Free University of Berlin who studies paper mills. The manuscript might be provided to the paper mill by a dishonest scientist for a price; in other cases, it might be generated in house. To ensure the papers get published, paper mills sometimes offer bribes to corrupt editors, according to an investigation by the Center for Scientific Integrity. Abalkina said that such papers are typically riddled with fraud — everything from doctored images to plagiarised text. To avoid plagiarism detectors, paper mills often use artificial intelligence to alter the text they lift from other papers, sometimes introducing bizarre phrasing such as 'bogus upside' instead of 'false positive.' Even as paper mills have worked to keep their efforts hidden, Abalkina has traced the output of companies in Russia, Iran and other countries, and found thousands of their papers in print. Amaral and his colleagues have now analysed those patterns, using network theory and other statistical techniques. 'We tried to give a picture of what's below the surface,' said Reese Richardson, a postdoctoral researcher at Northwestern University and an author of the new study. For their analysis, the scientists built a database of more than 1 million scientific papers. They searched for the papers in online forums where sleuths share duplicated images and tortured phrases, as well as the Retraction Watch Database, maintained by the Center for Scientific Integrity. The researchers compiled a list of 30,000 papers that have either been retracted or show signs of having come from a paper mill. They discovered connections between the papers that strongly hinted that they were the product of large-scale fraud. Many of these connections linked clusters of editors and authors who often worked together. 'There are huge networks that are very densely connected, where they're all sending their papers to one another,' Richardson said. 'If that's not collusion, I don't know what is.' The scientists found more evidence of paper mills by looking at duplicated images. Some papers contained images copied from more than one other paper. Mapping the connections between them, the researchers charted networks of thousands of papers. The papers in a cluster all tended to be published in the same short window of time, often in journals put out by a single publisher. The best explanation Amaral sees for the pattern of this network is that paper mills are creating banks of images that they use to create entire batches of papers, which they then peddle to certain corrupt editors. After a while, the paper mills make new images and find new targets. The papers that Amaral and his colleagues could study came to light only because of the work of independent sleuths. To estimate how many paper mill papers have yet to be exposed, Amaral's team created a statistical model that accurately predicted the rate at which suspicious papers surfaced. They estimate that the number of paper mill products may be 100 times greater than the ones they have identified. Elisabeth Bik, a California-based expert on scientific fraud who was not involved in the study, said that it confirmed her early suspicions. Amaral and his colleagues warn that fraud is growing exponentially. In their new study, they calculated that the number of suspicious new papers appearing each year was doubling every 1.5 years. That's far faster than the increase of scientific papers overall, which is doubling every 15 years. Amaral and his colleagues found evidence that paper mills are selectively targeting certain fields to publish dubious papers. The team compared research on different versions of RNA, a molecule that has many roles in the cell. Papers on a form of RNA called microRNA and its role in cancer were much more likely to show signs of possible fraud than other RNA-related fields, such as the gene editing technology CRISPR. But Amaral suspects that paper mills will eventually turn their attention to other fields as well. In an executive order in May on 'gold-standard science,' President Donald Trump drew attention to the problem of scientific fraud. 'The falsification of data by leading researchers has led to high-profile retractions of federally funded research,' the order stated. But the administration has not offered any new initiatives to address the problem. Thousands of scientists have protested the order, arguing that it would lead to the political muzzling of genuine scientific findings.
Euronews
04-08-2025
- Climate
- Euronews
Spain and Portugal declares high-alert due to fire risk
Portugal entered a state of alert on Sunday due to the worsening risk of wildfires amid severe hot weather. Temperatures there are expected to range from 36 to 44 degrees Celsius. Portugal's Minister of Internal Administration Maria Lúcia Amaral said access, movement and permanence within forest spaces would be prohibited in accordance with forest fire defence plans. Fireworks, carrying out work and using machinery and burning things will also be prohibited as the nation faces the extreme heat. Amaral said these preventative measures came amid the high temperatures and low humidity and the corresponding risk of wildfires. Five districts in the north of the country will be on red alert on Monday and Tuesday. All the remaining districts will be on orange alert, except for the district of Faro which will be on yellow. The high alert situation will last until Thursday. Forest fires continue to rage in the north of Portugal and at least one village in the Douro region had to be evacuated on Sunday. Spain will also experience high temperatures as a mass of hot air from North Africa hovers over the Iberian Peninsula. It is currently enduring the summer's second heatwave expected to last until the end of the weak. The extreme weather is set to affect the entire country except for the Cantabrian region and the Canary Islands. Temperatures in Andalucía, Extremadura, Castilla-La Mancha, and Galicia are expected to surpass 40 degrees Celsius, with some zones like the Guadalquivir valley reaching as high as 42 degrees. Spain's Ministry of Health issued a 'red risk' health alert for hundreds of municipalities. The heatwave in both Portugal and Spain will reach its peak intensity on Monday and Tuesday. Typically, cold Nordic countries are also being seared by a 'truly unprecedented' heatwave, according to local authorities. Scientists say the region went through its longest heatwave since the 1960s – with temperatures regularly soaring past 30 degrees Celsius. Finland had three straight weeks with over 30 degrees Celsius heat in July. Norway's Meterological Institute said temperatures above 30 degrees Celsius were recorded on 12 days in July in the country's most northernmost counties. Swedish scientists also noted long-term heatwaves affecting the north of the country. The area has also been hit by storms and lighting strikes that have sparked wildfires. Warnings were also issued in eastern Poland for storms, rain and heat over the weekend. Strong winds of up to 80 km/h and hail are affected to hit parts of the country. The most severe warnings have been issued for parts of the Warmian-Masurian, Masovian, Lublin and Subcarpathian Voivodeships. Storms in these areas will be accompanied by heavy rainfall of up to 45mm. Authorities also warn of heatwave conditions with temperatures in the affected regions expected to hover around 30 degrees Celsius. However, the long period of unstable weather that has characterised this year's Italian summer is finally coming to an end. After baking in heatwaves across the country, rainstorms are now affecting several regions, particularly those along the Adriatic coast. A 70-year-old man was reportedly struck by lightning on a beach in Piombino during a storm. He was saved by the intervention of rescue services, and his heart began beating again after 30 minutes of resuscitation. He was then transferred by hospital to a local hospital.
Euronews
02-08-2025
- Climate
- Euronews
Portugal declares high-alert due to hot weather and fire risk
Mainland Portugal will enter a state of alert from midnight on Sunday due to the worsening risk of wildfires as a result of "considerably severe hot weather" with maximum temperatures expected to range from 36 to 44 degrees Celsius. The announcement was made on Saturday by Minister of Internal Administration Maria Lúcia Amaral. It will be in force until 11.59pm on 7 August. "This decision stems from the maintenance of very high temperatures, low humidity levels and the need to adopt preventive and special measures to respond to the risk of fire in a large part of mainland Portugal," explained the minister. During this period, she added, the following exceptional measures will be implemented: "Prohibition of access, movement and permanence within forest spaces, in accordance with municipal forest fire defence plans; prohibition of burning and burning as well as suspension of authorisations that have been issued; prohibition of carrying out work in forest spaces and other rural spaces using machinery; prohibition of the use of fireworks or other pyrotechnic artefacts as well as the suspension of authorisations that have been issued." Amaral said there are some very specific exceptions to these restrictions which can be found on the Portuguese government portal. Episode of severe hot weather in Portugal A mass of hot air from North Africa will be over the Iberian Peninsula from Sunday. It means that Portugal and Spain will experience even higher temperatures that could reach 45 degrees Celsius. Until next Wednesday, a severe episode of hot weather is expected in Portugal. Maximum temperatures of between 36°C and 40°C are expected in most of the country, and between 41°C and 44°C in the interior of the Alentejo, the Tagus Valley and the Douro Valley. On Monday, the maximum temperature is expected to drop in the Algarve, which may also occur along the rest of the coast and extend to Tuesday, the Portuguese Institute for the Sea and Atmosphere (IPMA) warned. However, Porto, Braga, Bragança, Viana do Castelo and Vila Real will be on red alert on Monday. The IPMA indicates that "tropical nights are expected in most of the territory", with minimum temperatures varying between 20 and 25 degrees Celsius from Monday onwards. As a result of the heatwave, all the districts of mainland Portugal, with the exception of Faro, are under an orange warning. The orange warning, which is the second most serious on a scale of three, is issued by the IPMA when there is a meteorological situation of moderate to high risk. The yellow warning, which is less serious, is issued when there is a risk situation for certain activities depending on weather.
IOL News
03-07-2025
- Politics
- IOL News
Is Equating the Gaza Genocide to Auschwitz a Misrepresentation?
A woman mourns over the shrouded body of a Palestinian killed during a reported Israeli strike on a humanitarian aid distribution warehouse in the Sabra neighbourhood in Gaza City, in the central Gaza Strip on June 30, 2025. Despite misconceptions, Israel is not trying to starve the Gazan people, says the writer. Image: AFP Nicholas Woode-Smith Roberto Amaral's comparison of Gaza to Auschwitz is not just patently ahistorical but belies an ignorance of the realities of the Gaza conflict and the true human cost of the Holocaust (From Auschwitz to Gaza: The modern-day concentration camp, published in the Sunday Independent and IOL, 9 June 2025). To equate the systematic industrial genocide of six million Jews in Auschwitz with Israel's military campaign in Gaza is not only a gross distortion but a deeply offensive minimisation of the Holocaust. In five years, a patch of dirt approximately 346 acres large, guarded by 10 miles of barbed wire, became the last resting place of over 1.1 million innocents. The vast majority of those exterminated were Jews. Auschwitz was just one of the many concentration and death camps constructed by the Nazi regime to exterminate Jews and their perceived enemies. Six million Jews were systematically rounded up, put into hellish camps, and shot, gassed, brutalised, tortured and slaughtered. The global Jewish population only recovered from this genocide in recent years. The scale of the operation and its cold and calculated industrial efficiency were unlike anything that the world had ever seen before. Jakub Nowakowski, Director of Cape Town's Holocaust & Genocide Centre, poignantly highlights the intense and concentrated cruelty of the Nazi's final solution: 'Six camps... became centres of industrialised murder... In Bełżec alone, 500,000 Jews were killed in just ten months.' Amaral's use of the term 'Luciferian' to describe Israel reveals much of the underlying bigotry of his argument. Describing an entire state as satanic is not a political critique; it's dehumanisation. This language echoes some of the oldest antisemitic tropes in history, many of which fuelled genocidal ideologies in Europe. Amaral wishes to paint Israel as the fundamental antagonist in what is a tragic and complicated conflict. He fails to mention the October 7 massacre, one of the largest mass atrocities against Jews since the Holocaust, and the event that caused this war in the first place. As Nowakowski pertinently comments: 'It is worth keeping in mind that it was Hamas that sparked this latest cycle of violence with its attack on Israel on October 7, two years ago, not the Israeli army.' Video Player is loading. 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Advertisement Next Stay Close ✕ Ad loading Further, Amaral refuses to call the conflict a war, stripping Gazans and Hamas of their agency and acting as if Palestinians are only passive victims who have not pulled a single trigger. It is this passivity that Amaral asserts is further evidence of Israel's genocide against the Gaza people. But there is a large difference between Gaza and Auschwitz. And genocide isn't just about the number of dead. As Nowakowski explains: 'The definition of genocide... turns on one thing above all else—intent. For an atrocity to be genocide, its defining objective must be the physical elimination of a group, or a part of that group.' In the case of the Holocaust: 'These six camps, including Bełżec, Auschwitz-Birkenau, and Treblinka, became centres of industrialised murder... Their deaths were not collateral; they were the objective.' Genocide is not Israel's objective in Gaza. Israel is not marching civilians into gas chambers or firing wantonly at innocents. And despite misconceptions, Israel is not trying to starve the Gazan people either. The vast majority of civilian deaths have occurred because of Hamas' strategy of embedding itself among civilians, using homes, hospitals, schools, and mosques to store weapons and launch attacks on Israeli civilians, attempting to kill them merely for being Jewish. The fact of the matter is that if Israel could achieve its military objective of saving its hostages and eliminating Hamas as a threat to its people without harming a single civilian, that is what they would choose. A true genocide would have no such discernment between combatants and noncombatants. The Jews of Europe, the Tutsis of Rwanda, the Armenians, and the Bosnian Muslims were targeted because of who they are. The aim was their extermination. Amaral and other writers risk overextending the term 'genocide' and dulling its moral edge. It risks confusing true genocide with what is already a tragic, albeit necessary, war. To call Gaza a modern Auschwitz is not only historically incoherent, but devalues the unique horror of the Holocaust, where genocide was not a side effect. It was the mission. Civilian deaths in Gaza must not be dismissed. But they must also not be mislabelled. If we are to prevent future genocides, we must first be honest about what they are and what they are not. Comparing Gaza to Auschwitz reveals a deeper moral confusion. The Jews of Europe were powerless civilians systematically rounded up and exterminated solely for who they were. In Gaza, Israel is targeting Hamas, a heavily armed terrorist group that governs Gaza, started this war, and uses its people as shields. There is no moral equivalence between mass murder and tragic collateral damage. To pretend otherwise is to insult the memory of Holocaust victims and obscure the reality of today's war. To call Gaza another Auschwitz is not just a mistake. It is a betrayal of memory and a barrier to truth and peace. * Nicholas Woode-Smith is the the Managing Editor of the Rational Standard and a Senior Associate of the Free Market Foundation. He writes in his personal capacity. ** The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of IOL, Independent Media or The African. *** EDITOR'S NOTE: The claims made in this article reflect factually incorrect statements regarding Israel's ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people, as ruled by the International Court of Justice, the International Criminal Court's findings, and the ongoing and unfolding humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
