As part of his job as fraud detector at biomedical publisher Spandidos, John Chesebro trawls through research papers, scrutinising near identical images of cells. For him, the tricks used by \u201cpaper mills\u201d \u2014 the outfits paid to fabricate scientific studies \u2014 have become wearily familiar.<\/p>\n
They range from clear duplication \u2014 the same images of cell cultures on microscope slides copied across numerous, unrelated studies \u2014 to more subtle tinkering. Sometimes an image is rotated \u201cto try to trick you to think it\u2019s different\u201d, Chesebro says. \u201cAt times you can detect where parts of an image were digitally manipulated to add or remove cells or other features to make the data look like the results you are expecting in the hypothesis.\u201d He estimates he rejects 5 to 10 per cent of papers because of fraudulent data or ethical issues.<\/p>\n
Spandidos, based in Athens and London, accepts a large volume of papers from China, with around 90 per cent of its output coming from Chinese authors. In the mid-2010s, independent scientists accused Spandidos of publishing papers with results that recycled the same sets of data. As part of its response to the allegations, the publisher is using a team of in-house fraud detectors to weed out and retract fake research.<\/p>\n
Over the past two decades, Chinese researchers have become some of the world\u2019s most prolific publishers of scientific papers. The Institute for Scientific Information, a US-based research analysis organisation, calculated that China produced 3.7mn papers in 2021 \u2014 23 per cent of global output \u2014 and just behind the 4.4mn total from the US.<\/p>\n
Read it all<\/a> (registration or subscription).<\/p>\n China\u2019s fake science industry: how \u2018paper mills\u2019 threaten progress https:\/\/t.co\/ajIYXluYA9<\/a><\/p>\n — FT China (@ftchina) March 28, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n \n