Journal will not retract influential paper by botanist accused of plagiarism and fraud

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Alison Avenell of the University of Aberdeen and Andrew Grey and Mark Bolland, both at the University of Auckland, who exposed fraud on a massive scale by a Japanese bone researcher, say journals often don’t take alleged misconduct seriously. The BMC Medicine paper illustrates journals’ reluctance to provide detailed responses to detailed complaints of misconduct, they write in a joint comment in response to questions from Science. “Authors submitting work for publication are asked to provide a point-by-point response to reviewers’ comments, yet journals cannot manage to do the same when integrity concerns are raised,” the three researchers say.