Paper mills for established scientists

[Hibush]

Some just worry about paper mills generating generic papers for student assigments. The same process is happening with much worse consequences. Real peer-reviewed journals are getting spammed with papers purporting to do very similar analyses on lots of different genes. The results are all fake. Many of the papers have been published. One Western blot apparrently appears in 400 different articles in major journals.


Systematic fabrication of scientific images revealed
https://febs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/1873-3468.13201

The linked editorial, by FEBS Letters editor Jana Christopher describes steps that reviewers, editors and journal staff need to take to stem this process.

The driving force for both career scientists and students is credentialism. They are rewarded for having certain markers that will provide a credential. That credential then confers certain benefits.