Peer-review fraud cited in retraction of 60 academic papers

Guardian : Earlier this month Sage Publications announced that it was retracting 60 articles published over a 4-year period in the Journal of Vibration and Control (JVC). The retraction was the result of a 14-month investigation revealing that Peter Chen, a researcher at the National Pingtung University of Education in Taiwan, may have manipulated the submission process by fabricating reviewers for his papers and those of his friends. According to Sage, the “peer review and citation ring” may have involved the creation of as many as 130 email accounts in order to get as many papers reviewed favorably and, hence, published as possible. “On at least one occasion, the author Peter Chen reviewed his own paper under one of the aliases he had created,” said Sage. Ali Nayfeh, the editor-in-chief of JVC since its inception in 1995, resigned in May following the findings.