Paper mills bribe editors to pass peer review, and detecting tumors with a blood draw

Science Magazine Podcast

Science Podcast

News Commentary, News, Science

4.2 • 791 Ratings

🗓️ 19 January 2024

⏱️ 38 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Investigation shows journal editors getting paid to publish bunk papers, and new techniques for finding tumor DNA in the blood First up on this week’s episode, Frederik Joelving, an editor and reporter for the site Retraction Watch, talks with host Sarah Crespi about paper mills—organizations that sell authorship on research papers—that appear to be bribing journal editors to publish bogus articles. They talk about the drivers behind this activity and what publishers can do to stop it. Next, producer Zakiya Whatley of the Dope Labs podcast talks with researcher Carmen Martin-Alonso, a graduate student in the Harvard–Massachusetts Institute of Technology Program in Health Sciences and Technology, about improving liquid biopsies for cancer. They discuss novel ways to detect tumor DNA circulating in the blood. This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy. About the Science Podcast Authors: Sarah Crespi; Zakiya Whatley; Richard Stone Episode page: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.zahpt8h About the Science Podcast: https://www.science.org/content/page/about-science-podcast Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Morgan State University, a Baltimore, Maryland Carnegie R2 doctoral research institution,
0:05.0	offers more than 100 academic programs and awards degrees at the Bacclureate, Masters, and Doctoral
0:11.4	Levels, is furthering their mission of growing the future leading the world.
0:16.0	Morgan continues to address the needs and challenges of the modern urban environment.
0:20.0	With a four-year quadrupling
0:22.3	of research, more than a dozen new doctoral programs, and eight new National Centers of Excellence,
0:28.4	Morgan is positioned to achieve Carnegie R1 designation in the next five years. To learn more about
0:34.5	Morgan and their ascension to R1, visit morgan.edu slash research.
0:40.4	This podcast is supported by the Icon School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, one of America's leading research medical schools.
0:48.0	Icon Mount Sinai is the academic arm of the eight hospital Mount Sinai health system in New York City.
0:55.9	It's consistently among the top recipients of NIH funding. Researchers at ICONMount Sinai have made breakthrough discoveries in many
1:02.1	fields vital to advancing the health of patients, including cancer, COVID and long COVID,
1:08.7	cardiology, neuroscience, and artificial intelligence.
1:12.5	The Icon School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, we find a way.
1:22.2	This is the science podcast for January 19th, 2024. I'm Sarah Crespi.
1:32.2	First up, we have Fred Joving, an editor and reporter for the site Retraction Watch.
1:38.5	He wrote a story on networks of paper mills. These are organizations that sell authorship on research papers.
1:49.2	That also appear to be bribing journal editors to publish bogus papers. We talk about the drivers behind this illicit activity and what journals can do to stop it. Next on the show, producer Zakiya Watley of the Dope Labs podcast talks with researcher
1:54.2	Carmen Martin Alonzo about an advance in liquid biopsies for cancer.
1:59.3	They discuss novel approaches to detecting tumor DNA circulating in the blood.
2:13.2	This scientific sleuth called Nick Weiss came to us with a very interesting finding.
2:19.3	He was looking at Facebook one evening and was seeing posts.
	...

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