Little Office of Research Integrity

.

 Old materials published in 1987 were used to make two (2) duplicated papers with different titles and different authors in 2003 and 2004: one in the Canadian Metallurgical Quarterly (CMQ) , and another in the Journal of Materials Processing Technology which is now officially retracted thanks to the high standards of the editor-in -chief of that journal.

Both papers published in 2003 and 2004 are entirely copied from the paper published in 1987 and the original co-authors are eliminated. What does the eliminated co-author (former student)say?  What about the Scholarship?

  See below the summary of work in 1987, 2003, and 2004:

       (Smith, Ghoreshy, DeMonte,..)                 (Smith & MacKay)                             (Smith, DeMonte, MacKay)  

Contrary to what Smith & McKay claim in CMQ and JMPT, it seems that financial support received from NSERC and industry was not used to conduct the research described. There was no need to do research since the entire results and discussions reported in 2003 and 2004 were available to authors in 1987. It seems that the financial support was used to pay someone (two times) to retype, copy, and paste the same old materials from 20 years ago.

It seems that NSERC funds and other support acknowledged in the CMQ and in JMPT were not used for a legitimate purpose. Old materials published in 1987 were used to manufacture two new duplicated papers in 2003 and 2004 with different titles and different authorship and were subsequently used to support a grant application. The intent to mislead is abundantly clear.

Additional Note: We have recently found another paper with similar title but the authors are only De Monte, Ghoreshy and Mackay !

CMQ is published by Maney Publishing on behalf of Metallurgical Society ( MetSoc) of the Canadian Institute of Mining,Metallurgical and Petroleum (CIM). The editor is Dr. J.D.Boyd (Department of Mechanical and Materials Enginnering, Queen's University). Mahi Sahoo is listed as associate editor.

Since 2005 the issue has repeatedly been brought to the attention of CMQ editors. We are urging the CIM Executive Director, Jean Vavrek, to take research misconduct seriously and correct the scientific record for the members.

It is the responsibility of the MetSoc and CIM to promote high professional standards among the members (and CMQ editors) according to the existing bylaws. CIM must not be complicit in misconduct. Scientific records should be corrected in a timely manner by objectively looking into the problem.

What does the Queen's investigation report say?

“.. holus-bolus recycling, with only minor cosmetic alterations, of material published earlier. The scale of this activity is remarkable.” 

[Queen’s University's investigation report, 2005]

 Tables, graphs, and pictures reported in 1987, 2003, and 2004 are all similar -    

   Pretty amazing!   Thank you NSERC for the Discovery Grant.