Author: Center for Scientific Integrity

The Center for Scientific Integrity, the parent nonprofit of Retraction Watch, has launched a new initiative to investigate and rapidly disseminate problems in the medical literature that directly affect human health.

Thanks to a $900,000 grant from Open Philanthropy, the Medical Evidence Project will leverage the tools of forensic metascience — using visual and computational methods to determine a paper’s trustworthiness — to rapidly identify problems in scientific articles, combined with the experience and platform of Retraction Watch to disseminate those findings.

“We originally set up the Center for Scientific Integrity as a home for Retraction Watch, but we always hoped we would be able to do more in the research accountability space,” said Ivan Oransky, executive director of the Center and cofounder of Retraction Watch. “The Medical Evidence Project allows us to support critical analysis and disseminate the findings.”

Several high-profile cases illustrate the need to scrutinize the medical literature. For example, European guidelines for giving beta blockers to patients before major surgery were based on results from a set of clinical trials, the DECREASE trials, later discredited due to misconduct. Dozens of systematic reviews and clinical guidelines on treatments for osteoporosis included clinical trials by Japanese bone-health researcher Yoshihiro Sato, who, it turned out, fabricated clinical trial results.

Beyond these high-profile cases are papers with what might appear to be small errors or mistakes that have an outsized impact on clinical results. The Medical Evidence Project aims to take a systematic look at these articles.

Scientific sleuth James Heathers will serve as the project’s director. “When we publish papers or change policies, we often get estimates of how many people would be positively affected by changes in treatment guidelines,” Heathers said. “I would like to produce that same estimate for the re-evaluation of the existing evidence. I strongly suspect that we’re about to do something seriously cost-effective, but I’ll only sleep well when I’ve proved it.”

Grantmaking organization Open Philanthropy has generously funded the Medical Evidence Project for $450,000 per year for two years. Staff for the project will also include part-time analysts and an editor to do investigations and write and publish results.

Investigations by universities, organizations and publishers often take months or years to complete, and findings are only communicated at the end of the process. The Medical Evidence Project hopes to accelerate that, swiftly disseminating the results of its investigations.

The project will take a broad look at all disciplines of medicine, Heathers said.

“There have been some unpleasant and relevant cases in anesthesiology, obstetrics and gynecology, surgery, trauma, and different elements of alternative and complementary medicine over the last few years,” he said. “I’d like to see if there are any more. But I’m quite agnostic. There isn’t much ‘patient-neutral’ medicine. It all matters.”

We are thrilled to announce that David Robert Grimes and Mariana Ribeiro will join the Retraction Watch team as Sleuths in Residence starting June 1.

Earlier this year we announced the Sleuth in Residence Program, an opportunity for active sleuths to have a secure and paid position while working closely with our research team on specific projects, and with our journalism team to publish their findings. Our goal is to build capacity in this space to emphasize the value of compensating and protecting the critical work of sleuths.

We’re pleased to be able to bring on two Sleuths in Residence as part of this effort.

David Robert Grimes is a mathematical modeller, cancer scientist, broadcaster, and author. He is an expert in the public understanding of medical science, contributing to outlets including The Guardian, Scientific American, the New York Times, BBC, Financial Times, Irish Times, and more. David’s research focuses largely on research integrity, metascience, and public understanding. He was joint recipient of the 2014 Nature/Sense about Science John Maddox Prize and is a fellow of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. He is the author of Good Thinking: Why Flawed Logic Puts Us All at Risk and How Critical Thinking Can Save the World (The Experiment, 2021).

Mariana Ribeiro is currently a postdoctoral researcher at Brazil’s National Cancer Institute (INCA), where she leads the development of the Institute’s scientific integrity framework, focusing on governance and educational initiatives. She has almost 10 years of experience in retraction studies. She holds a degree in biomedical sciences from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ) in Brazil, and a Ph.D. in science education from the Institute of Medical Biochemistry Leopoldo de Meis (IBqM/UFRJ). Her M.Sc. and Ph.D. research focused on retractions, science communication and policy, supported by datasets collected from the Retraction Watch and Retraction Database. Her interests include the relationship between retractions and the reward system of science, as well as new models of scholarly communication, the relationship between science and the public, and the social responsibility of scientists.

“The Sleuths in Residence program brings a longtime goal into reality for us,” said Ivan Oransky, Retraction Watch cofounder and executive director of the Center for Scientific Integrity, the parent organization for Retraction Watch. “We have long relied on the important work of sleuths in our reporting to hold researchers, editors, journals and publishers accountable for maintaining the integrity of scientific research. Sleuths are typically unpaid and work at great personal risk. We are proud to bring David and Mariana on board as our first Sleuths in Residence.”

The Sleuths in Residence are one-year positions. The program is funded by a generous donation from George Tidmarsh.

Retraction Watch has been honored with the Council of Science Editors’ highest honor: The 2025 Award for Meritorious Achievement.

CSE gives the award each year to an organization or individual who has made “significant contributions” toward the goal of CSE, “namely, the improvement of scientific communication through the pursuit of high standards in all activities connected with editing.” 

We were honored to be at the CSE Annual Meeting in Minneapolis today to accept the award. Below is a lightly edited version of our acceptance speech.

We’re so honored to be receiving this award, which has been given to so many of the people whose work we consider foundational to the field of scientific integrity and to what we have tried to do with Retraction Watch. 

We like to think that when we launched Retraction Watch 15 years ago, we knew what we were doing – as journalists, at least. We’d each been reporting on science and medicine for more than a decade, which seemed like a long time then. And by and large, that instinct has proved correct. 

But it’s also fair to say that we didn’t know what we were getting ourselves into. To quote ourselves, speaking to Nicholas Wade of the New York Times in October 2010: “We wondered if we’d have enough material.”

That was one of the many things we’ve been wrong about. As Minnesotans might say, “uff da.”

We’ve published more than 6,700 posts since our first one went live on Aug. 3, 2010. There are more than 59,000 retractions and counting in The Retraction Watch Database, which is now part of Crossref and is being used every day by bibliographic software, scholars, and others around the world to help paint an ever more granular picture of the state of scientific publishing. 

Along the way, we’ve chronicled good behavior, bad behavior, and everything in between. And we are even still surprised by stories, albeit less frequently than we used to be. 

In 2010, we were, if not quite the only game in town, one of just a few journalists and groups looking at retractions with any regularity. We have plenty of competition now: In contrast to 2010, when research scandals were covered only rarely by the mass media, they’re on front pages regularly. And as addicted as we are to scoops, we’re happy for that competition. It keeps us motivated, and it’s good for public discourse. It forces us to be curious, humble, and always learning.

All of these things make the work of Retraction Watch compelling – and gratifying – for the two of us and our colleagues.

In short, it has been the privilege of our professional lives. And we are deeply grateful –  and humbled, really – by this award from a group as respected as CSE. The list of previous winners – starting with Patty Baskin, who was kind enough to nominate us this year – includes many of the most important innovators, heroes and heroines, and standard bearers we have long admired. The Center for Open Science;  Annette Flanagin and Drummond Rennie;  the aforementioned Crossref; Barbara Gastel; Eugene Garfield, whom I had the privilege of learning from during my time at The Scientist magazine. The list literally goes on and on, and unless I read every name, I’ll leave out titans.

The honor is even greater when we consider that Retraction Watch has always viewed scientific publishers and publishing service companies – the very companies that employ many of you, either directly or indirectly, who provide services to your journals, and who sponsor this meeting – among those whom we hold accountable. 

This kind of intellectual honesty – giving credit to those who may sometimes be on the other side of an argument – is now more important than ever. We are living through a time when retractions are being weaponized, scientific publishing is facing scrutiny, and even science itself is under attack. 

That makes the work of Retraction Watch, and of CSE, all the more important. Now is not the time to fade like Homer Simpson into the shrubbery, and turn away from difficult truths. Fraudulent work must be called out, and the scientific record corrected, no matter how much pressure or how many legal threats publishers, editors and sleuths face. We remain committed to our work, and we know that many others are making the same choices.

We thank CSE for this award on behalf of the small but mighty staff at Retraction Watch. We also thank you on behalf of our readers, our sources, our financial supporters – and our critics.

We look forward to continued conversations about the critical issues we cover. Thank you again for this great honor.

(Fun?) postscript: The Lucite award earned us a stop at airport security. 

We’re thrilled to be partnering with foremost scientific sleuth Elisabeth Bik on a new way to support scientific integrity: The Elisabeth Bik Science Integrity Fund.

Bik is a renowned science integrity advocate and microbiologist who investigates and exposes research misconduct, including image duplication and data manipulation, to uphold transparency and ethical standards in scientific publishing.

The Fund, launched with the proceeds of Bik’s Einstein Award, will provide financial resources to Bik and other sleuths and collaborators, as well as provide funding for training programs, grants, or awards for science integrity advocates. Plans also include funding educational or outreach initiatives promoting transparency and accountability in scientific research. Based on a fiscal sponsorship model, and leveraging our experience in nonprofit development and administration, Bik will have full direction over the Fund’s resources.

“This Fund is a great chance to help science integrity advocates work better together to ensure research misconduct is exposed and addressed,” said Bik. “Keeping science honest takes a team effort, and with this support, I want to bring together even more sharp-eyed sleuths to keep research on the right track.” 

“We are delighted to partner with Bik, whose work has been so crucial to efforts to clean up the scientific record, to provide administrative support as well as a way donors can support her efforts and earn a tax deduction,” said Ivan Oransky, cofounder of Retraction Watch and executive director of The Center For Scientific Integrity, Retraction Watch’s parent nonprofit organization. “We see the Fund fitting extremely well with our efforts at Retraction Watch and the Retraction Watch Database, as well as the Retraction Watch Sleuth In Residence program. We are grateful that Bik has chosen us as a partner and can’t wait to see how much more impact the Fund will allow her to have.”

Read a news story about the fund published today on Science’s website.

We hope to grow the Fund to increase its impact. Contributions are tax-deductible to the full extent of the law, and can be made here or by check, made out to The Center For Scientific Integrity and sent to 121 W. 36th St., Suite 209, New York, NY 10018, with a note in the memo field saying “Bik Fund.” Should you be in a position to contribute securities, please contact ivan@retractionwatch.com for instructions.