The dentist José Luis Calvo Guirado enters the world's prime 20 scientists with essentially the most retired research | Science | EUROtoday

The dentist Jose Luis Calvo Guirado, professor on the Catholic University of Murcia till 2021, has entered the highest 20 scientists on this planet with essentially the most research withdrawn resulting from irregularities, in line with the rely of the American group Retraction Watch. A dozen magazines have already retracted 34 of his works, affected by anomalies, resembling reusing the identical pictures again and again in several experiments with canines or rabbits. Calvo Guirado, one of the cited scientists on this planet in line with the classification of Stanford University (USA), maintains that he has not accomplished “any cheating” in his life.

The researcher's web site says that he was born “in a modest neighborhood” within the Argentine metropolis of San Juan. “It was very clear to him, from a young age, that his dream was to prosper and achieve great achievements in order to become like the other boys around him,” states his temporary official biography. Calvo Guirado, in line with his story, was within the Argentine Army for a couple of years, studied Dentistry and opened his personal dental clinic in Murcia. “José Luis is a serious, honest, responsible, hard-working, fearless, fun, healthy, athletic and great strategist individual. […] That is why he is where he is, based on his work and daily effort,” says his web site.

Alarms about his work went off in 2018. The journal Clinical Oral Implants Research, from the American writer Wiley, retracted 18 research by Calvo Guirado in simply six months. One of those investigations, on experimental dental implants in Beagle laboratory canines, included images used as an instance completely different research. The identical factor occurred in comparable work with Foxhound canines. The dentist then assured EL PAÍS that every thing was “a matter of envy” and involuntary errors. “I wonder if the magazine was waiting for us to make a mistake to discredit us,” he mentioned.

The trickle of retractions has continued and there are actually 10 specialised journals, from 5 completely different publishers, which have withdrawn 34 research by Calvo Guirado, however the dentist maintains his model of the good conspiracy towards him. “This is something that came to me out of the blue, they have started to go after me, like when they find a scapegoat and start hitting them,” he says by cellphone. The dentist assures that he has employed “an international law firm” to defend himself on a case-by-case foundation. “I have put it in the hands of international justice. They have all been reported, I am waiting for the resolution,” he says, with out providing extra particulars.

Calvo Guirado's thirty-fourth retraction got here a month in the past. Magazine Clinical Oral Investigations, from the American writer Springer, eradicated a examine on experimental dental implants carried out within the tibias of reside rabbits, after detecting pictures that had been apparently repeated and manipulated by means of rotations. The identical publication withdrew one other work from 2013 two years in the past. The retraction word is devastating. Those accountable for the journal denounced {that a} dozen medical pictures from that examine seem in different works illustrating experiments that don’t have anything to do with it. One of them, a microscope {photograph} of a rabbit bone, was revealed in 5 completely different investigations. The important creator together with Calvo Guirado is Piedad Ramírez Fernández, then on the University of Murcia and now a professor on the Catholic University of Murcia. She is co-author of 14 of the retracted investigations.

The Catholic University of Murcia, a personal middle created in 1996 and supported by the Vatican, has greater than 21,000 college students. When it was based, the rector of the town's public college said that it was “a beach bar.” The personal establishment has since made efforts to enhance its analysis profile, recruiting scientists from extremely cited lists, resembling Juan Carlos Izpisua, who in 2017 created embryos with pig and human cells in Murcia, with the final word objective of producing organs. people in pigs, for transplants.

Calvo Guirado was a professor on the Catholic college between 2015 and 2021, a interval wherein he signed 11 of the research that are actually retracted. The establishment boasted that his professor was “ranked fifteenth in the world in research on dental implantology.” A spokesperson for the college now limits itself to declaring that the dentist “no longer has any connection” with the Murcian group, with out giving additional explanations. According to Calvo Guirado, he reached an settlement to not renew his contract. The different 23 research already retracted by him had been revealed between 2009 and 2015, when he was a professor on the University of Murcia.

A group from the University of Trieste (Italy) analyzed the phenomenon of scientific fraud in dentistry just a little over a 12 months in the past. “Calvo Guirado is the protagonist of the worst scandal in history in the field of dental research,” proclaimed the authors, led by surgeon Claudio Stacchi, within the ebook. Integrity of Scientific Research (Springer Publishing). The evaluation highlighted that some collaborators of Calvo Guirado share with him a mess of retracted research, such because the Colombian Rafael Delgado Ruiz (about twenty retracted works), the aforementioned Piedad Ramírez (14) and José Eduardo Maté (8), additionally a professor on the Catholic University of Murcia. EL PAÍS has requested Ramírez and Maté for his or her model of the occasions, with out receiving a response for the second.

“The fact that a well-known and respected researcher like José Luis Calvo Guirado has been involved in such a scandal should deeply worry the scientific community,” says Stacchi, president-elect of the Italian Society of Oral Surgery. The knowledgeable attributes the irregularities to the present strategies of evaluating science, which reward scientists—with raises, promotions, status within the rankings and better financing—primarily based on its manufacturing measured by weight, not by its high quality. “This cannot be a justification, but it is absurd to hide that what has happened to Calvo Guirado is just the tip of an iceberg that we are not yet able to see in its entirety, but we know that it exists and is enormous,” displays the Italian.

What has occurred to Calvo Guirado is simply the tip of an iceberg that we’re not but in a position to see in its entirety.

Claudio Stacchi, president-elect of the Italian Society of Oral Surgery

Stacchi recollects that the present scientific system faces “the proliferation of predatory or semi-predatory journals,” which publish any insubstantial examine so long as the authors pay the corresponding charges. The surgeon urges strengthening laptop methods to instantly detect repeated pictures or plagiarized texts. In Spain, the college high quality guardian entity, the National Agency for Quality Assessment and Accreditation (ANECA), is modifying the analysis standards for researchers, with the purpose of stopping judging their publications by weight.

Rafael Delgado Ruiz labored on the University of Murcia till 2012 and is co-author of twenty retracted works by Calvo Guirado. “I collaborated with the articles in the editing and grammar part in English,” he says. “I believe there was a component of over-enthusiasm, ignorance of specific copyright issues, and mixing of image files, which resulted in similar images being submitted. Unfortunately, retractions remain with us like an indelible stain and one retraction weighs more than hundreds of published articles,” says the Colombian, who has been a professor for a decade at Stony Brook University in New York. The Argentine dentist was additionally a volunteer, unpaid professor at this American establishment, however a spokesperson confirms that the college ended this relationship in 2022.

Dentist Lisa Heitz-Mayfield, from the University of Western Australia, was the journal's editor-in-chief. Clinical Oral Implants Research when this publication retracted the primary 18 research by Calvo Guirado in 2018. “Neither I nor anyone from my team of associate editors are trying to persecute any researcher,” he says in response to the Argentine dentist's insinuations that there’s a world conspiracy towards him . Heitz-Mayfield continues to run the journal. “The decision to retract a study is not made lightly or by a single person. When it is shown that science is unreliable and the author cannot adequately clarify the doubts, the retraction is executed,” he underlines.

The dentist from Murcia emphasizes that he continues to analyze on his personal and publish his research. He is even an editor in a number of specialised magazines. The Portuguese researcher Jaime Teixeira da Silva and his Vietnamese colleague Quan-Hoang Vuong additionally analyzed the case of Calvo Guirado final 12 months, in an instructional work on scientists with a mess of retractions who, nevertheless, proceed to behave as editors, with the facility to guage the research of others. The doc highlighted that within the dentist's 240-page resume there’s not a single point out of the handfuls of retracted investigations of his. “What signal does this send to Calvo Guirado's colleagues and to the academic community in general?” requested Teixeira da Silva and Vuong.

Calvo Guirado is a member of the editorial committee of the magazines Indian Journal of Dental Sciences, Dentistry and Oral Research y AIMS Bioengineering, along with having been editor of particular points for the publishing big MDPI, a Swiss firm accused of incomes tens of millions of euros by publishing hundreds of insubstantial research. “If editors who have multiple retractions and a history of malpractice are rewarded, […] “It sends a signal that it is acceptable to assume a leadership position despite lacking the qualities that define a competent and ethical leader,” lament Teixeira da Silva and Vuong, from Phenikaa University, in Vietnam.

The Argentine dentist occupies the final place on this planet prime 20 compiled by Retraction Watch. In first place is the German anesthetist Joachim Boldt, from the Ludwigshafen Hospital, who has collected 194 retracted research. In second and third place are two different anesthetists, the Japanese Yoshitaka Fujii (172 retired works) and Hironobu Ueshima (124). They are large frauds that extremely occurred for many years for your complete world to see.

Despite his dozens of retractions, José Luis Calvo Guirado continues to share on his social networks that he’s “among the best researchers in the world.” The web site of his Murcian clinic proclaims: “José Luis is the same child who more than 50 years ago played in the streets of the modest neighborhood of La Virgen de Los Desamparados in San Juan in Argentina. He has not changed the way he is and behaves, being the same fun and happy child as he was then. José Luis keeps the link with him alive Jositoas they called him in Argentina, being faithful to his principles.”

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