The paper with the nonexistent reference, published November 13, 2025 in DARU Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences, criticizes platforms for post-publication peer review – and PubPeer specifically – as being vulnerable to “misuse” and “hyper-skepticism.” Five of the paper’s 17 references do not appear to exist, three others have incorrect DOIs or links, and one has been retracted.
One of the fabricated references credits Retraction Watch's cofounder Ivan Oransky with a nonexistent article, “A new kind of watchdog is shaking up research,” purportedly published in Nature in 2019. Other references include nonexistent articles credited to sleuth Elisabeth Bik, molecular biologist and sleuth David Vaux – a member of the board of directors of The Center for Scientific Integrity, our parent nonprofit – and Stanford’s John Ioannidis. The DOI provided for Vaux’s supposed article on scientific misconduct is actually an interview with biochemist Peter Macheroux. The DOI attributed to Ioannidis leads to a study of steroid-induced bone death in rabbit hips.
