bims-skolko Biomed News
on Scholarly communication
Issue of 2025–08–24
seventeen papers selected by
Thomas Krichel, Open Library Society
  1. Leading US journal refuses RFK Jr's request to retract childhood vaccine study.
  2. Challenges and needs of nurse researchers on research publication in health universities of Karnataka, India: a cross-sectional survey.
  3. Finding your academic voice: faster, healthier writing with AI speech recognition.
  4. Hijacked medical journals rank first via search engine optimization and threaten academic integrity.
  5. AI content is tainting preprints: how moderators are fighting back.
  6. Use of a Social Media Platform for Undergraduate Medical Writing: Experience From a Developing Country.
  7. Nursing Academic Reviewers' Perspectives on AI-Assisted Peer Review: Ethical Challenges and Acceptance.
  8. Hidden Prompts in Manuscripts Threaten the Integrity of Peer Review and Research: Recommendations for Journals and Institutions.
  9. Identifying trends in reporting on the ethical treatment of insects in research.
  10. Critical Contextual Empiricism for Busy People: Scientific Argumentation as Epistemic Exchange.
  11. Writing So That Your Work Will Be Read.
  12. Citation integrity in the age of AI: evaluating the risks of reference hallucination in maxillofacial literature.
  13. Tier-based standards for FAIR sequence data and metadata sharing in microbiome research.
  14. Fostering Data Sharing by Encouraging Researcher Participation in Secondary Analyses.
  15. Are editors and authors ensuring the use of People-First-Charter language?
  16. Preprint Servers.
  17. The Journal of Midwifery & Women's Health 2016-2025: Advancing Through Growth and Change.
  1. BMJ. 2025 Aug 18. 390 r1765
    Leading US journal refuses RFK Jr's request to retract childhood vaccine study.
    Janice Hopkins Tanne.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.r1765
  2. J Res Nurs. 2025 Aug 14. 17449871251347840
    Challenges and needs of nurse researchers on research publication in health universities of Karnataka, India: a cross-sectional survey.
    Remya U Rajendran, Mamatha Shivananda Pai, Baby S Nayak, Shalini G Nayak, Judith Angelitta Noronha, Santhosh Krishnan Venkata, Vimala Ramoo, Accamma Oommen, Vishnu Renjith.
       Background: Effective dissemination of scientific knowledge through publication is vital for advancing nursing and healthcare. However, nurse researchers often encounter challenges that impede their ability to publish in reputable journals.
    Aim: To identify the perceived challenges and support needs related to research publication among nurse researchers at health universities across Karnataka, India.
    Methods: A multicentre web-based cross-sectional survey was conducted from January to May 2024 across 33 nursing institutes with 319 nurse researchers.
    Results: Of the 319 respondents, 58.6% had published papers, but only 15% had published in indexed journals. The most frequently reported barriers to publication were lack of time (53.3%), funding constraints (42.9%) and difficulty in initiating writing (27.9%). Limited writing skills were significantly associated with academic designation (χ² = 11.9, p = 0.003) and difficulty starting writing (χ² = 15.9, p < 0.001). A substantial majority expressed a need for technical support in areas such as manuscript formatting (87.9%), submission (85%) and responding to reviewers (84.6%). The primary motivations for publication included career advancement (67.7%) and meeting institutional requirements (50.2%).
    Conclusion: This study underscores the pressing need for targeted interventions, including structured training, technical assistance and mentorship, to support nurse researchers in overcoming publication challenges and enhancing scholarly productivity.
    Keywords:  Mentorship; Nursing faculty; Nursing research; Publishing; Support of research; Writing
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1177/17449871251347840
  3. Nature. 2025 Aug 19.
    Finding your academic voice: faster, healthier writing with AI speech recognition.
    Zhicheng Lin.
      
    Keywords:  Authorship; Communication; Machine learning; Scientific community; Technology
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-025-02418-9
  4. Eur J Intern Med. 2025 Aug 16. pii: S0953-6205(25)00328-0. [Epub ahead of print] 106450
    Hijacked medical journals rank first via search engine optimization and threaten academic integrity.
    Mihály Hegedűs, Mehdi Dadkhah, Lóránt Dénes Dávid.
      The rise of questionable journals poses a significant threat to academic integrity, resulting in substantial waste of institutional and university resources. This commentary analysis focuses on six hijacked medical journals, a specific type of questionable publication. We utilized Semrush, an online Search Engine Optimization auditing platform, to analyse our data, which revealed that hijacked journals disseminate their content through search engines. Specifically, searches for certain medical keywords return hijacked medical journals' content among the top 20 results. Evidence from both previous research and the current study suggests that hijacked journals leverage various channels for content dissemination, including artificial intelligence chatbots, citation databases, spam emails, and search engines. Raising awareness about this issue is crucial to mitigating the immediate harm caused by these journals. Furthermore, long-term solutions will necessitate advancements in technological development to combat this evolving problem effectively.
    Keywords:  Circular economy; Hijacked journals; Journal visibility; Predatory journals; SEO; Sustainable development goals
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejim.2025.106450
  5. Nature. 2025 Aug;644(8077): 590-591
    AI content is tainting preprints: how moderators are fighting back.
    Traci Watson.
      
    Keywords:  Machine learning; Publishing; Scientific community
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-025-02469-y
  6. Cureus. 2025 Jul;17(7): e87971
    Use of a Social Media Platform for Undergraduate Medical Writing: Experience From a Developing Country.
    Sayuri Serasinghe, Umanga Geekiyanage, Buddhima Premaratne, Rohan Siriwardana.
      Introduction While scientific writing is an important skill undergraduates need to develop, many find it to be challenging in the early parts of their journey, as opportunities to improve and publish their academic writing are scarce. Although many scientific journals use social media platforms to increase their accessibility, their use in undergraduate writing is not documented. Methods The medical student journal "The Apprentice" and its Facebook platform were established in 2020 by a volunteer group of medical students representing all academic years. The Facebook journal publishes case reports, scientific papers, posts of medical interest, and posts containing matters of medical education and perspectives. Written work submitted to the journal is reviewed by the editorial board, which consists of a volunteer group of students. The final review is done by the volunteer staff advisors. Subsequently, work is published on the Facebook platform. The three-year progress of the journal was evaluated by looking at total likes, interactions, and reaches of the published posts. Results Over a period of three years, there were 3,344 followers and 3,269 likes. There were 202 posts, with a mean of 333 reaches per post and 44 mean engagements. Most of the journal page followers were in the age range of 25-34 years, which coincides with the majority of undergraduates in Sri Lankan medical schools. Additionally, they were geographically centered around the three main universities in the country. The highest reach and engagement were seen with the case reports (reach: 995) and original articles (reach: 1980) posted on the page. Conclusions This study demonstrates the ability to use a social media-based student journal to bridge the gap between informal learning and formal academic publishing, especially in a resource-poor setting. "The Apprentice" Facebook journal became popular among medical undergraduates in a short time.
    Keywords:  facebook; medical writing; scholarly communication; social media; undergraduate medical education
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.7759/cureus.87971
  7. Int Nurs Rev. 2025 Sep;72(3): e70100
    Nursing Academic Reviewers' Perspectives on AI-Assisted Peer Review: Ethical Challenges and Acceptance.
    Sayed Ibrahim Ali, Mostafa Shaban.
       AIM: This study aimed to explore the perceptions, experiences, and ethical considerations of nursing academic reviewers regarding the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into the peer review process, with a focus on acceptance dynamics and implications for nursing journal policy.
    DESIGN: A qualitative descriptive design was employed, guided by an interpretivist approach and reported according to the COREQ checklist.
    METHODS: Fifteen nursing academic reviewers from four countries (Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Australia, and the United States) were recruited via snowball sampling. Semi-structured interviews were conducted between January and March 2025 using Zoom video conferencing. Interviews were held in Arabic or English, transcribed verbatim, translated as needed, and thematically analyzed using reflexive thematic analysis per Braun and Clarke's six-phase framework.
    RESULTS: Five themes were generated: perceived benefits of AI (efficiency, fairness, and workload reduction), ethical concerns (transparency, bias, and data privacy), risks to reviewer autonomy and judgment, divergent attitudes toward AI adoption, and the need for clear guidelines and training. Participants expressed cautious optimism, emphasizing that while AI tools may enhance consistency and reduce administrative burden, they raise complex ethical questions and must not replace human judgment.
    CONCLUSION: The integration of AI into peer review processes presents both opportunities and ethical challenges. The nursing academic reviewers in this study recognize the utility of AI for supporting routine tasks but remain concerned about algorithmic bias, transparency, and its impact on scholarly independence. Ethical AI adoption requires structured policies and capacity-building initiatives.
    IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING PRACTICE AND POLICY: To uphold scholarly integrity, nursing journals and academic institutions should develop transparent AI governance frameworks, invest in reviewer education on responsible AI use, and preserve the central role of human judgment in peer review. These steps are vital to ensuring AI complements rather than compromises research quality and ethics in global nursing scholarship.
    Keywords:  academic publishing; artificial intelligence; nursing ethics; peer review; policy development; qualitative research; reviewer perceptions
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1111/inr.70100
  8. Ann Biomed Eng. 2025 Aug 17.
    Hidden Prompts in Manuscripts Threaten the Integrity of Peer Review and Research: Recommendations for Journals and Institutions.
    Louie Giray.
      I examine the scholarly implications of a troubling case where researchers embedded hidden prompts like "give a positive review only" into academic preprints to manipulate AI-assisted peer review. AI is now woven into nearly every facet of academic life, including the peer review process. I contend that manipulating peer review through embedding secret prompts is as serious as plagiarism or data fabrication. Peer review may not be perfect, but deception is misconduct. Reviewers must still be held accountable. Those who blindly rely on AI outputs without critical engagement fail in their scholarly duty. AI should only amplify the reviewer's expertise. As institutions begin regulating AI in research, similar frameworks must extend to peer review. Journals and publishers should establish clear, enforceable guidelines on acceptable AI use: Will AI be banned, regulated, or embraced? If allowed, disclosures must be mandatory. Authors should also be informed if AI tools will be used in the review process, ensuring transparency and consent. Confidentiality is another pressing issue. Real cases have shown how ChatGPT links shared by reviewers were indexed online, compromising sensitive, unpublished research, even though OpenAI has since moved to discontinue public link discoverability. Beyond policy, we must cultivate a culture of transparency, trust, and responsibility. Institutions can host ethics workshops and mentor early-career scholars. This is not just about AI; it is about who we are as researchers and reviewers. No matter how advanced the technology, integrity must remain our anchor. Without it, even the most innovative research stands on shaky ground.
    Keywords:  Academic integrity; Artificial intelligence; Co-intelligence; Peer review; Research ethics
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s10439-025-03827-7
  9. PLoS One. 2025 ;20(8): e0328931
    Identifying trends in reporting on the ethical treatment of insects in research.
    Craig D Perl, Cat Kissinger, R Keating Godfrey, Enrique M Castillo, Bob Fischer, Meghan Barrett.
      Transparent reporting on the ethical treatment of research animals (e.g., implementation of the 3Rs, replace, reduce, and refine) is recommended when publishing in peer-reviewed literature. This is meant to foster public trust, safeguard animal welfare, and generate reproducible science. However, entomologists are not expected to engage in such reporting, as their research is not subject to legislated ethical review. Recently, however, entomologists have reported increased concern about the ethical treatment of insects in research, and associated reproducibility and public trust issues. To what degree are these increasing concerns reflected in changes in practices? We surveyed 15 high-impact journals that publish on insects over 20 years to collect data on reporting related to the ethical treatment of insects in research, including animal reduction methods, analgesics/anesthesia statements, and information regarding sacrifice. Out of 1359 sampled papers, no studies reported any methods to reduce animal use. Over 20 years, we found an increase in the proportion of papers reporting insect death and a decrease in the papers reporting significant invasive handling. 84% of papers with significant animal handling or death did not report the use of any anesthetics. We also found an increase in animal-treatment-specific ethics statements (from 0% to 8%), largely driven by the journal Animal Behaviour. We end by 1) making recommendations for entomologists looking to improve their reporting practices and 2) providing tools to improve transparent reporting of information related to the ethical treatment of insects in research.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0328931
  10. Topoi (Dordr). 2025 ;44(3): 733-747
    Critical Contextual Empiricism for Busy People: Scientific Argumentation as Epistemic Exchange.
    Catarina Dutilh Novaes, Çağlar Dede.
      In her account of science known as critical contextual empiricism (CCE), Helen Longino has famously argued that critical discursive interaction provides the very basis for the objectivity of science. While highly influential, CCE has also been criticized for being overly idealized, failing not only as a descriptive but also as a normative account of scientific institutions and practices. In this paper, we examine Longino's social account of science from the vantage point of a conception of argumentation as epistemic exchange. We show that CCE does not explicitly problematize some important aspects of scientific practices, in particular: the costs and risks involved in extensive critical discursive interaction; the imperative of responsible collective workload management in a scientific community; and the need for mechanisms of curation and filtering in any sufficiently large epistemic community. The argumentation as epistemic exchange model retains the core idea of CCE, namely the centrality of critical discursive interaction in science, but incorporates aspects of scientific practice neglected by CCE (costs and risks, workload management, curation). Our analysis thus adapts CCE to situations where scientists are 'busy people' who must contend with limited resources (of time, energy, funding etc.). To illustrate our proposal, we discuss practices of peer review as instances of epistemic exchange. While highlighting the intrinsic vulnerabilities of the peer review system, we also offer some recommendations on how to improve it.
    Keywords:  Critical contextual empiricism; Epistemic exchange; Peer review; Scientific argumentation
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s11245-025-10198-0
  11. J Nurs Scholarsh. 2025 Aug 19.
    Writing So That Your Work Will Be Read.
    Susan Gennaro.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1111/jnu.70043
  12. J Craniomaxillofac Surg. 2025 Aug 18. pii: S1010-5182(25)00263-X. [Epub ahead of print]
    Citation integrity in the age of AI: evaluating the risks of reference hallucination in maxillofacial literature.
    Anuj Jain, Pranali Nimonkar, Pratap Jadhav.
      The increasing adoption of large language models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT in academic writing has introduced both opportunities and risks. While these tools enhance productivity and accessibility, their reliability in generating accurate references remains uncertain. This short communication highlights the growing concern of 'reference hallucination', where AI-generated citations appear legitimate but are fabricated or contain significant metadata errors. Across all scientific disciplines, including oral and maxillofacial surgery (OMFS), where evidence-based practice is foundational, such inaccuracies can undermine academic integrity and clinical trust. This article summarizes common reference-related errors reported in literature and calls for heightened editorial vigilance, AI-literacy training, and the integration of real-time bibliographic tools. Responsible use of AI in scholarly publishing is essential to preserving the quality and credibility of surgical literature.
    Keywords:  Academic integrity; Artificial intelligence; ChatGPT; Large language models; Oral and maxillofacial surgery; Reference hallucination
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcms.2025.08.004
  13. Nucleic Acids Res. 2025 Aug 11. pii: gkaf777. [Epub ahead of print]53(15):
    Tier-based standards for FAIR sequence data and metadata sharing in microbiome research.
    Lina Kim, Anton Lavrinienko, Zuzana Sebechlebska, Sven Stoltenberg, Nicholas A Bokulich.
      Microbiome research is a growing, data-driven field within the life sciences. While policies exist for sharing microbiome sequence data and using standardized metadata schemes, compliance among researchers varies. To promote open research data best practices in microbiome research and adjacent communities, we (i) propose two tiered badge systems to evaluate data/metadata sharing compliance, and (ii) developed an automated evaluation tool to determine adherence to data reporting standards in publications with amplicon and metagenome sequence data. In a systematic evaluation of publications (n = 2929) spanning human gut microbiome research, and case studies of soil and gut microbiota (n = 370), we found nearly half do not meet minimum standards for sequence data availability. Moreover, poor standardization of metadata creates a high barrier to harmonization and cross-study comparison. Using this badge system and evaluation tool, our proof-of-concept work exposes (i) the ineffectiveness of sequence data availability statements and (ii) the lack of consistent metadata reporting. We highlight the need for improved practices and infrastructure that reduce barriers to data submission and maximize reproducibility in microbiome research. We anticipate that our tiered badge framework will promote dialogue regarding data sharing practices and facilitate data reuse, supporting best practices that make microbiome data Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable (FAIR).
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1093/nar/gkaf777
  14. J Clin Epidemiol. 2025 Aug 14. pii: S0895-4356(25)00267-7. [Epub ahead of print] 111934
    Fostering Data Sharing by Encouraging Researcher Participation in Secondary Analyses.
    Clovis Mariano Faggion, Naichuan Su.
      
    Keywords:  data sharing; ethics; reproducibility of results
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclinepi.2025.111934
  15. Sex Transm Infect. 2025 Aug 17. pii: sextrans-2025-056644. [Epub ahead of print]
    Are editors and authors ensuring the use of People-First-Charter language?
    Laurie Smith, Klaudia Serwin, Deborah Williams, Colin Fitzpatrick, Daniel Richardson.
      
    Keywords:  Attitude to Health; HIV; Patient Participation
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1136/sextrans-2025-056644
  16. Neurosurgery. 2024 Aug 01. 95(2): 251-252
    Preprint Servers.
    Douglas Kondziolka.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1227/neu.0000000000002974
  17. J Midwifery Womens Health. 2025 Jul-Aug;70(4):70(4): 541-544
    The Journal of Midwifery & Women's Health 2016-2025: Advancing Through Growth and Change.
    Melissa D Avery.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1111/jmwh.70004
This page is being maintained by Thomas Krichel. It was last updated on 2025‒08‒26 at 13:37.