A recent investigation reveals abnormal publication records of an author group from the Southwest University. TAN Qinyi (谭亲毅) is one of the core authors among this authorship network. Another key author is TENG Luyan.
A same ethical approval number (XMYY-2024KYSB090) in three articles [1, 2, 3] coauthored by YE Guanzhi (叶冠志) et. al., with The First Affiliated Hospital of Xiamen University. However, This ethical approval is questionable.
LIN Qun (林群), an anesthesiologist at the First Affiliated Hospital of Fujian Medical University, has published three materials science articles focusing on the photocatalytic properties of nanomaterials, topics that are entirely unrelated to his professional background.
The article [1] reports the prevalence of cleft lip and palate (CLP) in Hubei province of China, during 2015 and 2022. However, comparing to the numbers reported in other articles, the prevalence of 0.44‰ reported in article [1] seems to be abnormal.
Abnormal citation patterns are observed on the article [1]
A recent investigation by the 5GH Team identified ten problematic references in article [1], specifically references 2, 3, 6, 7, 8, 18, 20, 26, 53, and 56.
The ethics statements on two article [1, 2] are found to be questionable. Due to authors' violation against the ethics management regulations in China, it remains unclear whether such conclusion in article [2] is solid. The 5GH Team is seeking a volunteer team to replicate the study. If any group is interested, they are welcome to contact the Team at 5GH@5gh.org.cn.
In 2025, 55 journals were editorially delisted by WOS, however, on February 1st, 2026, 18 of them still claim to be indexed in the database.
Currently, we have analyzed 29 Review articles published on "Journal of Controlled Release" in 2025 and 2026, under Open Access model, and found 14 (48%) of them have at least one problematic reference, which was flagged regarding their data/image integrity.
Recently, the 5GH Team uncovered a network at Hainan University and other Chinese universities suspected of manipulating the peer review process.
Following a lead, we have identified 46 articles, whose corresponding authors listed email addresses under this domain
Recently, the 5GH Team has identified about 1,713 potential irrelevant citation vehicles, articles massively citing irrelevant references.
A recent investigation by the 5GH Team uncovered the questionable editorial and review practices by HUANG Difang (黄棣芳) on PLoS ONE and other journals.
Recently, the 5GH Team received a tip-off alleging that Timothy Jeonglyeol LEE (李鼎烈) from the Macau University of Science and Technology may be exploiting his position as the Editor-in-Chief of "The International Journal of Tourism Research" (IJTR) to inflate his citations. Here are some more detailed data
A previous investigation [1] revealed that about 17.5% citations to DAI Shifeng (代世峰) in 2025 came from the "International Journal of Coal Geology" (IJCG), the journal for which he services as the Editor-in-Chief. However, our further investigation shows that the phenomenon was common over the last two decades.