Eugenie Reich
@eugenie-reich.bsky.social
Whistleblower attorney focused on scientific fraud & founder of eugeniereichlaw.com. Author of "Plastic Fantastic: How The Biggest Fraud In Physics Shook The Scientific World" https://tinyurl.com/yft98tp5. BJKS Podcast https://shorturl.at/OuQin.
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Eugenie Reich
@eugenie-reich.bsky.social
· Mar 30
Plastic Fantastic: How The Biggest Fraud In Physics Shook The Scientific World
Plastic Fantastic: How The Biggest Fraud In Physics Shook The Scientific World - Kindle edition by Reich, Eugenie Samuel. Download it once and read it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Use features like bookmarks, note taking and highlighting while reading Plastic Fantastic: How The Biggest Fraud In Physics Shook The Scientific World.
www.amazon.com
I'm very happy to say that Plastic Fantastic, my book on scientific fraud at Bell Laboratories, is available online as an affordable paperback or ebook. The content is the same but it has taken taken months to reformat after rights reverted to me from the original publisher.
Moving today's event to next Monday February 9 at 7pm.
Science fans in the Boston area: each month we meet to discuss science gone astray at Reproducibility Salon. On Monday Feb 2 at 7pm the topic is false allegations. How big a problem is this? Register, find address in Davis Sq. Somerville, & more details.
Reproducibility Salon - save the date -- discussing attacks on science, Mon, Feb 2, 2026, 7:00 PM | Meetup
Let's meet again on Monday February 2, 2026 at 7pm!
Topic for the night: examples of fabricated allegations about science that turns out to be right!
Is this a bi
www.meetup.com
February 2, 2026 at 9:01 PM
Moving today's event to next Monday February 9 at 7pm.
Brilliant analysis. The first aggregate evidence I've seen that PubPeer is performing institutions' research integrity oversight function for them.
Little blogpost reporting an analysis of recent (2021-2025) retractions of highly-cited papers in relation to #PubPeer comments. deevybee.blogspot.com/2026/02/the-...
#retractions #publishing
#retractions #publishing
deevybee.blogspot.com
February 2, 2026 at 3:54 PM
Brilliant analysis. The first aggregate evidence I've seen that PubPeer is performing institutions' research integrity oversight function for them.
The Nature article that had 800 years of materials chemistry progress publicity has a megacorrection. I feel that the nonretracting authors should schedule time each week to phone up ongoing citers of their work, offer code and explain the situation. People sometimes miss corrections.
‘Nature’ robot chemist paper corrected, but some questions remain unanswered
The original study claimed the robot had discovered 43 new materials in 17 days
cen.acs.org
January 31, 2026 at 11:57 PM
The Nature article that had 800 years of materials chemistry progress publicity has a megacorrection. I feel that the nonretracting authors should schedule time each week to phone up ongoing citers of their work, offer code and explain the situation. People sometimes miss corrections.
Reposted by Eugenie Reich
Not thrilled they're (I think) a maintainer on a major software project, used by at least tens of thousands of other software projects. Particularly because following best practices on the topic really isn't that hard.
Not going to name and shame on this one though.
Not going to name and shame on this one though.
January 31, 2026 at 2:02 PM
Not thrilled they're (I think) a maintainer on a major software project, used by at least tens of thousands of other software projects. Particularly because following best practices on the topic really isn't that hard.
Not going to name and shame on this one though.
Not going to name and shame on this one though.
Science fans in the Boston area: each month we meet to discuss science gone astray at Reproducibility Salon. On Monday Feb 2 at 7pm the topic is false allegations. How big a problem is this? Register, find address in Davis Sq. Somerville, & more details.
Reproducibility Salon - save the date -- discussing attacks on science, Mon, Feb 2, 2026, 7:00 PM | Meetup
Let's meet again on Monday February 2, 2026 at 7pm!
Topic for the night: examples of fabricated allegations about science that turns out to be right!
Is this a bi
www.meetup.com
January 30, 2026 at 5:46 PM
Science fans in the Boston area: each month we meet to discuss science gone astray at Reproducibility Salon. On Monday Feb 2 at 7pm the topic is false allegations. How big a problem is this? Register, find address in Davis Sq. Somerville, & more details.
Good article by Theresa DeFino capturing my thoughts on how failure to address research integrity failures today accumulates problems for tomorrow. Each scientist or administrator involved in such a mess has autonomy to facilitate or resist that.
Attorney: Dana-Farber’s $15M Settlement Shows Failure of Integrity Oversight, More Suits Coming | JD Supra
Two years after an online sleuth put together a damning collection of papers by Dana-Farber Cancer Institute researchers containing what he suspected...
www.jdsupra.com
January 29, 2026 at 3:55 PM
Good article by Theresa DeFino capturing my thoughts on how failure to address research integrity failures today accumulates problems for tomorrow. Each scientist or administrator involved in such a mess has autonomy to facilitate or resist that.
Reposted by Eugenie Reich
I often find myself explaining something that is easy to take for granted, but should be evident: There is no reason why the program of Figuring Out Nature should proceed in time steps that are less than or comparable to the duration of one scientist’s career. (1/n)
Is Particle Physics Dead, Dying, or Just Hard? | Quanta Magazine
Columnist Natalie Wolchover checks in with particle physicists more than a decade after the field entered a profound crisis.
www.quantamagazine.org
January 27, 2026 at 4:57 PM
I often find myself explaining something that is easy to take for granted, but should be evident: There is no reason why the program of Figuring Out Nature should proceed in time steps that are less than or comparable to the duration of one scientist’s career. (1/n)
Reposted by Eugenie Reich
The world folds into itself.
(I resonate. I had a submission dinged when the editor claimed I had mismeasured the Dunning-Kruger effect. Umm.)
(I resonate. I had a submission dinged when the editor claimed I had mismeasured the Dunning-Kruger effect. Umm.)
January 23, 2026 at 1:39 AM
The world folds into itself.
(I resonate. I had a submission dinged when the editor claimed I had mismeasured the Dunning-Kruger effect. Umm.)
(I resonate. I had a submission dinged when the editor claimed I had mismeasured the Dunning-Kruger effect. Umm.)
Reposted by Eugenie Reich
Less is more. This aphorism is constantly on my mind. The scientific publication system is under tremendous strain, the last thing it needs is a massive dump of LLM generated/aided papers. If you love science, then show it some love. www.nature.com/articles/d41...
I’m going to halve my publication output. You should consider slow science, too
If we don’t slow down, the research enterprise is going to crash, argues Adrian Barnett.
www.nature.com
January 19, 2026 at 9:13 PM
Less is more. This aphorism is constantly on my mind. The scientific publication system is under tremendous strain, the last thing it needs is a massive dump of LLM generated/aided papers. If you love science, then show it some love. www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Reposted by Eugenie Reich
Reposted by Eugenie Reich
Want to get the data out of a PDF figure? As in, the actual data – not a rough trace-along-the-lines version?
I made an app you might like: adamkucharski.github.io/pdf2plot/
It all started a few years ago... 🧵
I made an app you might like: adamkucharski.github.io/pdf2plot/
It all started a few years ago... 🧵
January 13, 2026 at 9:12 PM
Want to get the data out of a PDF figure? As in, the actual data – not a rough trace-along-the-lines version?
I made an app you might like: adamkucharski.github.io/pdf2plot/
It all started a few years ago... 🧵
I made an app you might like: adamkucharski.github.io/pdf2plot/
It all started a few years ago... 🧵
Reposted by Eugenie Reich
I think you can critique one and not let the other off the hook. Its the responsibility of a journalist to inform the public. This study, even if it purports to be high quality and made it past peer review, can be quashed by a science journo interrogating the data/arguments effectively.
January 14, 2026 at 10:40 PM
I think you can critique one and not let the other off the hook. Its the responsibility of a journalist to inform the public. This study, even if it purports to be high quality and made it past peer review, can be quashed by a science journo interrogating the data/arguments effectively.
Reposted by Eugenie Reich
Some people are responding to this with "it's not a problem that there's tons of fake images everywhere because I personally know they're not real," and I would invite those people to take a look at the state of the world.
A thought from @drandrewthaler.bsky.social that's going to fester:
How long until we start to see range extension papers- "This species is thought to live over there, but we saw it over here and therefore it needs protection here"- based on fake images?
www.southernfriedscience.com/thats-not-a-...
How long until we start to see range extension papers- "This species is thought to live over there, but we saw it over here and therefore it needs protection here"- based on fake images?
www.southernfriedscience.com/thats-not-a-...
That’s not a blobfish: Deep Sea Social Media is Flooded by AI Slop
Well, it finally happened. Over the last two week, my usually well-curated feeds of videos from the deep sea have been overrun with AI slop masquerading as authentic images of strange and delightfu…
www.southernfriedscience.com
January 13, 2026 at 2:19 PM
Some people are responding to this with "it's not a problem that there's tons of fake images everywhere because I personally know they're not real," and I would invite those people to take a look at the state of the world.
"It is not really an effective process and we ask a lot of it. A lot of peer reviewers just aren’t looking for fraud."
January 12, 2026 at 4:21 PM
"It is not really an effective process and we ask a lot of it. A lot of peer reviewers just aren’t looking for fraud."
It's refreshing to remember the time when everyone thought this was really cool. Now everyone wants to be seen!
🧪 New blog post: Our new paper on invisibility physics! skullsinthestars.com/2026/01/10/o...
Our new paper on invisibility physics!
So I’ve written a lot about the physics of invisibility on this blog and have even written a popular science book on the subject, but many people may not know that I also still occasionally d…
skullsinthestars.com
January 10, 2026 at 10:04 PM
It's refreshing to remember the time when everyone thought this was really cool. Now everyone wants to be seen!
It is definitely true that over time anyone can get an antenna for what will be retracted. And also for what is almost surely wrong but will be a tough target.
📚 Opening Pandora’s box: Developing reviewer rhetorical sensitivity through retracted articles doi.org/10.1080/0898...
January 9, 2026 at 1:15 PM
It is definitely true that over time anyone can get an antenna for what will be retracted. And also for what is almost surely wrong but will be a tough target.
Great story about how evidence that most miss can be clear as day to experts who study that problem .. and how a talk to one student who is paying attention can be more important than a rockstar prof giving keynote to hundreds wondering about the lunchbreak.
How plate tectonics revolutionized our understanding of Earth - High Country News
And how scientist Tanya Atwater was at the center of it all.
www.hcn.org
January 7, 2026 at 1:42 PM
Great story about how evidence that most miss can be clear as day to experts who study that problem .. and how a talk to one student who is paying attention can be more important than a rockstar prof giving keynote to hundreds wondering about the lunchbreak.
I worry less about general AI slop than about bias or fraud in LLM / AI output with influence, if code not available. Prescient (2020) example - a pharma company bribing an electronic medical record company to insert covert prompts to doctors to prescribe - tipping scales at the point of care. M
www.justice.gov
January 6, 2026 at 5:48 AM
I worry less about general AI slop than about bias or fraud in LLM / AI output with influence, if code not available. Prescient (2020) example - a pharma company bribing an electronic medical record company to insert covert prompts to doctors to prescribe - tipping scales at the point of care. M
Reposted by Eugenie Reich
Wondering what it would look like if there were a way to generally support and fund science communicators, ideally without getting venture capital involved.
January 5, 2026 at 8:00 PM
Wondering what it would look like if there were a way to generally support and fund science communicators, ideally without getting venture capital involved.
Reposted by Eugenie Reich
🎆Congratulations🎇 Sleuths at PubPeer - pubpeer.com :
End-of-the-Year Countdown runs for 250,000 flagged papers!!
...that's a 3‰ of total publications over all years & disciplines (ca. 76,000,000)
👉essential for #ResearchIntegrity
End-of-the-Year Countdown runs for 250,000 flagged papers!!
...that's a 3‰ of total publications over all years & disciplines (ca. 76,000,000)
👉essential for #ResearchIntegrity
December 31, 2025 at 7:13 AM
🎆Congratulations🎇 Sleuths at PubPeer - pubpeer.com :
End-of-the-Year Countdown runs for 250,000 flagged papers!!
...that's a 3‰ of total publications over all years & disciplines (ca. 76,000,000)
👉essential for #ResearchIntegrity
End-of-the-Year Countdown runs for 250,000 flagged papers!!
...that's a 3‰ of total publications over all years & disciplines (ca. 76,000,000)
👉essential for #ResearchIntegrity
Reposted by Eugenie Reich
As a paleontologist I've had field photos of material ruined by post processing. My google pixel tried to interpolate detail on fossil close ups, resulting in a swirling mess on close inspection. A good smart phone camera can be incredibly handy in the field, but now I use the dumbest one I can.
December 16, 2025 at 10:35 PM
As a paleontologist I've had field photos of material ruined by post processing. My google pixel tried to interpolate detail on fossil close ups, resulting in a swirling mess on close inspection. A good smart phone camera can be incredibly handy in the field, but now I use the dumbest one I can.
Illiteration: start with a coherent set of thoughts and scatter misspelled gibberish throughout
December 31, 2025 at 2:04 PM
Illiteration: start with a coherent set of thoughts and scatter misspelled gibberish throughout
Reposted by Eugenie Reich
Physics in 2025: A year of unforgettable breakthroughs! 🔬 We’re excited to share Physics World’s roundup of the Top 10 Physics Breakthroughs of the Year for 2025 🌌⚛️📡Dive into the full article to explore how these discoveries are shaping science and technology: https://bit.ly/3YaD0lC
Top 10 Breakthroughs of the Year in physics for 2025 revealed – Physics World
A molecular superfluid, high-resolution microscope and a protein qubit are on our list
physicsworld.com
December 31, 2025 at 12:44 PM
Physics in 2025: A year of unforgettable breakthroughs! 🔬 We’re excited to share Physics World’s roundup of the Top 10 Physics Breakthroughs of the Year for 2025 🌌⚛️📡Dive into the full article to explore how these discoveries are shaping science and technology: https://bit.ly/3YaD0lC
Reposted by Eugenie Reich
Just finished this gripping read on scientific fraud by @eugenie-reich.bsky.social
Had to tab the quote:
“In comparison to the mythical picture of researchers as an army of self-correctors marching in an organised way toward the truth, science is more of a guerrilla war.”
#researchintegrity
Had to tab the quote:
“In comparison to the mythical picture of researchers as an army of self-correctors marching in an organised way toward the truth, science is more of a guerrilla war.”
#researchintegrity
December 30, 2025 at 11:38 PM
Just finished this gripping read on scientific fraud by @eugenie-reich.bsky.social
Had to tab the quote:
“In comparison to the mythical picture of researchers as an army of self-correctors marching in an organised way toward the truth, science is more of a guerrilla war.”
#researchintegrity
Had to tab the quote:
“In comparison to the mythical picture of researchers as an army of self-correctors marching in an organised way toward the truth, science is more of a guerrilla war.”
#researchintegrity
Thank you for the inquiries that have come in since the Dana-Farber announcement. I am still catching up. It may be useful to review the background information on my website about the elements of a False Claims Act violation.
December 29, 2025 at 3:03 AM
Thank you for the inquiries that have come in since the Dana-Farber announcement. I am still catching up. It may be useful to review the background information on my website about the elements of a False Claims Act violation.