Stand up: "Micron has just had to retract a paper, for the first time in its 45-year existence. We hope it will be the last time."

Micron. 2014 Feb 20. pii: S0968-4328(14)00034-1. doi: 10.1016/j.micron.2014.02.009. [Epub ahead of print]

Ethics issues.

Cox G, Braet F, Egerton R.

Micron has just had to retract a paper, for the first time in its 45-year existence. We hope it will be the last time. An author was writing a review of the topic, saw a micrograph in a Micron paper, and alerted us to the fact that it looked unreal. Computer analysis bore this out, and correspondence with the authors elicited the admission that the junior author did not think the image was good enough, and decided to ‘improve’ it in Photoshop. One ironic aspect is that the person who spotted the fakery frequently reviews papers for Micron, and had he been sent this one the problem might have been averted.