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Retracted articles on stem cells are continuously cited in publications and used by ChatGPT

Author

Listed:
  • Xinhe Zhang

    (Xi’an Jiaotong University Health Science Center, NHC Key Laboratory of Environment and Endemic Diseases, School of Public Health)

  • Tianshu Gu

    (University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Department of Clinical Pharmacy and Translational Science)

  • Sidharth Loganathan

    (University of Tennessee Health Science Centre, Department of Orthopedic Surgery and BME-Campbell Clinic)

  • Yanjun Xie

    (Xi’an Jiaotong University, Department of Occupational and Environmental Health, School of Public Health, Health Science Center)

  • Jinghong Chen

    (Xi’an Jiaotong University Health Science Center, NHC Key Laboratory of Environment and Endemic Diseases, School of Public Health)

Abstract

The integration of retracted scientific literature into large language models (LLMs) poses significant risks to research integrity, particularly in fast-moving fields like stem cell research. To develop and apply a multi-method framework for detecting the presence of retracted stem cell articles in ChatGPT-5.0’s training data and analyze citation patterns. We identified 117 retracted stem cell articles from PubMed (1998–2025) using title keywords and collected 30 non-retracted control articles matched by publication year and journal impact factor. We employed two detection methods: (1) Question-answering tests based on article conclusions; (2) Text autocompletion tasks measuring similarity between ChatGPT-generated completions and original abstracts. Statistical analyses included chi-square tests, correlation analysis, and multivariate regression. The text autocompletion method showed high similarity (ROUGE-L score > 0.7) for 67.5% of retracted articles, strongly indicating their presence in training data. In QA testing, ChatGPT-5.0 utilized 61.5% (72/117) of retracted articles, with only 41.7% (30/72) of these responses including retraction notices. Retraction time interval significantly influenced citation rates (χ2 = 16.28, p

Suggested Citation

  • Xinhe Zhang & Tianshu Gu & Sidharth Loganathan & Yanjun Xie & Jinghong Chen, 2025. "Retracted articles on stem cells are continuously cited in publications and used by ChatGPT," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 130(11), pages 6503-6511, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:130:y:2025:i:11:d:10.1007_s11192-025-05484-y
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-025-05484-y
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