Written by Weishi MengMarch 28, 2026September 28, 2026

NIH’s Case Against Ariel Fernandez in the COVID-19 Cover-Up

NIH has censored Ariel Fernandez, a physicist and chemist with a Yale University Ph. D. and a retired endowed chair professor from Rice University. By weaponizing the Office of Research Integrity, NIH resurrected a closed case of research misconduct after more than a decade. The administrative action was triggered by Fernandez’s challenge of the official narrative regarding the origin of SARS-CoV-2, the causative agent of the COVID-19 pandemic. Fernandez was the first scientist to report that SARS-CoV-2 is a lab product of gain of function research, at a variance with the official narrative that claimed that SARS-CoV-2 was a zoonotic occurrence. Ariel Fernandez has been censored and discredited by NIH at the instigation of Peter Daszak, the NIH contractor who engaged the Wuhan Institute of Virology to perform the gain of function research that caused the pandemic. The censorship of Ariel Fernandez is part of the Covid-19 cover-up implemented by NIH/DHHS.

Written by Weishi MengSeptember 22, 2022September 28, 2022

The Scam of Scientific Publishing and the Wild West of Post Publication Peer Review

Have you ever met a top scientist who is also an active journal editor? After years of patent litigation this question keeps coming up when seeking for technical help. The answer is: only seldom, since great minds usually have little interest in getting distracted. The consequences of this inverted selection are immediately apparent: deep […]

Written by Weishi MengMarch 24, 2019February 29, 2020

Retraction Watch: a loose cannon threatens the scientific establishment

To make progress, science requires peer review. But the type of peer review that has assisted scientific research for centuries is a far cry from the self-appointed data police organization named Retraction Watch (RW). With its complete lack of accountability and nonexistent scientific credentials, RW only encourages unfiltered denigration. To quote Susan T. Fiske, chaired […]

Written by Weishi MengFebruary 20, 2019February 28, 2020

Another scam in scientific publishing: The rogue editor

The reproducibility crisis, especially in the soft sciences, is by no means the only crisis affecting publication of scientific research. As we and others have emphasized, an even greater danger originated with the self-appointed fraud police with its tactics of coercion, bullying and shaming arising with the advent of violent organizations like Retraction Watch. The […]

Written by Weishi MengFebruary 17, 2019February 29, 2020

Scientific Establishment Under Attack: Prof Susan Fiske on Retraction Watch and Anti-Science Terrorism

Science requires peer critiques, cannot do without them. But as we have amply shown, Retraction Watch (RW) only encourages unfiltered denigration. To quote Susan T. Fiske, chaired Professor of Psychology and Public Affairs at Princeton University and former APS president, “the self-appointed data police is volunteering critiques of such personal ferocity and relentlessness that they […]

Written by Weishi MengFebruary 11, 2019February 29, 2020

Overdue: US Advisory Board for Research Integrity hopefully ending the era of Retraction Watch and data bullies

When it comes to scientific integrity, US research institutions are stuck in a dismal situation. A breed of data thugs bullying institutions and journals, and a mob of angry losers and science dropouts are effectively running the show from the squalor of venues like Retraction Watch. Sadly, a few members of the science establishment – […]

Written by Weishi MengFebruary 1, 2019February 29, 2020

Michael Deem seriously involved in the CRISPR babies experiment

It now turns out that the American biophysicist Michael W. Deem from Rice University was far more involved in the widely condemned “CRISPR babies” experiment than was previously known. STAT learned that Deem was the senior author on a paper entitled “Birth of twins after genome editing for HIV resistance” submitted to Nature in November, 2018. The first […]

Written by Weishi MengJanuary 20, 2019February 29, 2020

Retraction Watch going extinct? It should.

We often hear that life is too short. I would add: Too short for what? Clearly, it all depends on what you choose to do. If you are trying to unravel the secrets of the universe, then life is surely too short. Ars lunga vita brevis, said the Romans. On the other hand, if you […]

Written by Weishi MengNovember 30, 2018January 20, 2019

CRISPR babies: a US connection? Interview with former Rice University professor

The genetic editing of human embryos through a molecular biology manipulation known as CRISPR surely sent shock waves across the globe. Many felt that He Jiankui, the Chinese scientist who carried out the experiments had opened Pandora’s box. Yet, as people had now some time to ponder over the events, the scientific establishment has […]

Written by Weishi MengMay 28, 2018June 9, 2018

The Web-Based Sewage of Science Fed by a Failed Peer Review System

We love science, we also know that getting and keeping our scientific work published in a good venue can be an arduous task. This is true now more than ever due to a lack of leadership in the scientific establishment and to the advent in 2010 of a new player in the game: the angry […]

Science and Context

Restoring a healthy NIH research environment for scientific pursuit.

Category: Research misconduct