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Biophysicist Kuo-Chen Chou has been removed from the editorial board of the Journal of Theoretical Biology after repeatedly manipulating the peer-review process to amass citations to his own work. Last year, Chou was also barred from being a reviewer at Bioinformatics. Investigations at both journals revealed that Chou asked authors of dozens of papers he was editing or reviewing to cite a long list of his publications — sometimes more than 50. Chou declined to answer questions about his citation practices.

Nature | 4 min read

An Argentinian research station has logged the highest temperature ever recorded on the continent of Antarctica: 18.3℃. “It’s only five years since the previous record was set and this is almost one degree centigrade higher,” notes climate scientist James Renwick.

The Guardian | 5 min read

Features & opinion

We are facing an epidemic of ‘truth decay’, as epidemiologist and former safety regulator David Michaels demonstrates in his excoriating new book about the corporate denial industry. Reviewer Felicity Lawrence lauds it as a brave and important work, filled with carefully documented, enraging examples of the systemic corruption of science.

Nature | 5 min read

Three major experiments are poised to take on the challenge of directly detecting dark matter. Two will search for elusive WIMPs, and will be shielded from a cacophony of other particles by being located deep underground in old mines. The other, in an ordinary lab, will attempt to coax out evidence of the uncountable trillions of axions that are theorized to surround us everywhere. So far, “you could say we’re the world’s best at finding nothing”, says physicist Murdock Gilchriese — but even a negative result will open up new avenues for exploration.

Smithsonian Magazine | 13 min read

After tweeting possibly the best out-of-office reply ever, epidemiologist Stephana Cherak was prompted to ponder her own approach to work-life balance. Hear more, plus catch up on the week in science, on this week’s Nature Podcast.

Nature Podcast | 26 min listenSubscribe to the Nature Podcast on iTunes, Google Podcasts or Spotify.

Where I work

Pamela Yeh is an evolutionary biologist at the University of California, Los Angeles.Credit: Sam Comen for Nature

For 22 years, evolutionary biologist Pamela Yeh has studied the dark-eyed junco (Junco hyemalis), focusing on a population that has settled at the campus of the University of California, Los Angeles. “There is something so joyful, so wondrous, about going into the on-campus ‘field’ to study birds — sometimes I feel I know a little secret about the natural world, right here,” says Yeh. “It makes my heart sing.” (Nature | 5 min read) (Sam Comen for Nature)