Comment on Would You Take a Cancer Cure Proven Effective in a Predatory Journal? by herr doktor bimler

Update to that last comment: the paper by Bradstreet et al. in Front. Hum. Neurosci ("A new methodology of viewing extra-axial fluid and cortical abnormalities in children with autism via transcranial ultrasonography") was followed, a few months later, by a <a href="http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/fnhum.2014.00240/full" rel="nofollow">General Commentary Paper</a> by Dario Siniscalco, basically lauding the wonderful groundbreaking nature of Bradstreet's work. Under 'Conflicts of Interest' Siniscalco states "The author declares that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest". Sadly, he does <b>not</b> bother stating that he was <i>one of the reviewers</i> of the paper he is now praising; nor that he has collaborated with Bradstreet on numerous studies* with commercial applications (i.e. they are part of Bradstreet's business). Looking down the Commentary Paper, we find it had four reviewers, of whom <i>three</i> are also regular Siniscalco collaborators (Anna Sapone, Nicola Antonucci and Alessandra Cirillo). Of those three, Dr Sapone added her own COI statement that "despite having collaborated with the authors, the review process was handled objectively". I don't know what we can infer from the absence of such a statement from Antonucci and Cirillo. It is all looking remarkably incestuous, and not a good look for Frontiers. * "Mesenchymal stem cells in treating autism"; "Therapeutic role of hematopoietic stem cells in autism spectrum disorder-related inflammation"; "Perspectives on the Use of Stem Cells for Autism Treatment"; "The in vitro GcMAF effects on endocannabinoid system transcriptionomics, receptor formation, and cell activity of autism-derived macrophages"