International Journal of Photoenergy has retracted the article titled “Highly Active Rare-Earth-Metal La-Doped Photocatalysts: Fabrication, Characterization, and Their Photocatalytic Activity” [1], due to concerns with the figures as originally noted on PubPeer [2].
Unexpected similarity is found between Figure 1 (a and b). The authors responded that since the difference in concentration between the two catalysts is minimal and that both catalysts are prepared under the same condition with marginal difference in doping concentration, obtaining similar XRD patterns for both catalysts are highly possible. The editorial board determined that this response does not account for the level of similarity observed and the article is therefore retracted from the journal due to concerns with the reliability of the data.
The authors agree to the retraction and the notice.