This is a series of emails I've received recently from a predatory journal titled Medical Research Archives. The personal nature of the emails is noteworthy. It is spam however; see the link here.

For example, the signature line of the MRA email concludes with the following flourish: NLM (PubMed) ID: 101668511.
The National Library of Medicine catalog does indeed have such an ID number -- for a journal that is [n]ot in the NLM Collection and [n]ot currently indexed for MEDLINE because the articles were not deposited in PubMed Central (PMC) in compliance with public access policies.

(Thanks to Associate Prof Catherine Arnott Smith at the University of Wisconsin for pointing out this deceptive practice).




-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: Re: Update to "The unfolding mechanism of monomeric mutant SOD1 by simulated force spectroscopy"
Date: Mon, 28 May 2018 00:38:06 +0000
From: Dr. A. Phiri <a.phiri@medicalresearcharchives.com>
Reply-To: Dr. A. Phiri <editorialboard@mraj.org>
To: <(MY EMAIL) phas.ubc.ca>


Fwd: Re: Update to "The unfolding mechanism of monomeric mutant SOD1 by simulated force spectroscopy" Dear Dr. Plotkin,

I don't think I got a reply to this yet, please let me know if you preparing an article is a possibility.


Thank you,

A. Phiri, M.D.

From: A. Phiri, M.D. (a.phiri@medicalresearcharchives.com)
Sent: May 23, 2018
To: (MY EMAIL) phas.ubc.ca
Subject: Update to "The unfolding mechanism of monomeric mutant SOD1 by simulated force spectroscopy"

Dear Dr. Plotkin,

We are planning the next few issues of the journal and I thought I would get in touch with you. Your article from a while ago titled "The unfolding mechanism of monomeric mutant SOD1 by simulated force spectroscopy" was an interesting read and I think another article from you would fit well into the journal.

Would you consider submitting either an update to this article or something new? May I send along more information?


Thank you,


A. Phiri, M.D.

Editorial Board

Medical Research Archives

NLM (PubMed) ID: 101668511

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Lo and behold, I've received another email with the same format as above, this time from SPG BioMed, a journal in the so-called Science Publishing Group. Again the pseudo-personal follow-up to their utterly-ignored initial email is noteworthy. The demonic face of spam once again rears its ugly cargo-cult-constructed head however, as the journal is indeed predatory.




-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: Re: Review article?
Date: Sun, 03 Jun 2018 19:09:23 +0000
From: K Gyamdjyan M.D. <kgyamdjyan@spg-journals.org>
Reply-To: K Gyamdjyan M.D. <k.gyamdjyan@spg.eu.com>
To: steve@phas.ubc.ca <steve@phas.ubc.ca>


Fwd: Re: Review article? I am following up on this as I don't think I got a reply from you yet. Would it be feasible for you to prepare an article in the coming weeks or months?


From: K. Gyamdjyan, (k.gyamdjyan@spg.eu.com)
Sent: May 29, 2018
To: steve@phas.ubc.ca
Subject: Your paper "The unfolding mechanism of monomeric mutant SOD1 by simulated force spectroscopy"

Dear Dr. Plotkin,

I am working on putting together the next couple of issues of SPG BioMed and wanted to get in contact because I think your work may be a good fit for the journal. I came across the article you published a while ago which was titled "The unfolding mechanism of monomeric mutant SOD1 by simulated force spectroscopy". I think a new article that updates this research would be valuable. Or if you have moved on from this research you could certainly prepare an article on another topic.

Do you still work in this area? I was trying to find your University of British Columbia profile page but was unable to do so.

Could we discuss the idea of you preparing a manuscript?


Best Regards, 

logo K. Gyamdjyan, M.D., Ph.D.
 Editorial Board
 SPG Biomed
 k.gyamdjyan@spg.eu.com
 +41 43 5082905

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