PhD Stripped of Degree Due to Plagiarism
An Estonian University of Life Sciences PhD in bioenergetics stripped of his degree Tuesday under the suspicion of plagiarism, the first such instance in the university's history, lifted both theoretical and applied research, a senior academic official said.
The dissertation topic of the 40-year-old researcher, Andres Menind, was related to biomass and fuels ("Peculiarities of pretreatment and fuels refining [sic] of biomass") and was defended in front of the university's technology board in January, reported ETV.
Following a recent tip received by the university, the dissertation, which was written in English, was checked by three plagiarism-detecting programs, and experts found the work to be plagiarized.
University of Life Sciences vice rector for studies Paavo Kaimre said the incident was regrettable.
"The said work used segments from the works by other authors without proper reference, breaking the rules set by the university, copyright laws and the code of ethics for scientists,“ said Kaimre.
Kaimre told ERR News the monograph-style work was around 80 pages long and at least three long segments were affected by plagiarism. The segments had both plagiarized theory and plagiarized research, he said. Some of the dissertation material was co-published with Slovak scientists.
Menind told Delfi he did not deliberately or knowledgeably commit plagiarism.
"Every minor referenced section has someone’s name attached and all names are listed in the used literature,“ he said.
Menind said he will contest the decision. There is a 30-day window to do so.