It wasn't uncommon for a scholar to reject a manuscript.
Regardless of how famous the scholar was or how much they had accomplished in the past, if they didn't choose the right journal, or if the results didn't meet the standards for publication, it could cause the manuscript to be rejected during the review process.
However, not everyone had the opportunity to see a published thesis being withdrawn.
Let's not talk about the papers that were still waiting in the queue. For a paper that had already been published, every retraction was a huge blow to the credibility of the journal. This was because it was equivalent to publicly admitting that there was a major and irreparable error in the published paper.
Therefore, generally speaking, unless there was a serious case of academic fraud or something that damaged the reputation of the scholar, the journal would be very cautious when withdrawing a published thesis.
The Nobel Prize-level academic fraud that caused a sensation in the biology community — Kobokata Haruko incident. Even though the entire academic community believed that her experimental results were photoshopped, in the end, the Nippon Institute of Physical Chemistry still couldn't withstand the pressure. They received written consent from Kobokata herself regarding the withdrawal of the STAP cell thesis. Only then did Nature withdraw the controversial thesis.
Even though the field of integrated circuit design couldn't be compared to the field of biology, it was quite unusual for the IEEE to suddenly withdraw the thesis after the report was over.
In short, after being rejected for the first time in his life, Lu Zhou felt like he had no regrets in his academic career.
However, speaking of which, this was his first time submitting a thesis to an IEEE journal. This kind of journal was biased towards the fields of electrical and electronic engineering. His field of expertise was still a bit lacking. Even though a top publication in the field of electrical engineering had invited him to publish a thesis on controllable fusion technology, considering the fact that this technology involved a lot of things, Lu Zhou still politely rejected them.
He didn't expect to be kicked out of the IEEE conference for the first time. Not only that, but it was also because of the ridiculous reasons of "academic fraud" and "falsifying experimental data".
When Lu Zhou saw the written notice of withdrawal from the IEEE, he couldn't help but feel emotional.
In all honesty, was he the kind of person who would joke about experimental data?
He didn't know how much influence the International Integrated Circuit Design and Process Conference had on the industry. What made him sigh wasn't because of the ridiculous reason, but because he felt that academic purity and fairness were becoming more and more like a piece of paper to wipe one's ass.
Even when the United States and the Soviet Union were engaged in an arms race, things didn't end up like this …
"I heard that your manuscript was withdrawn?"
Chen Yushan sat on the sofa in the dean's office at the Institute for Advanced Study. When she talked about this, she had a mischievous smile on her face.
Seeing her gloating expression, Lu Zhou sighed and said with a helpless expression, "Do you have to be so happy that my manuscript was withdrawn?"
"What are you talking about? How could I be gloating? It's just that it's rare to see you suffer a setback, so I'm a little surprised. "
Lu Zhou said in a self-deprecating manner, "It's not that I suffered a setback. It's just that I finally managed to show my face at IEEE, but they chased me away."
Chen Yushan: "Did they ask you to modify the thesis?"
"The withdrawal notice tactfully mentioned that they wanted me to modify the experimental data that seemed a bit 'exaggerated', but they didn't say what was exaggerated. I'm sure they didn't repeat the experiment, because they didn't have the conditions to do so. "
Chen Yushan asked curiously, "Then do you plan on changing it?"
"Change?" Lu Zhou smiled and said nonchalantly, "Why should I change what's right?"
Complying with the reviewer's opinion and correcting obvious or easily misunderstood mistakes was another matter. To be honest, he didn't take this kind of ambiguous or even non-existent accusation to heart.
Chen Yushan looked at the expression on Lu Zhou's face and couldn't help but smirk.
"No wonder you're a genius, that's your style."
Lu Zhou smiled and said, "What does this have to do with being a genius?"
"How is it unrelated? Think about it, when you were in school, weren't all geniuses who dared to talk back to the teacher? If he's a slacker and the teacher says he's wrong, I'm afraid he'll admit defeat. "
"What are you talking about?" Lu Zhou listened to this strange analogy and sighed. He said, "Also, you're exaggerating to call IEEE a teacher, they're not qualified."
"It's just an analogy, why are you trying to argue with me?" Chen Yushan rolled her eyes and suddenly had an idea. She said, "Speaking of which, have you ever thought about starting your own journal?"
Lu Zhou nodded and said, "Before I left yesterday, the CEO of Huawei talked to me about this."
In fact, it wasn't just the CEO of Huawei who talked to him about this issue, but his old friends in the Chinese academic community also talked to him about it. However, he didn't think it was a big deal, so he didn't think too much about it.
After all, in his opinion, the submission of the thesis wasn't important; the thesis itself was important. An outstanding research result, even if it was posted on arXiv, would definitely attract people's attention.
Only research results that weren't particularly important or even dispensable would need to be published on the journal itself to reflect their value.
But now, it seemed like his idea was a bit too idealistic.
Even though a journal was only a platform for publishing academic results, using someone else's microphone to speak still had some restrictions. Normally, these restrictions wouldn't be reflected. Most people wouldn't do things like unplugging the microphone or kicking the spokesperson off the stage. However, it was obvious that IEEE had crossed this line.
Maybe I should really consider starting an academic journal for my own fun.
"Wang Zhengfei talked to you about this?" Chen Yushan looked at Lu Zhou and asked curiously, "What did he say?"
Lu Zhou thought for a bit and said, "He said that carbon-based chips are something that we invented, so it's not appropriate to let other people review the paper. There are research institutes in the field of carbon-based integrated circuits, but most research institutes and scholars' understanding of this stuff is still at the theoretical level. Asking them for their opinion is a bit too much. "
Chen Yushan nodded thoughtfully and said, "I think so too … What do you think?"
"I think what he said makes sense."
Lu Zhou paused for a second and smiled. He then said, "I thought about it carefully. The Jinling Institute for Advanced Study has been established for so long, but we don't even have a journal. It would be a bit embarrassing.
"I plan on setting up a comprehensive journal in the name of the Institute for Advanced Study … Of course, people who aren't from the Institute for Advanced Study can still submit, but we have to do the review ourselves."
Chen Yushan: "Do you need my help?"
"Of course, I don't know these things. I can be the editor-in-chief for the time being, but I'll have to ask you to take care of the specific details."
When Chen Yushan heard Lu Zhou's request, she couldn't help but smirk.
"No problem, don't worry, leave it to me."
At this point, she suddenly thought of a very important matter, so she asked.
"Oh yeah, by the way, what do you plan on calling the journal?"
Lu Zhou spent around five minutes thinking about this question. He then looked up and spoke.
"Just call it …"
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