In recent days, following the academic storm stirred up by the Chinese science popular blogger “Geng Xue,” Beijing University professor Rao Yi claimed during a lecture that China has set a world historical record in scientific academic misconduct. The video of this statement has once again gone viral on Chinese social media platforms.
According to reports from the “Ningbo Daily” and “Ming Pao,” the video of Rao Yi that has been circulating online was from his speech titled “Where is Chinese Science Heading” given on May 11th at Dongfang University of Science and Technology in Ningbo, Zhejiang Province.
In his speech, Rao Yi mentioned that China ranks among the top two in the world in terms of the quantity of scientific papers, setting a record in terms of development speed and scientific academic misconduct.
He pointed out that China’s academic misconduct record is not only due to the large volume of scientific research, which results in a higher absolute number of violations, but also because the actual proportion of misconduct is unprecedented in world history. Looking back, a few decades ago, both the UK and France had only a small amount of academic misconduct cases, which subsequently became historical scandals. Even during its scientific rise, the United States did not experience massive fraud cases.
Rao Yi warned that China rarely punishes academic misconduct, and if not properly addressed, teachers leading students to cheat will cause far-reaching harm to various industries in China when these students enter the workforce after graduation. He emphasized the need for universities and governmental institutions to implement stricter supervision and punishment measures.
Rao Yi is one of China’s most controversial and influential scientists, holding multiple prestigious positions such as tenured professor at Peking University, former dean of the School of Life Sciences at Peking University, former president of Capital Medical University (2019-2025), member of the Academic Advisory Committee of the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, honorary director of the Capital Medical Science Innovation Center, and member of the Board of Trustees of West Lake University.
In April of this year, a research team led by Professor Wang from Tongji University had two papers published in “Nature” within a year questioned for data fabrication. After this incident was exposed by the aforementioned blogger “Geng Xue” (Geng Hongwei, a PhD dropout from Beihang University), Rao Yi continuously raised doubts on his public account “Rao Discusses Science” and pushed for Tongji University to launch an investigation.
For the past few years, “Geng Xue Tells Stories” has been creating videos in the field of biological popular science, occasionally delving into academic integrity issues, targeting individuals who have been falsely labeled as talents because “they occupy the best labs and funding but use fake papers to earn more achievements.”
Since April, his public report has implicated professor teams at several prestigious universities including Sun Yat-sen University, Nankai University, and others for suspected academic paper falsification.
As of May 19th, he has garnered over 3 million followers on short video platforms, and his videos exposing academic fraud have collectively received over 1 million likes. Some people refer to the series of reactions triggered by his whistleblowing actions as an “academic earthquake.”
Several universities have responded to these allegations. Tongji University announced on May 6th that the papers involved academic misconduct were fired from their positions, had their professional grade reduced by two levels, and terminated the employment relationship with the first author.