RETRACTED: Influence of steel fibres on the mechanical and physical performance of self-compacting concrete manufactured with waste materials and fillers

This article has been retracted: please see Elsevier Policy on Article Withdrawal (https://www.elsevier.com/about/our-business/policies/article-withdrawal ). This article has been retracted at the request of the Editor-in-Chief. Following receipt of whistle-blower complaints, an investigation of this and related papers was conducted. The Editor-in-Chief no longer has confidence in the scientific integrity of this paper as similar images have been used in various articles in multiple journals claiming varying conditions, which violates our publishing policies. The XRD spectra in this paper (Figure 1) have been published in other papers by the same group authors, sometimes reported as representing different materials. Figure 1a is reported to be an XRD of marble. The same XRD is reported in [Structures, 25, 2020, pp 72–87; Mechanics of Materials, 150, 2020, 103592 and Materials, 14(18), 2021, 5185] as being cement and in [Journal of Cleaner Production, 276, 2020, 124291] as being coarse recycled aggregate. Figure 1b is reported to be an XRD of red mud. The same XRD is reported in [Journal of Cleaner Production, 276, 2020, 124291; Structures, 25, 2020, pp 72–87 and Materials, 14(18), 2021, 5185] to represent “untreated coal coarse aggregate” and in [Mechanics of Materials, 150, 2020, 103592] as “untreated coal fine aggregate”. Figure 1c has been published in [Construction and Building Materials, 2020, 257, 119463; Construction and Building Materials, 2019, 204, pp. 809–827; Construction and Building Materials, 2018, 186, pp. 400–422; Journal of Cleaner Production, 276, 2020, 124291; Journal of Building engineering, 36, 2021, 102125; Structures, 25, 2020, pp 72–87; Construction and Building Materials, 314, 2022, 125667; Journal of Building Engineering, 38, 2021, 102090; Cement and Concrete Composites, 2021, 122 104121, Mechanics of Materials, 150, 2020, 103592 and Materials, 14(18), 2021, 5185] reported to be essentially the same material, coarse natural aggregate. However, in this paper, the same XRD is reported to be granite aggregate and a different chemical composition is reported. Figure 1d is reported to be an XRD of limestone. The same XRD has been published in [Construction and Building Materials, 2019, 204, pp. 809–827; Construction and Building Materials, 2018, 186, pp. 400–422; Journal of Building engineering, 36, 2021, 102125 and Cement and Concrete Composites, 2021, 122 104121] reported to be recycled aggregate. In [Journal of Cleaner Production, 276, 2020, 124291; Structures, 25, 2020, pp 72–87; Mechanics of Materials, 150, 2020, 103592 and Materials, 14(18), 2021, 5185], the same XRD is reported to be fine natural aggregate. Figure 1e is reported to be an XRD of cement. The same XRD has been published in [Construction and Building Materials, 2019, 204, pp. 809–827; Construction and Building Materials, 2018, 186, pp. 400–422; Journal of Building engineering, 36, 2021, 102125 and Engineering Structures, 249, 2021, 113362] reported to be coarse recycled aggregate. In [Construction and Building Materials, 2020, 257, 119463], the same XRD is reported to be rubber waste. Additionally, this paper contains multiple instances of the use of unattributed third party images (Figures 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10). In particular, Figure 8a was published previously in an unrelated study [ https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/publications/research/infrastructure/structures/06103/ ] and Figure 8b is a ‘catalogue’ image and therefore does not provide a true representation of the splitting tests and failures reported in this study. Unattributed use of images is a violation of COPE publishing ethics guidelines and can have the effect of distorting the scientific record. Communication with the corresponding author raised further concerns with the integrity of this work and proposed revisions deepened, rather than clarified, the uncertainty as to what materials were used in this study..