Proofig AI checks far more than images. Its image checks detect duplication, manipulation, plagiarism, self-plagiarism and AI-generated figures. RefGuard, Proofig AI’s reference integrity product, flags retracted, hallucinated and unsupported citations. Octym, built by the team behind Proofig AI, reviews the entire paper with 26 checks, and PubShield returns the results of several integrity checks to one dashboard.
Why does research integrity now reach past the figures?
Proofig AI built its reputation on image integrity, and image problems still matter. But a manuscript can fail in other places too:
- A reference can point to a paper that was retracted after it was cited.
- An AI writing tool can produce a convincing citation for a paper nobody ever published.
- A real source can be cited for a claim it never makes.
- Statistics, methods and disclosures can be inconsistent or missing.
The scale of the problem shows in the published record. Nature reported that retractions of research articles passed 10,000 in 2023, an annual record, as publishers worked to clean up sham papers and peer-review fraud. Each retracted paper can live on in the reference lists of later work.
That is why Proofig AI’s coverage now runs from figures to references to the full paper. The principle stays the same at every level: software surfaces the signals, and a person makes the call.
What does Proofig AI check in research images?
Proofig AI’s image integrity checks screen each figure in a manuscript, from microscopy and Western blots to FACS, graphs and charts. They look for five kinds of problem:
- Duplication and reuse inside the manuscript, including images that were resized, rotated, flipped, cropped or partly overlapping.
- Manipulation within a single image, such as cloning, splicing, deletion and content-aware edits.
- Image plagiarism, comparing visuals against more than 155 million PubMed open-access images, the largest image-plagiarism database in the industry, with a link to the original article for each match.
- Self-plagiarism through My Database, a private repository of your own past papers, posters, grant submissions and lab images, including material that public databases do not cover.
- AI-generated images across six categories: microscopy, histology, cell plates, animal imaging, medical scans, and Western blots and gels.
Results arrive in minutes. Reviewers inspect each flag with forensic tools and decide what belongs in the final PDF report. The image plagiarism detection page describes this check in detail.
Which reference problems does RefGuard catch?
RefGuard is Proofig AI’s reference integrity product. It checks a manuscript’s reference list and is available on its own, inside PubShield, and as the reference checks in Octym. You upload a text-based PDF or Word file of up to 150 pages, and RefGuard compares each reference with the scholarly publishing record to confirm the article is real.
RefGuard’s report covers five areas:
- Hallucinated references. References that cannot be matched to any real publication are flagged. That is where hallucinated citations surface, including those invented by AI writing tools.
- Retracted citations. Citations of retracted papers are flagged with the reason, the date and the type of notice, drawn from a proprietary retraction database.
- Claim and citation consistency. RefGuard flags statements that need a source but lack one, and cited sources that do not fit, or even contradict, the claim they are meant to support.
- Incomplete or broken references. RefGuard points out incomplete or broken references, such as a wrong year or a missing author, so they stand out.
- Reference analytics. Quality, Impact, Recency and Diversity scores sit alongside verification status, publication years, citation counts, open-access share, the most-cited journals and work types, and a sortable, filterable reference list with CSV export. RefGuard also notes references 15 or more years old and paratext, meaning items that are not primary scholarly content.
As with Proofig AI’s image checks, these results are signals for a person to review, not verdicts, and authors stay responsible for their references. The RefGuard page walks through the RefGuard report and its views. For background on how invented citations end up in manuscripts, the Octym blog explains how hallucinated references get into real papers.
What does Octym add when the entire paper needs review?
Octym, built by the team behind Proofig AI, reviews the entire paper with 26 checks in one unified review. It accepts PDF and Word files and groups its checks into three areas:
- Internal manuscript integrity, including image manipulation and duplication powered by Proofig AI, graph and chart duplication, AI-generated images, statistical consistency, figure-legend consistency, claim and citation consistency, and AI-generated text signals.
- External checks and requirements, including image and graph plagiarism, retracted references, hallucinated references, incomplete or broken references, reference analytics, data and code availability, paper-mill signals and submission completeness.
- Research quality, including methods and rigor, reproducibility, replicability signals, research ethics disclosures, and a peer-review-grade analysis that brings the findings together.
Both of Octym’s integrity layers come from Proofig AI: its reference checks are RefGuard, and its image checks are Proofig AI’s image integrity checks. A single upload therefore covers figures, citations, numbers and methods at once. Each finding is a signal with its evidence attached, for an author or editor to weigh.
Where does PubShield fit for institutions and publishers?
PubShield, part of Proofig AI, is the all-in-one integration hub for manuscript quality assurance. A manuscript is submitted once, the integrity checks run in the background, and the results return to one dashboard, so no one has to chase reports across separate logins. Publishers and research institutions choose which checks run.
Inside PubShield, both image integrity and reference integrity come from Proofig AI: image checks from the Proofig AI platform and reference checks from RefGuard, Proofig AI’s reference integrity product. The PubShield page describes the full workflow.
For editorial offices that screen at volume, Proofig AI connects to Aries Editorial Manager and offers a REST API and SSO. Researchers who keep their work in LabArchives can start a check from their notebook.
Who relies on Proofig AI’s integrity checks?
Proofig AI’s checks serve the people who handle a manuscript on its way to publication and after it:
- Researchers and principal investigators check figures and references before submission, while fixes are still easy.
- Journal editors and publishers’ integrity teams screen submissions at the desk. The Science family of journals adopted Proofig AI to screen images across all six of its journals.
- Research institutions screen manuscripts before they leave the institution and track results on central dashboards.
- Research ethics committees and integrity officers review submitted and published work and keep audit-ready reports.
Grant committees, funding bodies and patent offices use the platform as well. Proofig AI is an STM Associate Member and a COPE member, has completed a SOC 2 examination, and reports 250K+ Manuscripts Scanned.
Frequently asked questions
What can Proofig AI catch when AI tools helped write a paper?
Proofig AI, RefGuard and Octym together look for traces of AI tools in a paper’s figures, references and text. Proofig AI’s image checks detect AI-generated figures in six categories, from microscopy to Western blots and gels. RefGuard detects hallucinated references by flagging citations that cannot be matched to any real publication. Octym adds AI-generated text signals and checks that AI use is disclosed. Each result is a signal for a person to weigh, never a judgment about an author.
What is the difference between image integrity and reference integrity?
Image integrity asks whether a paper’s figures are authentic and original; reference integrity asks whether its citations are real, valid and relevant. Proofig AI checks figures for duplication, manipulation, plagiarism, self-plagiarism and AI generation. RefGuard checks that each cited work matches a real publication, has not been retracted, is complete and correct, and fits the claim it supports. A manuscript needs both, and Octym runs both in one review.
Can a paper with clean figures still have problems in its references?
Yes, a paper can pass every image check and still carry problems in its reference list. A citation can point to a paper retracted after it was cited, to a work that cannot be matched to any real publication, or to a source that does not support the claim. Proofig AI’s image checks cover the figures, and RefGuard, Proofig AI’s reference integrity product, screens the reference list for these problems. Each flag is a signal for a person to review.
