Welcome to the world of self citation
Everyone is pursuing for high citation. Citations are widely recognized as a strong indicator of the significance and relevance -- that is, the impact -- of a piece of research. In the Times Higher Education World University Rankings system Citations – research influence (worth 32.5 per cent).
The purpose of a citation is to acknowledge and give credit to others. We don't need to give credit to ourselves. However Nelson Tansu, a self proclaimed youngest professor, optoelectronics from Indonesia who think he is a genius is not the only case of well known self citation. Milena Penkowa was a Danish neuroscientist, is another case that has made a big news in the research community in the first half of 2011.
Milena Penkowa represents an interesting case of a young scientist making a fantastic career in Danish science at Copenhagen University. At every possible occasion Milena Penkowa was put forward as a role model for young scientists. Now, to the embarrassment of the Danish scientific establishment, it turns out that Milena Penkowa was cheating with her scientific works.
Nelson Tansu represents another interesting case, he proclaimed himself as the youngest professor in the US. He claimed he has a brilliant career in US in Indonesian media. At every possible occasion Nelson Tansu was put forward as a role model for young Indonesia. Now another embarrassment it turns out that Nelson Tansu has been doing a lot of self citation.
The case of Nelson Tansu was exposed in a blog http://whatisgenius.blogspot.com/ The case of Penkowa was exposed by Peter Priisager who looked on the self-citations of Penkowa and reported it on his blog http://priisager.blogspot.com/2011_03_01_archive.html He found that 54% of Penkowa's citations where her own. Peter found that Penkowa published a lot and was heavily cited, But most of the citations were self-citations. This is the same case of Nelson Tansu who published a lot and heavily cited, but most of the citations are self citations. The case of Penkowa was reported in University news
http://universitypost.dk/article/comment-self-citations-and-case-milena-penkowa
On almost all bibliometric measures Penkowa and Tansu both are excellent scientists, publishing more than 200 papers, high citation volume and h index. However, looking at her and his citations one feature is very noticeable, that is the incredible numbers to which she and he cited herself and himself. For Penkowa, out of a total of 2,401 citations listed in the Web of Science database, 1,296 are self-citations. For Tansu, out if 1250 citations listed in Scopus, 720 are self citations, 57% are self citations. The hard evidence is now published in the public: http://www.scribd.com/doc/58867515/Nelson-Tansu-Self-Citation-Record
In one of the most self citation paper: Novel Approaches for High-Efficiency InGaN Quantum Wells Light-Emitting Diodes - Device Physics and Epitaxy Engineering, out of 49 citations, 40 citation was fabricated by Tansu (82% self citation) http://www.scribd.com/doc/56509005/Highest-Self-Citation-Paper
Apparently, Milena Penkowa and Nelson Tansu were so focused on their citations and h index, that every day the first thing in the morning Tansu and Penkowa checked his/her citation-index. The two scientists have the same obsession, and it is unhealthy both for the individuals, as well as for science as a whole.
Peter Priisager said that red lights should be flashing for scientist that cites themselves so often that more than 50% of their citations are self-citations. According to A nature blog article "Bad guys have > 50% self-citations" and "good guys have self-citations as < 50% of total citations http://blogs.nature.com/u24d269fc/2008/04/25/h-factors-research-metrics-and-self-citation
So Penkowa and Tansu both fell in the same category of bad guys. Tansu claims that self citation is normal, but no one has a self citation greater than 50%, they are bad guy, fabrication of citation and h index.
Tansu should be alerted that he will end up in a same condition as Penkowa. Penkowa is now fired from University of Copenhagen for her serious fraud in self citation. Her journal articles were retracted by publishers. An article in the famous Nature journal has revealed all her controversies http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110107/full/news.2011.703.html
Tansu that made a lot of self citations, including in Journal of Applied Physics, Applied Physics Letters and SPIE proceedings.Publishing a paper in scientific journals should not be intended for receiving citation. Tansu has figured out that the way to receive citation is by advertising, self citation and disseminating the publications by using consistent self citation. Familiarity with the tools and proper self citation strategy allows the researcher to increase his/her citation volume and h-index in a short time.