Scientists from many fields are scratching their heads over a paper claiming a black hole in the center of the Earth is shaping our DNA. It's either a brilliant satire on conspiracy theories, or the worst thing to be published in physics, genetics, and chemistry for a long time, possibly ever. Either way, we want to know how it got past peer review.

Last year the Macedonian Journal of Medical Science published a paper under the astonishing title “A Black Hole at the Center of Earth Plays the Role of the Biggest System of Telecommunication for Connecting DNAs, Dark DNAs and Molecules of Water on 4+N- Dimensional Manifold”. If you think the headline is out there, look at the diagrams.

No one appears to have noticed it for almost exactly a year, but it is now going off on science Twitter, and the responses are priceless.

The paper contradicts many long-established scientific conclusions, claiming “This structure is the main cause of the emergence of the large temperature of the core, magnetic field around the Earth, and gravitational field for moving around the Sun.” Who needs radioactive decay, the presence of molten iron, and the general operation of gravity?

But wait, the authors are just warming up. They move on to claiming “Each DNA has two parts which one can be seen on the four-dimensional universe, and another one has existed in extra dimensions, and only it's e_ects is observed.”

Eventually, the language reaches a sort of singularity of its own. “This dark part of DNA called as a dark DNA in an extra dimension.”

Then we get to the part about how dark DNAs help “water molecules store information and have memory,” and we're not even out of the abstract yet.

The authors even have a follow-up paper in the same journal: “Formation of Neural Circuits in an Expanded Version of Darwin's Theory: Effects of DNAs in Extra Dimensions and within the Earth's Core on Neural Networks.” This refers to “Stringy black anti-DNA” and “radiated signals of neural circuits in a chick embryo” and frankly we're as lost as you are.

Collaboration across fields is key to much of modern science, but the list of author affiliations is also raising eyebrows. The first author claims to be a nuclear physicist, the second works at a clinic for psychiatric disorders, and most of the rest are dermatologists.

The Macedonian Journal of Medical Science is not well known, particularly to bewildered physicists, so some people wondered if it was a “predatory journal,” that is, a publication that pretends to be peer-reviewed but will in fact run anything for money.

However, while it's impact factor is low, this is a real journal, publishing apparently worthy papers and archived by the US National Library of Medicine. It's puzzling however, that none of the authors are based in Macedonia.

One theory is that this “paper” is actually random phrases put together as an attempt to test the peer-review standards of journals that might be getting sloppy, something scientists do now and then. Evidence for this comes from the fact that the last author, Torello Lotti, has previously published about the problem of predatory journals.

On the other hand, some of the authors were also responsible for a now-retracted paper earlier this year attempting to link 5G and coronavirus, as well as a bunch of other "out there" claims.

Either way, we're worried about the answer to this question above. 2020 has been tough on us all.