Enlarge / A cropped image showing Raw TV's poster for the Netflix documentary What Jennifer Did, which features a long front tooth that leads critics to believe it was AI-generated. (credit: Raw TV)

An executive producer of the Netflix hit What Jennifer Did has responded to accusations that the true crime documentary used AI images when depicting Jennifer Pan, a woman currently imprisoned in Canada for orchestrating a murder-for-hire scheme targeting her parents.

What Jennifer Did shot to the top spot in Netflix's global top 10 when it debuted in early April, attracting swarms of true crime fans who wanted to know more about why Pan paid hitmen $10,000 to murder her parents. But quickly the documentary became a source of controversy, as fans started noticing glaring flaws in images used in the movie, from weirdly mismatched earrings to her nose appearing to lack nostrils, the Daily Mail reported, in a post showing a plethora of examples of images from the film.

Futurism was among the first to point out that these flawed images (around the 28-minute mark of the documentary) "have all the hallmarks of an AI-generated photo, down to mangled hands and fingers, misshapen facial features, morphed objects in the background, and a far-too-long front tooth." The image with the long front tooth was even used in Netflix's poster for the movie.

Enlarge / Microbiologist Didier Raoult addresses a press conference on COVID-19 at the IHU medical institute in Marseille on April 20, 2022. (credit: Getty | )

A scientific journal published by Elsevier has reportedly posted a stunning 101 expressions of concern on studies connected to Didier Raoult, a disgraced French microbiologist who gained international prominence amid the pandemic by promoting, with little evidence, that the malaria drug hydroxychloroquine could treat COVID-19—a claim that has now been firmly debunked.

According to Retraction Watch, the journal New Microbes and New Infections posted 101 expressions of concern on Raoult's works recently, including a 2023 study that drew sharp criticism. The study involved giving hydroxychloroquine to tens of thousands of COVID-19 patients after data indicated that it wasn't effective and the French government rescinded permission for its use against COVID-19. An op-ed in the major French newspaper Le Monde described the study as "the largest 'wild' therapeutic trial known to date."

The expressions of concern also come as Raoult saw his tenth study retracted, Retraction Watch noted.

Enlarge / The bundengan (left) began as a combined shelter/instrument for duck hunters but it is now often played onstage. (credit: Utrezz0707/CC BY-SA 4.0)

There's rarely time to write about every cool science-y story that comes our way. So this year, we're once again running a special Twelve Days of Christmas series of posts, highlighting one science story that fell through the cracks in 2020, each day from December 25 through January 5. Today: the surprisingly complex physics of two simply constructed instruments: the Indonesian bundengan and the Australian Aboriginal didgeridoo (or didjeridu).

The bundengan is a rare, endangered instrument from Indonesia that can imitate the sound of metallic gongs and cow-hide drums (kendangs) in a traditional gamelan ensemble. The didgeridoo is an iconic instrument associated with Australian Aboriginal culture that produces a single, low-pitched droning note that can be continuously sustained by skilled players. Both instruments are a topic of scientific interest because their relatively simple construction produces some surprisingly complicated physics. Two recent studies into their acoustical properties were featured at an early December meeting of the Acoustical Society of America, held in Sydney, Australia, in conjunction with the Australian Acoustical Society.

The bundengan originated with Indonesian duck hunters as protection from rain and other adverse conditions while in the field, doubling as a musical instrument to pass the time. It's a half-dome structure woven out of bamboo splits to form a lattice grid, crisscrossed at the top to form the dome. That dome is then coated with layers of bamboo sheaths held in place with sugar palm fibers. Musicians typically sit cross-legged inside the dome-shaped resonator and pluck the strings and bars to play. The strings produce metallic sounds while the plates inside generate percussive drum-like sounds.