This article has been retracted: please see Elsevier policy on article withdrawal ( article-withdrawal ).

This article has been retracted at the request of the Editor.

Post-publication, an investigation conducted on behalf of the journal by Elsevier’s Research Integrity & Publishing Ethics team discovered suspicious changes in authorship between the original submission and the revised version of this paper. During revision, the authors Bibi Ibtesam Shagufta, Syed Qamar Abbas, Seema Patel, Ishrat Khan, Sayed Asmat Ali Shah, Najeeb Akhter were added to the revised paper without explanation and without exceptional approval by the journal editor, which is contrary to the journal policy on changes to authorship. The Elsevier’s Research Integrity & Publishing Ethics team reached out to the authors for an explanation, but they failed to provide a satisfactory explanation to these changes. The Editor has determined that the authorship cannot be relied upon and has lost confidence in the conclusions of the article and has determined it should be retracted.

In addition, the investigation found that four citations were added to this paper which are redundant and benefit authors, Komal Anjum and Syed Shams Ul Hassan.

The authors have not responded to the retraction notice.