Science: Made in China?

Unfortunately the "rules" about diagnosing "Bad Science" break down when the research is done in another country, such as China. There are brilliant Chinese Scientists. There are wonderful research facilities and institutions in China. But there can also be a lack of communication between Science in China and Science in the USA.

So here is the scenario:

• A paper is published in a Chinese Chemistry Journal (in English) in 2007
  
• The journal is peer-reviewed
  
• One of 3 authors has no affiliation; the other 2 sound like good Chinese Institutions
  
• The results are surprising and have consequences in Physics, Chemistry, and Biology
  
• The authors explain the strange result via Physics, but are in Chemistry Departments
  
• It has only been cited 2 times, once by a different group not able to confirm the results and once by the original group rejecting the results of the 2nd group.
  
• There are some communication issues in the paper; it isn't written in the "scientific tone" that I am used to
  
• Of the 12 references, 6 are to papers written by the same authors
  

It is on the fence on my criteria for diagnosing "Bad Science", in no small part because it is disconnected from the American "Science Community". I think this is unfortunate - if the results in this paper are correct, they should be known in the entire scientific community. If they are not correct, it is somewhat disturbing to see that they were able to make it through a peer reviewed journal. Am I in a position to judge the science of this paper? I think so. One challenge is that my physics intuition says the results CANNOT be true, so I must find a way to calculate it or otherwise "prove" it. FYI: If you have institutional access, here is the paper, the response, and the defense http://www.springerlink.com/content/x1q13217t2427059/ http://www.springerlink.com/content/l462l03732453667/ http://www.springerlink.com/content/bk20343j63r19670/