It wouldn't be the first time someone's published a paper in a journal without doing their research properly and it passed peer review. Here's the abstract, sounds like the meat of the paper is actually the numerical model that simulates the behaviour:
"Thin liquid films, such as soap bubbles, have been studied extensively for over a century because they are easily formed and mediate a wide range of transport processes in physics, chemistry and engineering1, 2, 3. When a bubble on a liquid–gas or solid–gas interface (referred to herein as an interfacial bubble) ruptures, the general expectation is that the bubble vanishes. More precisely, the ruptured thin film is expected to retract rapidly until it becomes part of the interface, an event that typically occurs within milliseconds4, 5, 6. The assumption that ruptured bubbles vanish is central to theories on foam evolution7 and relevant to health8 and climate9 because bubble rupture is a source for aerosol droplets10, 11. Here we show that for a large range of fluid parameters, interfacial bubbles can create numerous small bubbles when they rupture, rather than vanishing. We demonstrate, both experimentally and numerically, that the curved film of the ruptured bubble can fold and entrap air as it retracts. The resulting toroidal geometry of the trapped air is unstable, leading to the creation of a ring of smaller bubbles. The higher pressure associated with the higher curvature of the smaller bubbles increases the absorption of gas into the liquid, and increases the efficiency of rupture-induced aerosol dispersal."
Which is probably fair enough, these things aren't trivial to get a consistent modelled behaviour for. Crap BBC article for sure.
