Letter to the Editor: Plagiarism — Is there a solution?

Madam, The world of science is bloomed by vast literature on virtually every scientific topic that comes to our mind. Unfortunately, this dissemination of knowledge has a few hurdles to its progress. Since the academic scientific enterprise rewards those with the most publications, there is tremendous pressure to generate voluminous output. In doing so, scientists often fall prey to fabrication (invention of data or cases), falsification (willful distortion of data) and plagiarism (copying of ideas, data, or words without attribution), which are serious forms of scientific misconduct. In this way, the image of scientists as objective seekers of truth is periodically jeopardized by the discovery of such scientific frauds. Increasing evidence, however, suggests that known frauds are just the tip of the iceberg, and that many cases are never discovered.