Dear skill test contestants I take immense pleasure in writing my first scientific blog in this contest. Here I am going to present a case study on plagiarism. This is an incident of plagiarism due to improper attribution of paraphrasing. Sticklen a review writer has presented an article on "Advances in using a genetically engineered bio-fuel crop to boost ethanol production" in an international journal "Nature Review Genetics" which was published in Feb. 2010.But later Mr.Shani has identified a part of the review which had the same meaning as that in the article which was published in an journal "Plant Science" in 2008 which was written by him on the relevant topic .He brought this sign of plagiarism into light, by writing a letter to the review committee and the review committee found that the article was plagiarized, since a part of the article contains a paraphrased information which is not attributed. When she was asked about this issue, she admitted that she has never committed the mistake, and supported by acknowledging that she has been diagnosed for essential thrombocythemia, in which a high platelet count has clogged blood vessels in her brain and caused her major memory and cognitive problems for more than two years. And said that she must have misplaced the index cards and wrongly entered the information(1). Though she presented a medical certificate for that, the committee did not consider it an accused to have done plagiarism and the paper was retracted back from the journal. The catch of the story is that, paraphrasing without proper attribution is considered as plagiarism and disciplinary action was taken against sticklen by making her "ineligibility for any internal research funding, including institutional match, for a period of two years, and no salary increase for the next two years"(2). Reference: 1) http://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/57267/ 2) Plagiarism retracts review - The Scientist - Magazine of the Life Sciences http://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/57267/#ixzz1A54DybqF