What are the ethical limits of claimed scientific authorship? A case report of relevance

Since its discovery in the middle of the XX century, research into autophagy has undergone a spectacular expansion, particularly in the early 1990s. A number of physiological processes involving autophagy have been revealed and important human pathologies have been associated with perturbations in autophagy. In 2008 the "Guidelines for the use and interpretation of assays for monitoring autophagy" was launched with the purpose of collecting in a single document all the available information to monitor autophagy, which, it was thought, might be useful for established groups and any new scientists attracted by this field. The usefulness and success of this Guidelines has led to the subsequent publication of editions every 4 years, a task in which a growing number of authors have become involved and consequently included in the list of contributors. However, this worthy initiative and closely associated metric parameters has led to important scholarly repercussions in terms of perceived merits, grants and financial support obtained, professional careers and other areas concerning scientific activity. All these aspects are carefully examined in this contribution.