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Donald R. Ort, The Sharing of Research Materials: Do You?, Plant Physiology, Volume 147, Issue 2, June 2008, Pages 441–442, https://doi.org/10.1104/pp.104.900259
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About once a month I receive a complaint, often from a frustrated young investigator, that after multiple requests he or she was unsuccessful in obtaining research materials that had been used in work published in Plant Physiology. I raised this issue at our summer editorial board meeting and was surprised to learn how many board members had experienced problems in obtaining research materials used in work published across the full range of top plant journals. The sharing of materials is an explicitly stated expectation of authors publishing in Plant Physiology as it is for nearly all journals that publish plant research. As stated in our Instructions for Authors, “Plant Physiology requires that all materials described in a manuscript be made freely available to academic investigators for non-commercial research purposes,” and the author responsible for material distribution must be listed for all submitted manuscripts. (There is a provision for expensive or scarce material: “The provision of novel enzymes, antibodies, and material products described in the manuscript can be reasonably limited in case that substantial effort is required for isolation.”) Board members had numerous creative suggestions about how to deal with the problem; however, because these suggestions were in the majority egregiously libelous if not out right illegal, they did not suggest a way toward a solution but left no doubt about the members' strong feelings toward those who would withhold research materials. Most researchers have the best intentions to distribute the requested material, but busy schedules and time commitments often push requests to the background. It is important for us to remember that we will be the requestor some day and will be expecting a timely response.
