On cleaning up scientific competition

You just knew I was going to love this one.
Janet Stemwedel has posted a two part interview with scientist Sean Cutler (lab website). As described by John Tierney at TierneyLab:

The journal carries an article by Dr. Cutler and 20 other researchers in the United States, Canada and Spain reporting a long-sought technique for helping plants to grow with less water by activating the natural defenses that enable plants to survive during droughts. (Here’s the Science article; here’s a summary of the research.) Dr. Cutler, an assistant professor of plant cell biology at the University of California, Riverside, knew that the rush to be first in this area had previously led to some dubious publications (including papers that were subsequently retracted). So he took the unusual approach of identifying his rivals (by determining which researchers had ordered the same genetic strains from a public source) and then contacting them.

Reading the interview of Cutler over at AiE&S I noticed that commenter qaz put her/his finger right on a key issue: