Sir

Your decision to let authors cite their contributions to papers is a welcome change in policy (Nature 399, 393; 1999). Statements clearly allocating credit and responsibility for the research done can only help to promote the health of science.

But it is likely that many authors will need persuasion before they embrace the idea of citing contributions. Such persuasion is unlikely to come from the journals themselves. Although some (notably The Lancet) courageously require the contributions of each author to be cited in papers, most do not — presumably for fear of alienating their clientele. It is probably too much to expect journals to threaten their livelihoods by imposing a rule that is unpalatable to many (particularly to senior) scientists.

But such persuasion might legitimately come from the agencies that fund research. If the US National Institutes of Health and the UK Wellcome Trust, for example, were to require every grant recipient to cite each author's contribution to any paper resulting from the research funded, this would promote the adoption of the new authorship policy. Because the major funding agencies need fear no reprisal from researchers who object to the policy, and because they have a vested interest in maintaining the health of the scientific enterprise, they stand in a unique position to bring change in this important area.