Researchers often face the challenge of ensuring they haven't inadvertently reused images from their previously published articles in new manuscripts. This tutorial will guide you through a simple solution to address this common issue.

Over years of work, researchers accumulate vast amounts of data and images. This wealth of information can sometimes lead to unintended reuse of images in new publications, potentially compromising the integrity of the research. To learn more about how to identify and prevent self-plagiarism in scientific publications, visit our page on PubMed Source Plagiarism.

If your previously published articles are indexed in PubMed, Proofig AI's PubMed check compares your manuscript against more than 155 million images from published literature.

We offer a straightforward and effective solution to this problem. By merging your new manuscript with PDFs of your previously published articles, our system can comprehensively check for any image reuse across all the documents.

Important: Proofig AI now supports uploading up to 8 manuscripts at once, but this is not a substitute for the merged-PDF method described here. Each manuscript in a batch is analyzed separately and manuscripts are not compared against each other. To check one manuscript against your earlier work, you still need them combined into a single file — or you can use My Database.

To use this feature, you'll need to merge your PDFs. Here's how:

Search online for "merge PDF online for free".

Choose any of the numerous free online tools to combine your new manuscript with your previously published articles into a single PDF file.

The merged file must not exceed the 50MB maximum file size. If the combined file is larger, split the check into several merged batches, each containing the new manuscript plus a subset of your earlier papers.

Once you have your merged PDF:

Upload it to our platform as you would with any single manuscript.

Proofig AI accepts Word (.doc / .docx) files as well as PDFs for normal single-manuscript analysis. This self-reuse workflow, however, requires all documents combined into one file.

Our system will analyze all the content, checking for any potential image reuse across your old and new work.

This check covers graphs, charts, diagrams, and plots as well as photographic images such as blots and micrographs.

By following these steps, you can easily ensure the originality of images in your new publications. This proactive approach helps maintain the integrity of your research and prevents unintended image reuse. Thank you for using Proofig AI.