Publication Ethics

Below is a publication ethics guide based on the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). Detailed guidelines and international standards can be found on the COPE website.

Author Responsibilities:

• Reporting Standards: Research reports must be accurate and provide an objective discussion of their significance. Basic data must be accurately presented in the paper. The paper should contain sufficient detail and references to allow others to replicate the work. False or knowingly inaccurate statements are unethical and unacceptable.
• Data Access and Retention: Authors should provide raw data related to their paper for editorial review and, if feasible, make it publicly accessible. Authors should be prepared to retain data for a reasonable time after publication.
• Originality and Plagiarism: Authors must ensure that their work is entirely original. If authors have used the work and/or words of others, it must be appropriately cited or quoted.
• Multiple, Redundant, or Concurrent Publication: Authors should not publish manuscripts describing essentially the same research in more than one journal or primary publication. Submitting the same manuscript to more than one journal concurrently is unethical and unacceptable.
• Acknowledgment of Sources: Proper acknowledgment of others' work must always be given. Authors should cite publications that have influenced their reported work.
• Authorship of the Paper: Authorship should be limited to those who have made significant contributions to the conception, design, execution, or interpretation of the reported study. All those who have made significant contributions should be listed as co-authors. Others who have participated in certain substantive aspects of the research project should be acknowledged or listed as contributors. The corresponding author should ensure that all appropriate co-authors and no inappropriate co-authors are included in the paper, and that all co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the paper and have agreed to its submission for publication.
• Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest: All authors should disclose any financial or other substantive conflicts of interest that might influence the results or interpretation of their manuscript. All sources of financial support for the project should be disclosed.
• Fundamental Errors in Published Works: When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in their published work, it is the author's obligation to promptly notify the journal editor or publisher and cooperate with the editor to retract or correct the paper.
• Hazards and Human or Animal Subjects: If the work involves chemicals, procedures, or equipment that have inherent hazards, the author must clearly identify these in the manuscript.

Editor Responsibilities:

• Fair Play: Editors should evaluate manuscripts based on their intellectual content without regard to the authors' race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy.
• Confidentiality: Editors and editorial staff must not disclose any information about a submitted manuscript to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, potential reviewers, other editorial advisers, and the publisher, as appropriate.
• Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest: Unpublished materials disclosed in a submitted manuscript must not be used in an editor's own research without the express written consent of the author.
• Publication Decisions: The editorial board is responsible for deciding which articles submitted to the journal should be published. The validation of the work in question and its importance to researchers and readers must always drive such decisions. Editors may be guided by the policies of the journal’s editorial board and constrained by such legal requirements as shall then be in force regarding libel, copyright infringement, and plagiarism. Editors may confer with other editors or reviewers in making this decision.
• Manuscript Review: Editors should ensure that each manuscript is initially evaluated by an editor for originality. Editors should organize and use peer review fairly and wisely. Editors should describe their peer review processes in information for authors and indicate which parts of the journal are peer-reviewed. Editors should use appropriate reviewers for papers considered for publication by selecting people with sufficient expertise and avoiding those with conflicts of interest.

Reviewer Responsibilities:

• Contribution to Editorial Decisions: Peer review assists editors in making editorial decisions and may help authors improve their papers through editorial communications.
• Promptness: Any selected referee who feels unqualified to review the research reported in a manuscript or knows that its prompt review will be impossible should notify the editor and excuse themselves from the review process.
• Standards of Objectivity: Reviews should be conducted objectively. Personal criticism of the author is inappropriate. Referees should express their views clearly with supporting arguments.
• Confidentiality: Any manuscripts received for review must be treated as confidential documents. They must not be shown to or discussed with others except as authorized by the editor.
• Disclosure and Conflict of Interest: Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for personal advantage. Reviewers should not consider manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, companies, or institutions associated with the papers.

Acknowledgment of Sources: Reviewers should identify relevant published work that has not been cited by the authors. Any statement that an observation, derivation, or argument had been previously reported should be accompanied by the relevant citation. Reviewers should also bring to the editor’s attention any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other published paper of which they have personal knowledge.