Journal of University of Anbar for Pure Science

Publication Ethics

This ethical statement binds the behavior of the author, the editor, the reviewers, and the publisher. This statement is based on COPE’s Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors.

Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractice Statement

The ethical policy of JUAPS is based on the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidelines and complies with JUAPS Editorial Board codes of conduct. Readers, authors, reviewers, and editors should follow these ethical policies once working with JUAPS. The ethical policy of JUAPS is liable to determine which of the typical research papers or articles submitted to the journal should be published in the concerned issue. For information on this matter in publishing and ethical guidelines, please visit (COPE).

Duties and Responsibilities of Publishers

JUAPS is committing to ensure that editorial decisions on manuscript submissions are final.
JUAPS promises to ensure that the decision on manuscript submissions is only made based on professional judgment and will not be affected by any commercial interests.
JUAPS is committed to maintaining the integrity of academic and research records.
JUAPS monitors the ethics of the Editor-in-Chief, Associate Editors, Editorial Board Members, Reviewers, Authors, and Readers.
JUAPS is always checking the plagiarism and fraudulent data issues involved in the submitted manuscript.
JUAPS is always willing to publish corrections, clarifications, and retractions involving its publications when needed.

Duties and Responsibilities of Editors

The Editors of the journal should have the full authority to reject/accept a manuscript.
The Editors of the journal should maintain the confidentiality of submitted manuscripts under review or until they are published.
The Editor-in-Chief should make a decision on submitted manuscripts, whether to be published or not, with other editors and reviewers
The Editors of the journal should preserve the anonymity of reviewers.
The Editors of the journal should disclose and try to avoid any conflict of interest.
The Editors of the journal should maintain academic integrity and strive to meet the needs of readers and authors.
The Editors of the journal should be willing to investigate plagiarism and fraudulent data issues and willing to publish corrections, clarifications, retractions, and apologies when needed.
The Editors of the journal should limit themselves only to the intellectual content.
The Editors of the journal must not disclose any information about submitted manuscripts to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, potential reviewers, other editorial advisers, and the publisher, as appropriate.
Unpublished materials disclosed in a submitted paper will not be used by the editor or the editorial board members for their own research purposes without the author's explicit written consent.

Duties and Responsibilities of Reviewers

The Reviewers of the journal should assist the Editors in making the decision for publishing the submitted manuscripts.
The Reviewers should maintain the confidentiality of the manuscripts, that they are invited to review.
The Reviewers should provide comments in time that will help editors make a decision on whether the submitted manuscript will be accepted or not.
The Reviewers are bound to treat the manuscript received for peer reviewing as confidential, and must not use the information obtained through peer review for personal advantage.
The Reviewer's comments against each invited manuscript should be technical, professional, and objective.
The Reviewers should not review the manuscripts in which they have found conflicts of interest with any of the authors, companies, or institutions.
The Reviewers should disclose and try to avoid any conflict of interest.

Duties and Responsibilities of Authors

Manuscripts must be submitted in English and written according to proper grammar and terminology.
Submitted Manuscripts must have not been published elsewhere, and are not currently under consideration by another journal or any other publisher.
The corresponding author is responsible for ensuring that the manuscript article's publication has been approved by all the other coauthors.
It is also the author's responsibility to ensure that the manuscripts emanating from a particular institution are submitted with the approval of the necessary institution.
It is a condition for submission of a manuscript that the authors permit editing of the paper for readability.
Authors are requested to clearly identify who provided financial support for the conduct of research and/or preparation of the manuscript and briefly describe the role of the founder/ sponsor in any part of the work.
A copyright release form must be signed by the corresponding author in case of multiple authorship, prior to the acceptance of the manuscript, by all authors, for publication to be legally responsible towards the Journal's ethics and privacy policy.
All articles published by JUAPS are made immediately available worldwide under an open access license. This means: everyone has free and unlimited access to the full-text of ALL articles. Everyone is free to reuse the published material if proper accreditation/citation of the original publication is given.
All authors have agreed to allow the corresponding author to serve as the correspondent with the editorial office, to review the edited manuscript and proof.
When author(s) discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in his/her own published work, it is the author’s obligation to promptly notify the journal editor or publisher to retract or correct the manuscript.
All authors must know that the submitted manuscripts under review or published with JUAPS are subject to screening using Plagiarism Prevention Software. Plagiarism is a serious violation of publication ethics.
All authors must ensure that all authors have read the submission final checklist before being submitted to the JUAPS.

Principles of Transparency

1. Peer review process: JUAPS is a double-blind peer reviewed electronic and print biannual publication concerned with all aspects of pure sciences. This process, as well as any policies related to the journal’s peer review procedures, is clearly described on the journal’s Web site.(Peer Reviewer).

Governing Body: JUAPS has a very strong editorial board, whose members are recognized experts in the subject areas included within the journal’s scope. The full names and affiliations of the journal’s editors are provided on the journal’s Web site (E ditorial Board).
Contact information: The Journal has provided the contact information for the editorial office of JUAPS (Contact Us).
Author fees / Access: The Journal database is fully open access, and full texts of published articles are available for everyone who can get access to the Journal website free of cost. Besides, the authors should pay the article publication fee of $100 US.
Copyright: Journals made clear the type of copyright under which authors' work will be published. Upon acceptance of the manuscript, authors will be asked to complete a "Journal Publishing Agreement.
Identification of and dealing with allegations of research misconduct: Editor-in-Chief takes reasonable steps to identify and prevent the publication of papers where research misconduct has occurred, including plagiarism, citation manipulation, and data falsification/fabrication, among others.
Web site: A journal’s Web site (JUAPS) contains that care has been taken to ensure high ethical and professional standards.
Name of journal: The Journal name "Journal of University of Anbar for Pure Science (JUAPS)" is unique and can not be easily confused with another journal.
Conflicts of interest: Authors are requested to evident whether impending conflicts do or do not exist while submitting their articles to JUAPS through the Conflict of Interest Disclosure form.
Publishing schedule: The periodicity at which a journal publishes is clearly indicated (JUAPS).
Archiving: A journal’s plan for electronic backup and preservation of access to the journal content is clearly indicated (IASJ).

Violation of Publication Ethics

Plagiarism: Plagiarism is intentionally using someone else’s ideas or other original material as if they are one's own. Copying even one sentence from someone else’s manuscript, or even one of your own that has previously been published, without proper citation, is considered by JUAPS Journals as plagiarism. All manuscripts under review or published with JUAPS are subject to screening using plagiarism prevention software. Thus, plagiarism is a serious violation of publication ethics. The service that helps editors to verify the originality of papers. Plagiarism is powered by the Turnitin. For a searchable list of all journals in the database, please visit: https://www.turnitin.com
Data Fabrication and Falsification: Data fabrication and falsification means the researcher did not really carry out the study, but made up data or results and had recorded or reported the fabricated information. Data falsification means the researcher did the experiment, but manipulated, changed, or omitted data or results from the research findings.
Simultaneous Submission: Simultaneous submission occurs when a manuscript (or substantial sections from a manuscript) is submitted to a journal when it is already under consideration by another journal.
Duplicate Publication: Duplicate publication occurs when two or more papers, without full cross-referencing, share essentially the same hypotheses, data, discussion points, and conclusions.
Redundant Publications: Redundant publications involve the inappropriate division of study outcomes into several articles, most often consequent to the desire to plump academic vitae.
Improper Author Contribution or Attribution: All listed authors must have made a significant scientific contribution to the research in the manuscript and approved all its claims. Don’t forget to list everyone who made a significant scientific contribution, including students and laboratory technicians.
Citation Manipulation: Citation Manipulation is including excessive citations, in the submitted manuscript, that do not contribute to the scholarly content of the article and have been included solely for the purpose of increasing citations to a given author’s work, or to articles published in a particular journal. This leads to misrepresenting the importance of the specific work and journal in which it appears and is thus a form of scientific misconduct.
Sanctions: In the event that there are documented violations of any of the above mentioned policies in any journal, regardless of whether or not the violations occurred in a journal, the following sanctions will be applied: (i) Immediate rejection of the infringing manuscript, (ii) Immediate rejection of every other manuscript submitted to any journal published by any of the authors of the infringing manuscript, (iii) Prohibition will be imposed for a minimum of 36 months against all of the authors for any new submissions to any journal, either individually or in combination with other authors of the infringing manuscript, and (iv) Prohibition against all of the authors from serving on the Editorial Board of any journal.

Handling Cases of Misconduct

Once JUAPS confirms a violation against JUAPS’s publication ethics, JUAPS addresses ethical concerns diligently following an issue-specific standard practice as summarized below.

The first action of the journal Editor is to inform the Editorial Office of JUAPS by supplying copies of the relevant material and a draft letter to the corresponding author asking for an explanation in a nonjudgmental manner.
If the author’s explanation is unacceptable and it seems that serious unethical conduct has taken place, the matter is referred to the Publication Committee via Editorial Office. After deliberation, the Committee will decide whether the case is sufficiently serious to warrant a ban on future submissions.
If the infraction is less severe, the Editor, upon the advice of the Publication Committee, sends the author a letter of reprimand and reminds the author of JUAPS publication policies; if the manuscript has been published, the Editor may request the author to publish an apology in the journal to correct the record.
Notification will be sent to the corresponding author, and any work by the author responsible for the violation or any work these persons coauthored that is under review by JUAPS journal will be rejected immediately.
The authors are prohibited from serving on the JUAPS editorial board and serving as a reviewer for the JUAPS Journal. JUAPS reserves the right to take more action.
In extreme cases, notifications will be sent to the affiliations of the authors, and the authors are prohibited from submitting their work to JUAPS for 5 years.
In serious cases of fraud that result in the retraction of the article, a retraction notice will be published in the journal and will be linked to the article in the online version. The online version will also be marked “retracted” with the retraction date.

Retraction / Withdrawal of Article

JUAPS 's policy It is a general principle of scholarly communication that the editor of a learned journal is solely and independently responsible for deciding which articles submitted to the journal shall be published. In making this decision, the editor is guided by the policies of the journal's editorial board and constrained by such legal requirements in force regarding libel, copyright infringement, and plagiarism. An outcome of this principle is the importance of the scholarly archive as a permanent, historic record of the transactions of scholarship. Articles that have been published shall remain extant, exact and unaltered as far as is possible. However, very occasionally circumstances may arise where an article is published that must later be retracted or even removed. Such actions must not be undertaken lightly and can only occur under exceptional circumstances. In all cases, our official archives at the Iraqi Academic Scientific Journals will retain all article versions, including retracted or otherwise removed articles.

Withdrawal of Article

JUAPS recognizes the importance of the integrity and completeness of the scholarly record to researchers and librarians and attaches the highest importance to maintaining trust in the authority of its electronic archive. Only used for Articles in Press which represent early versions of articles and sometimes contain errors, or may have been accidentally submitted twice. Occasionally, but less frequently, the articles may represent infringements of professional ethical codes, such as multiple submission, bogus claims of authorship, plagiarism, fraudulent use of data or the like. Articles in Press (articles that have been accepted for publication but which have not been formally published and will not yet have the complete volume/issue/page information) that include errors, or are discovered to be accidental duplicates of other published article(s), or are determined to violate our journal publishing ethics guidelines in the view of the editors (such as multiple submission, bogus claims of authorship, plagiarism, fraudulent use of data or the like), maybe “Withdrawn” from JUAPS. Withdrawn means that the article content (HTML and PDF) is removed and replaced with an HTML page and PDF simply stating that the article has been withdrawn according to the JUAPS Policy on Article in Press Withdrawal with a link to the current policy document.

Retraction of Article

Infringements of professional ethical codes, such as multiple submissions, bogus claims of authorship, plagiarism, fraudulent use of data, or the like. Occasionally a retraction will be used to correct errors in submission or publication. The retraction of an article by its authors or the editor under the advice of members of the scholarly community has long been an occasional feature of the learned world. Standards for dealing with retractions have been developed by a number of library and scholarly bodies, and this best practice is adopted for article retraction by JUAPS:

A retraction note titled “Retraction: [article title]” signed by the authors and/or the editor is published in the paginated part of a subsequent journal issue and listed in the contents list.
In the electronic version, a link is made to the original article.
The online article is preceded by a screen containing the retraction note. It is to this screen that the link resolves; the reader can then proceed to the article itself.
The original article is retained unchanged save for a watermark on the .pdf indicating on each page that it is “retracted.”
The HTML version of the document is removed.

Article removal: legal limitations

In an extremely limited number of cases, it may be necessary to remove an article from the online database. This will only occur where the article is clearly defamatory or infringes others’ legal rights, or where the article is, or we have good reason to expect it will be, the subject of a court order, or where the article, if acted upon, might pose a serious health risk. In these circumstances, while the metadata (Title and Authors) will be retained, the text will be replaced with a screen indicating the article has been removed for legal reasons.

Article replacement

In cases where the article, if acted upon, might pose a serious health risk, the authors of the original article may wish to retract the flawed original and replace it with a corrected version. In these circumstances, the procedures for retraction will be followed with the difference that the database retraction notice will publish a link to the corrected re-published article and a history of the document.

Expression of concern

If conclusive evidence about the reliability or integrity of a published work cannot be obtained, e.g. if authors produce conflicting accounts of the case, or authors’ institutions refuse to investigate alleged misconduct or to release the findings of such investigations, or if investigations appear not to have been carried out fairly or are taking an unreasonably long time to reach a conclusion, then the editor may issue an expression of concern rather than retracting the publication immediately.

Such expressions of concern, like retraction notices, shall be clearly linked to the original publication, i.e. in electronic databases and by including the author and title of the original publication as a heading, and shall state the reasons for the concern. If more conclusive evidence about the publication’s reliability becomes available later, the expression of concern shall be replaced by a notice of retraction (if the article is shown to be unreliable) or by an exonerating statement linked to the expression of concern (if the article is shown to be reliable and the author is exonerated(.

Publishing corrections

Corrections will be done in the following manner:

The title will include the words Erratum; Corrigendum; Addendum; Retraction or Expression of concern as applicable.

It will be published as a separate document, with a unique DOI, and be included in the work’s table of contents.

It will cite the original publication.

It will enable the reader to identify and understand the correction in the context of the errors made, or explain why the work is being corrected, or explain the editor's concerns about the contents of the work.

It will be linked electronically with the original electronic publication, wherever possible.

It will be in a form that enables indexing and abstracting services to identify and link corrections to their original publications.

Errata

An erratum is a correction of an important error (one that affects the publication record, the scientific integrity of the work, or the reputation of the authors or of the work) that has been introduced during the production of the work, including errors of omission such as failure to make factual proof corrections requested by authors within the deadline provided by JUAPS and within the JUAPS policy. Errata for typing or grammatical errors will not be published, except where an apparently simple error is significant (for example, an incorrect unit). A significant error in a figure or table is corrected by publication of a new corrected figure or table as an erratum only if the editor considers this necessary for a reader to understand it.

Corrigenda

A corrigendum is a correction of an important error made by the authors of the work. Corrigenda are judged on their relevance to readers and their importance for the published record. Corrigenda are published after discussion among the editors, often with the help of peer reviewers. All co-authors must sign an agreed wording for the corrigendum. Corrigenda submitted by the original authors are published if the scientific accuracy or reproducibility of the original work is compromised; occasionally, on an investigation by the editors, these may be published as retractions. In cases where some co-authors decline to sign a corrigendum or retraction JUAPS, in consultation with the editors, reserves the right to publish it with the dissenting author(s) identified. JUAPS may publish a corrigendum if there is an error in the published author list, but not for overlooked acknowledgments.

Ethical obligations

JUAPS expects authors to maintain the highest ethical standards when conducting research and in the publication process. The following principles, which are not an exhaustive list, should apply:

Soundness and reliability

The research being reported should:

be conducted in an ethical and responsible manner and follow all relevant legislation.
be sound and carefully executed.
use appropriate methods of data analysis and display.

The authors should:

check their manuscripts carefully at all stages to ensure that methods and findings are reported accurately.
carefully check calculations, data presentations, typescripts/submissions and proofs.

Honesty

Researchers should:

present their results honestly and without fabrication, falsification or inappropriate data manipulation;
present research images, e.g. micrographs, pictures of electrophoresis gels, without them being modified in a misleading way.
follow applicable reporting guidelines.
provide sufficient detail and describe their methods clearly and unambiguously and with reference to public sources of information, in order to permit others to repeat the work and confirm the findings. Data should always be reported accurately and never be manipulated, with any problematic data also treated accordingly.
present reports of complete research. They should not omit inconvenient, inconsistent or inexplicable findings or results that do not support the authors’ or sponsors’ hypothesis or interpretation.
alert the editor promptly if they discover an error in any submitted, accepted or published work. Authors should cooperate with editors in issuing corrections or retractions when required.
represent the work of others accurately in citations and quotations.
not copy references from other publications if they have not read the cited work, and
identify any hazards inherent in conducting the research.

Special notes:

Researchers should not enter agreements that permit the research sponsor to veto or control the publication of the findings (unless there are exceptional circumstances, such as research classified by governments because of security implications).
If investigations have involved animals or human subjects, authors should provide all the statements required by the book/journal in order to prove that the experimental protocols were approved appropriately and that they meet all the guidelines of the agency involved, including obtaining informed consent where required.
Information obtained privately should not be used without the explicit permission of the individuals from whom it was obtained, and appropriate letters confirming permission to include this information must be acquired.

Balance

Researchers should:

present new findings in the context of previous research. The work of others should be fairly represented. Scholarly reviews and syntheses of existing research should be complete, balanced, and should include findings regardless of whether they support the hypothesis or interpretation being proposed. Editorials or opinion pieces presenting a single viewpoint or argument should be clearly distinguished from.
scholarly reviews:
address study limitations in their manuscript.
avoid criticisms of a personal nature, although well-supported criticism of a piece of work is always welcomed.

Originality

Researchers should:

Adhere to the accepted publication requirements that submitted work should be original and has not been published elsewhere in any language without express citation and acknowledgement of the previously published work.
Adhere to and follow all applicable copyright laws and conventions. Copyright material, e.g. tables, figures or extensive quotations, should be reproduced only with appropriate permission and acknowledgement.
Properly acknowledge and reference relevant previous work and publications, both by other researchers and the authors’ own. The primary literature should be cited where possible.
Properly acknowledge data, text, figures or ideas originated by other researchers, and these should not be presented as if they were the authors’ own work. Original wording taken directly from publications by other researchers should appear in quotation marks with the appropriate citations.
Inform editors if findings have been published previously or if multiple reports or multiple analyses of a single data set are under consideration for publication elsewhere. Authors should provide copies of related publications or work submitted to other books/journals.
Not claim originality if others have already reported similar work in part or as a whole, and credit should always be given to the work and findings of others that have led to their findings or influenced them in some way.

Special notes:

Multiple publications arising from a single research project should be clearly identified as such and the primary publication should be referenced. Translations and adaptations for different audiences should be clearly identified as such, should acknowledge the original source, and should respect relevant copyright conventions and permission requirements. If in doubt, authors should seek permission from the original publisher before republishing any work.
Avoid fragmenting research to maximize the number of articles submitted to a journal, and the submission of the same research to multiple books/journals or other publication media (also known as parallel publishing). Both these practices seriously undermine the innovative nature of research findings.

Human/animal rights

JUAPS promotes ethical and responsible research practices:

Authors should provide evidence that research has adhered to national standards for research practices (in human and animal studies).
Authors should provide evidence that studies have been approved by relevant bodies, the relevant research ethics committee or institutional review board, e.g. institutional review board, research ethics committee, data and safety monitoring board, and regulatory authorities including those overseeing animal experiments.
If human participants were involved manuscripts must be accompanied by a statement that the experiments were undertaken with the understanding and appropriate informed consent of each.
If experimental animals were used the materials and methods (experimental procedures) section must clearly indicate that appropriate measures were taken to minimize pain or discomfort, and details of animal care should be provided.
Editors should encourage peer reviewers to consider ethical issues raised by the research they are reviewing.
Editors should request additional information from authors if they feel this is required.
Editors reserve the right to reject manuscripts if there is doubt whether appropriate procedures have been followed.
If a manuscript has been submitted from a country where there is no ethics committee, institutional review board, or similar review and approval, editors should use their own experience to judge whether the manuscripts should be published. If the decision is made to publish a manuscript under these circumstances, a short statement should be included to explain the situation.

Respecting confidentiality

In most cases, editors should only consider publishing information and images from individual participants/subjects or patients where the authors have obtained the individuals’ explicit consent. Exceptional cases may arise where gaining the individuals’ explicit consent is not possible but where publishing such information or image can be demonstrated to have a genuine public health interest. In cases like this, before taking any action, editors should seek and follow counsel from the book/journal owner, AOSIS and/or legal professionals.

In the case of technical images (for example, radiographs, micrographs), editors should ensure that all information that could identify the subject has been removed from the image.