Editorial Policies

Focus and Scope

Highlights in BioScience is an international peer-reviewed open access journal which aims at publishing papers of the highest quality in broad aspects of BioScience-related research. The Journal is continuously published by the International Library of Sciences. It covers all areas of Biology and life sciences. Highlights in BioScience has been fully Open Access and publishes all papers under the liberal CC BY license, giving the life science community quality research to share and discuss. The average time from submission to a first decision is 21 days.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

  •  Biodiversity/Evolution Biology   
  • Chemical Biology
  • Chromosome Biology/Gene Regulation
  • Developmental biology
  • Enzymology/Biochemistry
  •  Biophysics research
  • Genetics/Epigenetics/Genomics
  • Microbials/Biofuels
  • Molecular and cellular biology
  • Plant Biology
  • Post-translational Modifications/Proteomics
  • Structural Biology
  • Bioinformatics
  • Database and tools

 

Section Policies

Research Article

Research Articles are limited to 5,000 words and should make fundamental contributions to our understanding in all areas of Biology and life sciences. These articles should include the elements described below in the section of the Instructions to Authors.

Title page: List title, authors, and affiliations as the first page of a manuscript

Abstract

Introduction

Materials and Methods

Results and Discussion (or separated)

Conclusions (optional)

Acknowledgments (optional)

References

Figures and their captions are inserted after references. Figure files are uploaded separately in the submission system.

Tables and their captions are inserted after figure pages.

supplementary data information captions (if applicable) after table pages. Supplementary data files are uploaded separately.


Checked Open Submissions Checked Indexed Checked Peer Reviewed

Review Article

1. Review Articles provide a comprehensive summary of research on a certain topic, and a perspective on the state of the field and where it is heading. Reviews are often widely read (for example, by researchers looking for a full introduction to a field) and highly cited. Reviews commonly cite approximately 100 primary research articles.

2. Mini-reviews are brief (maximum 3,000 words with a maximum of 2 figures or tables) summaries of important developments in Biology and life sciences research. They must be based on published articles and may address any subject within the scope of the journal.

Minireviews must have abstracts. Limit the abstract to 250 words or fewer. The body of the Minireview may have section headings and/or paragraph lead-ins.

Checked Open Submissions Checked Indexed Checked Peer Reviewed

Mini Review

Mini-reviews are brief (maximum 3,000 words with a maximum of 2 figures or tables) summaries of important developments in Biology and life sciences research. They must be based on published articles and may address any subject within the scope of the journal.

Minireviews must have abstracts. Limit the abstract to 250 words or fewer. The body of the Minireview may have section headings and/or paragraph lead-ins.

Checked Open Submissions Checked Indexed Checked Peer Reviewed

Opinions and Hypotheses

Opinions and Hypotheses are short articles (maximum 2,500 words with a maximum of 25 references) that present original and well-developed insights without complete supporting data. This article type places equal importance on new thought that is formulated in a manner that summarizes a problem, provides a new synthesis, and/or is suitable for subsequent experimental testing.

In this category, the journal provides a highly visible venue for the publication of ideas that have the potential to move fields and to challenge the status quo.

Authors should provide an abstract of 150 words or fewer. The body of an Opinions and Hypotheses article may have section headings and/or paragraph lead-ins.

Checked Open Submissions Checked Indexed Checked Peer Reviewed

Letter to Editor

Letters to the Editor are intended for comments on articles published in the journal and must cite published references to support the writer’s argument. Letters may be no more than 500 words long and must be typed double-spaced.

All Letters to the Editor must be submitted electronically. The cover letter should refer to the article in question by its title and the last name of the first author. In addition, the volume and issue and/or DOI should be indicated. In the Abstract section of the submission form, put "Not Applicable." Letters to the Editor do not have abstracts. The Letter must have a distinct title, which must appear on the manuscript and on the submission form. Figures and tables should be kept to a minimum.

The Letter will be sent to the editor who handled the article in question. If the editor believes that publication is warranted, he/she will solicit a reply from the corresponding author of the article and make a recommendation to the editor in chief. Final approval for publication rests with the editor in chief.

Checked Open Submissions Checked Indexed Checked Peer Reviewed

Editorials

Editorials (maximum 500 words) communicated by members of the Highlights in BioScience Board of Editors address issues of science, politics, or policy.

Editorials should include an abstract of 150 words or fewer

Editors
  • Medhat Abdellatef
Checked Open Submissions Checked Indexed Checked Peer Reviewed

Methods and Protocols

Methods and Protocols manuscripts (5,000 word limit) describe major technical and methodological developments in BioScience-related research. These can be bioinformatic or laboratory techniques or any protocols that practically advance the field of Biology and life sciences. The description of each method or protocol must include validation of, or application to, a relevant and important question in Biology and life sciences and provide results demonstrating its performance in comparison to existing state-of-the-art techniques. Articles will be selected on the basis of importance to the field, methodological performance, and detailed description to enable application to the field immediately.

Checked Open Submissions Checked Indexed Checked Peer Reviewed

Resource Reports

Resource Reports (5,000 word limit) describe major technical advances and/or major informational databases that would be of interest in Biology and life sciences fields. The manuscripts should include detailed methods and illustration of proof-of-principle so that the new methodology can be replicated and/or utilized by others. Resource Reports follow the same formatting guidelines as Research Articles.

Checked Open Submissions Checked Indexed Checked Peer Reviewed

Perspectives

Perspectives are brief reviews (maximum 2,000 words) that offer a succinct overview of a specific topic with an emphasis on opinion and synthesis. Authors should provide an abstract of 150 words or fewer. The body of a Perspectives article may have section headings and/or paragraph lead-ins.

Checked Open Submissions Checked Indexed Checked Peer Reviewed

Computational Biology

1- Software 

Manuscripts whose primary purpose is the description of new software must provide full details of the algorithms designed. Describe any dependencies on commercial products or operating systems. Include details of the supplied test data and explain how to install and run the software. A brief description of enhancements made in the major releases of the software may also be given. The authors should provide a direct link to the deposited software from within the paper.

2- Database

For descriptions of databases, provide details about how the data were curated, as well as plans for long-term database maintenance, growth, and stability. The authors should provide a direct link to the database hosting site from within the paper.

Checked Open Submissions Checked Indexed Checked Peer Reviewed
 

Peer Review Process

The practice of peer review is to ensure that only good science is published. It is an objective process at the heart of good scholarly publishing and is carried out by all reputable scientific journals. Our referees play a vital role in maintaining the high standards Transport Policy and all manuscripts are peer-reviewed following the procedure outlined below.

Initial manuscript evaluation The Editor first evaluates all manuscripts. It is rare, but it is possible for an exceptional manuscript to be accepted at this stage. Manuscripts rejected at this stage are insufficiently original, have serious scientific flaws, have poor grammar or English language, or are outside the aims and scope of the journal. Those that meet the minimum criteria are normally passed on to at least 2 experts for review.

Type of Peer Review Transport Policy employs double-blind reviewing, where both the referee and author remain anonymous throughout the process.

How the referee is selected Whenever possible, referees are matched to the paper according to their expertise and our database is constantly being updated.

Corrections, Expressions of Concern, and Retractions Highlights in BioScience journal are committed to correcting errors in published papers. In cases where an institutional investigation of large-scale error or misconduct is underway, a Highlights in BioScience Journal may publish an Editorial Expression of Concern relating to the paper in question. In cases of irreproducibility of research findings reported in a Highlights in BioScience Journal paper, a retraction may be considered if the core conclusions are thereby invalidated. Papers will also be retracted in case of research misconduct, in accord with COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics) guidelines. Corrections to errors that do not affect the core conclusions of a paper are posted online and linked to the published paper.

 

Publication Frequency

Highlights in BioScience journal publishes continuously: the individual articles will be published as soon as they are ready, by adding them to the "current" volume's Table of Contents

 

Open Access Policy

This journal provides immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge.

 

Self-archiving of papers published in Highlights in BioScience

Authors publishing in Highlights in BioScience are encouraged to deposit the final published PDF in their institutional repository or any suitable subject repository on publication.
Authors should provide a link from the deposited version to the URL of the published article on the journal's website; in all cases, the requirement to link to the journal’s website is designed to protect the integrity and authenticity of the scientific record, with the online published version on the journal’s website clearly identified as the definitive version of record.

 

 

Archiving

This journal utilizes the LOCKSS system to create a distributed archiving system among participating libraries and permits those libraries to create permanent archives of the journal for purposes of preservation and restoration. More...

Digital archiving and preservation policy

 

Digital preservation can be seen as the set of processes and activities that ensure the information that now exists in digital formats is backed up and distributed to guarantee continued access for the long term. The digital content of the journal is extremely valuable and measures are in place to ensure both its current accessibility and long-term preservation. The preservation policy includes the following measures:

 

Website archiving: All of our electronic content (website, manuscripts, etc.) is stored on three different sources. Content on one server is online and accessible to the readers. The copy of the same content is kept as a backup on two other sources. In case of failure of one server, any one of the other sources can be made online and the website expected to be accessible within 24 hours.

Abstracting/Indexing services: Our journal’s Abstracting/Indexing services store many essential information about the articles. Additionally, our journal’s Abstracting/Indexing services archive not only the metadata about the article but the electronic versions of the articles, as well. Therefore, copies of the articles are available to the scientific community through their systems as an alternative to the journal's own.

Self-archiving: Authors may archive the final published version of their articles in personal or institutional repositories immediately after publication.

If the journal stops publishing: We intend and expect to continue to publish our journal for a very long time. If due to some rare, unfortunate circumstances, we are forced to stop publishing the journal, the manuscripts published in the journal will be kept online and accessible to the readers for at least 15 more years. When required under specific conditions, such as discontinuation of the collection or catastrophic failure of the website, the content will be accessible through LOCKSS System.

 

Publication Frequency

Highlights in BioScience journal publishes continuously: the individual articles will be published as soon as they are ready, by adding them to the "current" volume's Table of Contents

 

Open Access Statement

All articles published open access will be immediately and permanently free for everyone to read, download, copy, and distribute. Permitted reuse is defined by Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license.

Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY): lets others distribute and copy the article, to create extracts, abstracts, and other revised versions, adaptations or derivative works of or from an article (such as a translation), to include in a collective work (such as an anthology), to text or data mine the article, even for commercial purposes, as long as they credit the author(s), do not represent the author as endorsing their adaptation of the article, and do not modify the article in such a way as to damage the author's honor or reputation.

 

Plagiarism Policy

Highlights in BioScience journal use Plagiarism Detection service provided by Crossref and powered by iThenticate, so the journal is following an instant policy on rejection those received papers with a plagiarism rate of more than 13%. So, All of the authors and contributors must check their papers before submission to making assurance of following our anti-plagiarism policies.

Policy:

Papers must be original, unpublished, and not pending publication elsewhere. Any material taken verbatim from another source needs to be clearly identified as different from the present original text by (1) indentation, (2) use of quotation marks, and (3) identification of the source.

 Any text of an amount exceeding fair use standards (herein defined as more than two or three sentences or the equivalent thereof) or any graphic material reproduced from another source requires permission from the copyright holder and, if feasible, the original author(s) and also requires identification of the source; e.g., previous publication.

When plagiarism is identified, the Editor in Chief responsible for the review of this paper and will agree on measures according to the extent of plagiarism detected in the paper in agreement with the following guidelines:

Level of Plagiarism

 1.Minor: A short section of another article is plagiarized without any significant data or idea taken from the other paper

Action: A warning is given to the authors and a request to change the text and properly cite the original article is made

2.Intermediate: A significant portion of a paper is plagiarized without proper citation to the original paper

Action: The submitted article is rejected and the authors are forbidden to submit further articles for one year

3. Severe: A significant portion of a paper is plagiarized that involves reproducing original results or ideas presented in another publication

Action: The paper is rejected and the authors are forbidden to submit further articles for five years.

It is understood that all authors are responsible for the content of their submitted paper as they all sign the Highlights in BioScience Copyright Form. If a penalty is imposed for plagiarism, all authors will be subject to the same penalty.

If the second case of plagiarism by the same author(s) is identified, a decision on the measures to be enforced will be made by the Editorial board (Editor-in-Chief, and Editorial members) with the Chair of the Editor in Chief. The author(s) might be forbidden to submit further articles forever.

This policy applies also to material reproduced from another publication by the same author(s). If an author uses text or figures that have previously been published, the corresponding paragraphs or figures should be identified and the previous publication referenced. It is understood that in case of a review paper or a paper of a tutorial nature much of the material was previously published.

The author should identify the source of the previously published material and obtain permission from the original author and the publisher. If an author submits a manuscript to Highlights in BioScience with significant overlap with a manuscript submitted to another journal simultaneously, and this overlap is discovered during the review process or after the publications of both papers, the editor of the other journal is notified and the case is treated as a severe plagiarism case. Significant overlap means the use of identical or almost identical figures and identical or slightly modified text for one half or more of the paper. For self-plagiarism of less than one half of the paper but more than one-tenth of the paper, the case shall be treated as intermediate plagiarism. If self-plagiarism is confined to the methods section, the case shall be considered as minor plagiarism.

 If an author uses some of his previously published material to clarify the presentation of new results, the previously published material shall be identified and the difference to the present publication shall be mentioned. Permission to republish must be obtained from the copyright holder. In the case of a manuscript that was originally published in conference proceedings and then is submitted for publication in Highlights in BioScience either in identical or in expanded form, the authors must identify the name of the conference proceedings and the date of the publication and obtain permission to republish from the copyright holder. The editor may decide not to accept this paper for publication.

However, an author shall be permitted to use material from an unpublished presentation, including visual displays, in a subsequent journal publication. In the case of a publication being submitted, that was originally published in another language, the title, date, and journal of the original publication must be identified by the authors, and the copyright must be obtained. The editor may accept such a translated publication to bring it to the attention of a wider audience. The editor may select a specific paper that had been published (e.g. a “historic” paper) for republication in order to provide a better perspective of a series of papers published in one issue of Highlights in BioScience. This republication shall be clearly identified as such and the date and journal of the original publication shall be given, and the permission of the author(s) and the publisher shall be obtained.

The Highlights in BioScience layout editor for the Journal is responsible for maintaining the list of authors subjected to penalties and will check that no authors of a submitted paper are on this list. If a banned author is identified, the layout editor will inform the Editor-in-Chief who will take appropriate measures. This policy will be posted on the web site with the instructions for submitting a manuscript, and a copy will be sent to the authors with the confirmation email upon initial receipt of their original manuscript. A sentence shall be added to the copyright transfer form to indicate that the author(s) have read the Plagiarism Policy.

 

Privacy Policy

About Our Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy describes how Highlights in BioScience collects and uses the personal information you provide to Highlights in BioScience online system. It also describes the choices available to you regarding our use of your personal information and how you can access and update this information.

  1. Personal information we collect   
  2. How we use your personal information
  3. How long we retain your information
  4. Protection your personal information
  5. Updates to this Privacy Policy
  6. Contact us regarding your personal information


1. Personal information we collect

We request personal information from you When you register on a Journal's online system to submit a manuscript to consider in Highlights in BioScience, we will ask for the following information so that we may consider, process, and possibly publish your manuscript, in conformance with accepted publishing standards: your name, title, telephone number, email address, institution, department, address, degree, fax number, position, ORCID iD, state or province, and areas of interest or expertise. Additionally, Highlights in BioScience online system ask you to register you as a potential reviewer on our database or not.

2. How we use your personal information

If you are an author, we use your personal information for the purpose of processing, reviewing, communicating about, facilitating editorial review and peer review, and publishing your article.

If you are an editor or reviewer, we use your personal information to contact you about your potential or actual role as an editor or reviewer, to request and facilitate your review and handling of manuscripts, and to update you on news and developments at Highlights in BioScience as it may affect your work with us.

If you submit a manuscript to us for possible publication, we will send the title and abstract of your manuscript, to one or more potential external/volunteer editors and reviewers to gauge their interest in reviewing your content. If they agree to review your content, the Journal's system will allow them to access your full manuscript and any revisions and relevant comments you have provided. If your manuscript is accepted for publication, we share information about you, your manuscript, or other research content as reasonably necessary with our editing team to publish it.

We will not sell or lease your personal information to any third party.

3. How long we retain your information

We keep your personal information for as long as is necessary to provide services to you, and for as long as your account and/or registration with Highlights in BioScience is active.

4. Protection your personal information

We use reasonable and appropriate physical, technical, and administrative safeguards to protect your information from unauthorized use, access, loss, misuse, alteration, or destruction. We endeavor to protect the personal information we receive, gather, and store, by such means as password protection, firewalls, and other means.

5. Updates to this Privacy Policy

Highlights in BioScience may make changes to this privacy policy from time to time. Changes to this privacy policy will be made by updating this page. Please visit this privacy policy regularly to read the current version. If there are material changes to how we use your personal information, we will endeavor to provide you with reasonable notice of such changes, either by a prominent notice on Highlights in BioScience web site or to your email address of record.

6. Contact us regarding your personal information

If you have any questions about this privacy policy, you may contact our editorial office at editorial@highlightsin.org.

 

General policies

  1. Authorship
  2. Conflict of Interest
  3. Unpublished Data and Personal Communications

1. Authorship

Authors in Highlights in BioScience Journal must fulfill the criteria described below:

  1. Each author is expected to have made substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work;  
  2. OR the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data;
  3. OR creation of new software used in the work;
  4. OR have drafted the work or substantially revised it;
  5. AND has approved the submitted version;
  6. AND agrees to be personally accountable for the author’s own contributions and for ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work, even ones in which the author was not personally involved, are appropriately investigated, resolved, and documented in the literature.

Other individuals who have participated in the generation of the research paper but who do not meet the criteria for authorship should be listed in the acknowledgments section with a brief indication of the nature of their contribution.

In addition, corresponding authors must:

  1. Ensure that all listed authors have received and approved the manuscript prior to submission.
  2. Receive all substantive correspondence with editors as well as full reviews.
  3. Verify that all data, materials (including reagents), and code, even those developed/provided by other authors, comply with the transparency and reproducibility standards of both the field and the journal.
  4. Ensure that original data/materials/code upon which the submission is based are preserved and retrievable for reanalysis.
  5. Confirm that the presentation in the paper of the data/materials/code accurately reflects the original sources.
  6. Foresee and minimize obstacles to the sharing of data/materials/code.
  7. Ensure the entire author group is fully aware of and in compliance with best practices.
  8. Be responsible for signing off on galleys and ensuring all authors read and agree license forms.

For manuscripts that are accepted, all authors are required to affirm and explain their contribution to the manuscript, agree to the conditions of the publication including the availability of data, code, and materials, and declare any conflicts of interest. The senior author from each group is required to have examined the raw data their group has produced.

2.Conflict of Interest

Authors: Every author of content submitted to Highlights in BioScience Journal is required to disclose affiliations, funding sources, and competing interests that might be perceived as sources of bias related to the reported research and/or presented content. Specific details about the required disclosures are listed below along with information about the placement of these disclosures within the article. This policy applies to all types of articles.

Institutional affiliations: The title page of every submission must include for all authors the academic, corporate, government, industry, and/or other relevant institutional affiliations where the work was performed.

Funding and contributions: All authors must disclose complete and correct information about any and all financial contributions to the work being reported This information should be listed in the Funding statement section of the manuscript to ensure transparency during the review process and will be included in the final published work.

Competing interests: All authors must disclose complete and correct details of competing interests that have occurred within 5 years of inception of the research or clinical study under consideration. Interests outside the 5-year time frame must also be declared if they could reasonably be perceived as competing. When in doubt, authors should disclose the relationship. This information should be summarized in a Competing interests statement in the Competing interests section of the final published work. Authors can provide a URL to a list of an author’s affiliations/interests/relationships in addition to the Competing interests statement.

Reviewers: Reviewers form the cornerstone of the peer review process, and their evaluations ensure the quality of published research. Therefore, the editors seek reviewers for Highlights in BioScience Journal who do not have conflicts of interest with the reported research in the manuscripts they read. In addition to this precaution, reviewers are required to disclose any conflicts with the evaluation of the paper, and this information is taken into account by the editors when decisions are made. please note that Highlights in BioScience Journal use double-blind reviewing, where both the referee and author remain anonymous throughout the process.

Professional Editors: Editors for Highlights in BioScience are required to fill out a conflict of interest form, which is then evaluated by Highlights in BioScience management. Professional editors for the Highlights in BioScience Journal may not have any financial or management interest in any biotechnology, pharmaceutical or biomedical, institution, or company.

Academic Editors. Editors for Highlights in BioScience are required to disclose any conflicts with the evaluation of the paper and may be required to recuse themselves based on conflicts of interest.

3. Unpublished Data and Personal Communications

Citations to unpublished data and personal communications cannot be used to support significant claims in the paper. Papers will be held for publication until all “in press” citations are either published or posted in full on a preprint server.

 

Publication ethics

Article assessment

All manuscripts are subject to peer review and are expected to meet standards of academic excellence. If approved by the editor, submissions will be considered by peer reviewers, whose identities will remain anonymous to the authors.

Our Research Integrity team will occasionally seek advice outside standard peer review, for example, on submissions with serious ethical, security, biosecurity, or societal implications. We may consult experts and the academic editor before deciding on appropriate actions, including but not limited to recruiting reviewers with specific expertise, assessment by additional editors, and declining to further consider a submission.

Plagiarism

Authors must not use the words, figures, or ideas of others without attribution. All sources must be cited at the point they are used, and reuse of wording must be limited and be attributed or quoted in the text.

Highlights in BioScience Journal  uses Crossref Similarity Check (iThenticate) to detect submissions that overlap with published and submitted manuscripts.

Manuscripts that are found to have been plagiarized from a manuscript by other authors, whether published or unpublished, will be rejected and the authors may incur sanctions. Any published articles may need to be corrected or retracted.

Duplicate submission and redundant publication

Highlights in BioScience Journal consider only original content, i.e. articles that have not been previously published, including in a language other than English. Articles based on content previously made public only on a preprint server, institutional repository, or in a thesis will be considered.

Manuscripts submitted to Highlights in BioScience Journal must not be submitted elsewhere while under consideration and must be withdrawn before being submitted elsewhere. Authors whose articles are found to have been simultaneously submitted elsewhere may incur sanctions.

If authors have used their own previously published work, or work that is currently under review, as the basis for a submitted manuscript, they must cite the previous articles and indicate how their submitted manuscript differs from their previous work. Reuse of the authors’ own words outside the Methods should be attributed or quoted in the text. Reuse of the authors’ own figures or substantial amounts of wording may require permission from the copyright holder and the authors are responsible for obtaining this.

Highlights in BioScience Journal will consider extended versions of articles published at conferences provided this is declared in the cover letter, the previous version is clearly cited and discussed, there is significant new content, and any necessary permissions are obtained.

Redundant publication, the inappropriate division of study outcomes into more than one article (also known as salami slicing), may result in rejection or a request to merge submitted manuscripts, and the correction of published articles. Duplicate publication of the same, or a very similar, article may result in the retraction of the later article and the authors may incur sanctions.

Citation manipulation

Authors whose submitted manuscripts are found to include citations whose primary purpose is to increase the number of citations to a given author’s work, or to articles published in a particular journal, may incur sanctions.

Editors and reviewers must not ask authors to include references merely to increase citations to their own or an associate’s work, to the journal, or to another journal they are associated with.

Fabrication and falsification

The authors of submitted manuscripts or published articles that are found to have fabricated or falsified the results, including the manipulation of images, may incur sanctions, and published articles may be retracted.

Authorship and acknowledgements

All listed authors must have made a significant scientific contribution to the research in the manuscript, approved its claims, and agreed to be an author. It is important to list everyone who made a significant scientific contribution. We refer to the ICMJE guidelines. Author contributions may be described at the end of the submission, optionally using roles defined by CRediT. Changes in authorship must be declared to the journal and agreed to by all authors.

Anyone who contributed to the research or manuscript preparation, but is not an author, should be acknowledged with their permission.

Submissions by anyone other than one of the authors will not be considered.

Conflicts of interest

Conflicts of interest (COIs, also known as ‘competing interests’) occur when issues outside research could be reasonably perceived to affect the neutrality or objectivity of the work or its assessment. This can happen at any stage in the research cycle, including during the experimentation phase, while a manuscript is being written, or during the process of turning a manuscript into a published article. 

If unsure, declare a potential interest or discuss with the editorial office. Undeclared interests may incur sanctions. Submissions with undeclared conflicts that are later revealed may be rejected. Published articles may need to be re-assessed, have a corrigendum published, or in serious cases be retracted. For more information on COIs, see the guidance from the ICMJE and WAME.

Conflicts of interest do not always stop work from being published or prevent someone from being involved in the review process. However, they must be declared. A clear declaration of all possible conflicts – whether they actually had an influence or not – allows others to make informed decisions about the work and its review process.

If conflicts of interest are found after publication, this may be embarrassing for the authors, the Editor and the journal. It may be necessary to publish a corrigendum or reassess the review process.

Conflicts include the following:

  • Financial — funding and other payments, goods and services received or expected by the authors relating to the subject of the work or from an organization with an interest in the outcome of the work
  • Affiliations — being employed by, on the advisory board for, or a member of an organization with an interest in the outcome of the work
  • Intellectual property — patents or trademarks owned by someone or their organization
  • Personal — friends, family, relationships, and other close personal connections
  • Ideology — beliefs or activism, for example, political or religious, relevant to the work
  • Academic — competitors or someone whose work is critiqued

Authors

Authors must declare all potential interests in a ‘Conflicts of interest’ section, which should explain why the interest may be a conflict. If there are none, the authors should state “The author(s) declare(s) that there are no conflicts of interest regarding the publication of this paper.” Submitting authors are responsible for coauthors declaring their interests.

Authors must declare current or recent funding (including article processing charges) and other payments, goods or services that might influence the work. All funding, whether a conflict or not, must be declared in the ‘Funding Statement’.

The involvement of anyone other than the authors who 1) has an interest in the outcome of the work; 2) is affiliated to an organization with such an interest; or 3) was employed or paid by a funder, in the commissioning, conception, planning, design, conduct, or analysis of the work, the preparation or editing of the manuscript, or the decision to publish must be declared.

Declared conflicts of interest will be considered by the editor and reviewers and included in the published article.

Editors and Reviewers

Editors and reviewers should decline to be involved with a submission when they

  • Have a recent publication or current submission with any author
  • Share or recently shared an affiliation with any author
  • Collaborate or recently collaborated with any author
  • Have a close personal connection to any author
  • Have a financial interest in the subject of the work
  • Feel unable to be objective

Reviewers must declare any remaining interests in the ‘Confidential’ section of the review form, which will be considered by the editor.

Editors and reviewers must declare if they have previously discussed the manuscript with the authors.

Investigations

Suspected breaches of our publication ethics policies, either before and after publication, as well as concerns about research ethics, should be reported to our Editorial Office (editorial@highlightsin.org), overseen by the Head of Research Integrity.

Highlights in BioScience Journal  may ask the authors to provide the underlying data and images, consult editors, and contact institutions or employers to ask for an investigation or to raise concerns.

Corrections and retractions

When errors are identified in published articles, the publisher will consider what action is required and may consult the editors and the authors’ institution(s).

Errors by the authors may be corrected by a corrigendum and errors by the publisher by an erratum.

If there are errors that significantly affect the conclusions or there is evidence of misconduct, this may require retraction or an expression of concern following the COPE Retraction Guidelines.

All authors will be asked to agree to the content of the notice.