PUBLICATION POLICIES AND ETHICAL GUIDELINES

 Scientific Transactions in Environment and Technovation Journal(STET) follows the ethical policies during publication set out by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), available on its website and editorial board. 

GUIDELINES FOR AUTHORS

All authors are expected to adhere to the following guidelines when submitting manuscript to our journal:

• The article represents the authors own original work.
• The article is not being considered or reviewed by any other publication.
• The article has not been published elsewhere in the same or a similar form. This includes publication of an article in different languages and the reuse of substantial portions of articles without acknowledgement of prior publication.
• All authors are aware of and have consented to the submission and declared any potential conflict of interest – be it professional or financial – which could be held to arise with respect to the article.
• All authors fulfil the requirements for authorship.
• Authors must cite all relevant publications that have been used in or influenced the work, including their own previously published articles.
• Information obtained privately, as in conversation, correspondence, or discussion, should only be used and reported with written permission from the source and acknowledged as a personal communication.
• The article contains no libellous, defamatory or unlawful statements.
• When necessary, submit corrigenda in a timely and responsible fashion.
• Expect to sign a copyright assignment form on acceptance of their work, which will assume that the author is empowered to assign copyright to the publisher.
• Co-operate fully with the publication of errata and with the retraction of articles found to be unethical, misleading or damaging.
• If asked to provide a list of suggested reviewers, authors must provide the correct details for suitable reviewers with the appropriate experience to review, ensuring that the suggested reviewers do not have a conflict of interest.

GUIDELINES FOR REVIEWERS

Taking different aspects into consideration peer reviewer will be selected. This may include expertise, affiliation, and experienced reviewers, reviewers suggested by the authors or editors. All reviewers are expected to adhere to the following guidelines when reviewing the manuscript, which submitted to our journal:

• All the reviewers should be aware that the data of the assigned manuscript has to be maintained confidentially.
• Only accept invitations to review work that is relevant to their own expertise and speciality.
• Seek advice from the editor if anything is unclear at the time of invitation.
• Review submitted work in a responsible, impartial and timely manner.
• Report any suspected ethical misconduct as part of a thorough and honest review of the work.
• Avoid the use of unnecessarily inflammatory or offensive language in their appraisal of the work.
• If the article is appropriate it will be given approval to editor by the reviewer. In the case of rejection the reviewer need to give a clear explanation to the author about the reasons that intended him to reject the manuscript. He/her also need to explain what changes can be done in order to publish the article.
• Efficient and timely editorial processes are very important during the publication.
• Accept the commitment to review future versions of the work and provide follow up advice to the editor(s), if requested.
• Remain in good communication with both the publisher and the editor.

GUIDELINES FOR EDITORS

Being an editor, he/she should carry out their responsibilities with much dedication to improve the quality of the journal. It is advisable to oversee the journal policies time to time and assisting the publisher in maintaining the journal quality towards serving the scientific community. Editors to be followed:

• To improve the ways of journal processes, the editor should actively seek the views of editorial board members, reviewers, authors.
• Encourage research into peer review, technological advances and reassess journal processes in the light of new discoveries.
• STET welcomes their editor suggestions in providing appropriate resources, guidance from experts and training to perform the publisher role in a professional manner and improve the quality of the journal.
• Encourage initiatives designed to prevent research misconduct and educate researchers about publication ethics.
• Encourages submission of quality articles to the journal by personally recruiting authors, assisting them with outreach, and ensuring the marketing plan is executed.
• Ensures feedback provided to authors is constructive, fair, and timely.
• Should determine whether a submitted manuscript is appropriate for the journal.
• Article submitted for peer review is a privileged communication that should be treated in confidence, taking care to guard the author identity and work.
• Recruit high profile reviewers using multiple sources, e.g., personal recommendations, Web databases, published choice review.
• Should monitor the process of peer review and take steps to ensure this is of high standard.
• Communicate with reviewers as regularly as possible, according to their availability and give them clear instructions in maintaining quality of the journal.
• Avoid conflicts of interest when making assignments. Check whether reviewer has history of conflict with author.
• Should encourage reviewers to comment on- ethical questions and possible research and publication misconduct raised by submissions (e.g. unethical research design, inappropriate data manipulation and presentation).
• The originality of article submissions and to be alert to redundant publication and plagiarism.
• Ensure to rewrite content when required (Typographical errors, incorrect line or page breaks, Spelling errors, Errors in grammar and syntax, Errors in word usage, graphs, the styling of tables, and other art, including their labels, captions, and text mentions, Ambiguous vocabulary and syntax).
• Editors can comment on any issues related to the scientific content of the manuscript.
• Should communicate directly with the author and the review team.
• Recommend acceptance or rejection of the articles considered for publication to the journal Editor.
• Should be able to resolve any conflicts.

About Peer-Review process

STET aims at rapid publication of high quality research while maintaining rigorous but sympathetic peer review process. Manuscripts (other than those that are of insufficient quality or unlikely to be competitive enough for publication) will be peer-reviewed by two or more experts in the fields, and a decision is returned to the authors within weeks. If due to special circumstance, the review process takes more time, authors will be informed by email. Manuscripts with significant results will be reviewed and published at the highest priority and speed. Possible decisions on a manuscript are:

• accepted as it is
• accepted after minor revision
• accepted after major revision
• rejected

If minor revision is required, authors should return a revised version as soon as possible within one week. If major revision is required, authors should return a revised version within two to three weeks.

Confidentiality

Confidentiality is highly maintained by STET Editors about the submitted manuscript details and do not comment out to any other organizations when the manuscript is under the process of review or if it is rejected. Journal editors may speak out on the published articles but their comments are restricted to the content and the evaluation process.

Plagiarism

The attempt made by an author to use/pass some ones work as his/her own. Self-plagiarism is when author uses some parts of his/her research work without giving exact references. This can lead to the publication of the research work for twice in different journals. It generally occurs when large data is being copy pasted from other sources. Such type of manuscripts cannot be considered for publication in STET.

Duplicate Publication

Research work submitted to STET should be apt should not have been published anywhere else. Authors submitting the paper who have related work consideration or in press elsewhere should upload a clearly marked copy at the time of submission, and draw the editors attention to it in their cover letter.

In case if any part of the article is published previously it has to be intimated to the STET journal editor by specifying the details in the cover letter.

Disclosure and conflicts of interest

All authors should disclose in their manuscript any financial or other substantive conflict of interest that might be construed to influence the results or interpretation of their manuscript. All sources of financial support for the project should be disclosed. Examples of potential conflicts of interest which should be disclosed include employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, paid expert testimony, patent applications/registrations, and grants or other funding. Potential conflicts of interest should be disclosed at the earliest stage possible.

Fundamental errors in published works

When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in his/her own published work, it is the author obligation to promptly notify the journal editor or publisher and cooperate with the editor to retract or correct the paper. If the editor or the publisher learns from a third party that a published work contains a significant error, it is the obligation of the author to promptly.

Bioethics

Authors submitting articles to STET has to follow some bioethics when a research is carried on living organisms and Biosecurity. Researches carried out on living amphibians, vertebrates or invertebrates should have been carried out with ethical guidelines and regulations. Sex and other characteristics that influence the results have to be described. For experiments involving human subjects, authors must recognize the committee favoring the researches, and should include with their submission a comment affirming that illuminated consent was acquired from all subjects.