General Provisions
The Editorial Board of “LUNN Bulletin”, having given its full consent to the Declaration of the Association of Science Editors and Publishers, entitled “Ethical Principles of Scientific Publications”, shall hereby commit to following international rules and regulations as concerns publication ethics throughout its work with the Authors’ manuscripts, and shall consider any grounded applications stating any infringements found in the publications. The Board shall deem it the Authors’ and Reviewers’ obligation to notify the Board as promptly as possible of any overseen errors and infringements found by them during the post-publication period. The Board shall have an exclusive right to accept manuscripts for publication or reject the same. Any manuscript might be rejected by the Board subject to such compelling grounds as the theme of the article not covered by the Bulletin’s thematic areas; apparently low scientific quality of the article; the article published elsewhere earlier; the material submitted for publication being fundamentally out of compliance with the ethical principles shared by “LUNN Bulletin”. The Board shall accept articles for publication subject to them meeting the Journal’s requirements. The Board shall guarantee that the materials published in the Bulletin comply with international standards of scientific and publication ethics.
All manuscripts submitted for publication and not rejected for the above reasons shall be subject to reviewing, with the Reviewers selected by the Board out of most competent experts in the respective field of study.
The Board shall keep the Reviewers’ identities secret and shall not disclose the Authors’ identities to the Reviewers.
The Board must guarantee high quality of the materials published in the Bulletin and their contents value, as well as to publish any corrections, comments and apologies whenever necessary.
- Policies as regards the Requirements to Manuscripts
The Authors of the manuscripts submitted shall be liable for the authenticity of their findings and shall in every way encourage an unbiased discussion of their relevance. The baseline data must not contain errors or be ambiguous thus throwing the findings into doubt.
The manuscript absolutely must contain a detailed account of the study materials and methods, which would make the findings verifiable.
Any false data or knowingly inaccurate statements contained in a manuscript shall amount to a sufficient ground for rejecting the article.
- Advertising Policies
The Editorial Board shall in pursuing its activities meet ethical standards and shall declare its right to editorial independence. Neither placement of promotional materials nor sponsorship shall in any way govern the Board’s decision making while selecting materials to be published.
Any promotion materials placed in the Journal shall be in no way related to the scientific and research materials published in “LUNN Bulletin”.
All decisions as to placement of advertising materials shall be taken solely by the Editor-in-Chief.
The Editorial Board shall retain the right to reject any promotion materials, where the placement thereof in the Journal does not meet the policies of “LUNN Bulletin”.
- Baseline Data Access and Storage Policies
The Editorial Board shall retain the right to request from the Author the baseline (raw) data, e.g. to be forwarded to Reviewers or Editors. Authors should be ready to submit such data if requested by the Editorial Board.
- Policies as regards Improper Borrowing
The Editorial Board shall deem any forms of plagiarism (plagiarizing texts, ideas or data) unethical and unacceptable and shall not therefore publish any articles containing plagiarism.
The forms of plagiarism shall include:
― using (verbatim quoting) of any portion of any materials without indicating the source;
― using images, figures, photos, tables, diagrams, charts or any other forms of graphic presentation without indicating the source and without consent of the copyright holder;
― using any materials without a written consent of the Authors or copyright holders who prohibit their use without such consent.
The Editorial Board shall regard the following as improper borrowing:
― no graphical emphasis on verbatim quotations, with reference made to the source; improper references (incomplete bibliographical description of the source, encumbering its identification);
― reference to any source other than the original, without a clear indication (misidentifying the original source);
― no reference in the text to sources mentioned in the bibliography;
― excessive quoting, specifically of the Author’s works (with references to sources made and graphical emphasis of the quotations present), not justified by either genre or objectives of the article.
Authors must submit genuinely original works. Works by other authors must be mentioned with references made to the respective original sources (to be included in the bibliography). Any quotations of texts published elsewhere earlier must be presented as direct speech, with the text put in inverted commas and the original source mandatorily indicated. The manuscripts must not contain large segments of borrowed texts.
Manuscripts submitted for publishing shall be subject to a mandatory check for improper borrowings with the “Antiplagiat” software or other tools, should the Editorial Board have any grounds to initiate a more thorough check.
The Editorial Board strongly advises Authors not to apply any techniques of boosting text authenticity as determined by the “Antiplagiat” software. Should any signs of such techniques application be found, the article shall be rejected. Text authenticity should be at least 85%.
Review articles objectively containing more quotations than usual shall be considered individually.
Articles containing over 20% materials by the same Author (thesis, Author’s abstract, monograph, earlier publications in journals or collected works) shall be rejected.
Plagiarism of ideas and data is to be identified while the article is being reviewed, as well as following publication (upon readers’ feedback). Should any improper borrowing of ideas or data be established, the Editorial Board might resolve to reject the manuscript despite its being already published.
- Publications Priority Policies
A manuscript submitted to more than one journal at the same time shall constitute an infringement of publication ethics. Any manuscripts under consideration or previously published elsewhere shall be rejected.
Certain types of articles (e.g. translated articles) shall in some cases be allowed (some conditions being met). As they submit a manuscript for such “secondary” publication, the Authors must notify the Editorial Board accordingly and provide compelling grounds for such publication. Copyright issues related to “secondary” publications shall be settled on a case-by-case basis. Manuscripts submitted for “secondary” publication shall be subject to the following general rules:
― a full bibliographical reference to the “primary” publication provided;
― the original references list to the “primary” publication retained.
- Original Sources Acknowledgement Policies
The Editorial Board states that third parties’ contributions into the study in question be mandatorily acknowledged at all times. The Authors must make references to the publications relevant to their study as well as to obtaining relevant findings presented in the manuscripts. Any information other that duly presented shall only be used subject to a written consent of the original source. Any information obtained from confidential sources must not be mentioned in manuscripts without a written consent of the parties immediately related to such sources.
- Publications Authorship Policies
Authorship (co-Authorship) of publications shall rest only with the persons directly involved in conceptualizing the work, exploration, performance and/or interpretation of the findings, as well as in writing the text of the manuscript (including scientific and stylistic editing and bringing the article in line with the Journal’s requirements).
Priority in a joint publication shall rest with the head of the team that has prepared the manuscript. The head of the team of co-authors is understood to be the most active contributor into the article preparation, familiar with all stages of the study, and to be the Corresponding Author, i.e. the Author with whom the Editorial Board is in communication throughout the editing, publishing and post-publishing periods.
Such Corresponding Author as head of the team of co-authors shall guarantee that all significant contributors into the study be identified as co-authors, while those not involved directly in the study and article preparation shall not be identified as co-authors. The corresponding Author (head of the team of co-authors) shall guarantee that all of the co-authors have approved the final manuscript and agreed to submit it for publishing.
- Policies as regards the Rights of the Objects of Study
The manuscript shall state that any persons who acted as objects of study have voluntarily agreed to be involved in the study as such and have been informed of the purpose, objectives and risks possibly arising out of the study.
The Authors shall be personally liable for non-disclosure of the participants’ identities. The Authors must make sure the information stated in the manuscript does not allow to identify the objects of study.
- Policies as regards Potential or Apparent Conflicts of Interest
All Authors shall be obligated to disclose financial or any other apparent or potential conflicts of interest which might affect the findings or conclusions as stated in the article. Examples of potential conflicts of interest that are to be disclosed include:
― financial consideration gained for participation in conducting the study or writing the article;
― any relations (like contract work, advice, equity assets, fees, expert’s report) with organizations immediately interested in the subject-matter of the study;
― patent applications or registration of patents for the outcomes of the study (copyrights, etc.);
― financial backing gained at any stage of the study or during the article preparation (including grants and other forms of financial assistance).
Information about such conflicts of interest, given by the Authors, shall only be available to the Editorial Board when considering publishing the article.
- Policies as regards Significant Errors in Publications
Should the Author find any significant errors or inaccuracies in the publication, the Author shall advise the Editorial Board thereof and further co-operate for an earliest withdrawal of the publication or correction of errors. Whenever the Board has obtained a grounded third-party statement of any significant errors contained in the publication, the Author shall either revoke the manuscript or correct the errors as early as possible and submit the revised manuscript, or prove such statement wrong by way of submitting the necessary grounds to the Board.
- Articles Revoking Policies
In some cases, the Editorial Board might resolve to revoke an article.
The article shall be formally revoked should any infringements of publication ethics be found at any stage of editing, publishing, reviewing, replication and post-publishing periods. Revocation for the above reason shall entail prohibition on publishing any further articles in the Journal by all the co-authors involved.
Reasons underlying revocation shall include:
― any plagiarism found in the article, including borrowed figures, charts, tables, etc. when such plagiarism was established after the article was already published;
― any third parties’ claims arising concerning copyright on the article or part(s) thereof;
― the same article published elsewhere prior to publication in the Journal;
― any serious errors found in the article, that put its scientific value to doubt.
The resolution to revoke and withdraw the article shall be stated in a report signed by the Editor-in-Chief, with a copy sent to the Author. The Editorial Board shall thenceforth post on the “LUNN Bulletin” website a statement on the article’s being revoked, without actually withdrawing it from the printed issue or its online version.
- Authors’ Data Privacy Policies
The Authors shall agree that their personal data, like full name, name and address of their affiliates, e-mail, phone number used in communications with the Editorial Board will be available to the public. The above data shall be published in the best interests of the Authors with a view to keeping record of the Authors’ publications and including the same into the relevant sciento- and bibliometric databases. Any personal data other than the above shall be used by the Editorial Board solely in its communications with the Authors for editing and printing purposes. The Editorial Board shall undertake not to communicate that data to any third parties.