Plagiarism Policy

The journal maintains a zero-tolerance policy toward plagiarism and related forms of academic misconduct. All submissions must represent original work that appropriately acknowledges the contributions of others and complies with international standards of scholarly integrity, copyright, and responsible authorship.

1. Definition and Scope of Plagiarism

Plagiarism, as defined by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and other governing bodies, includes but is not limited to:

• Verbatim copying of text, data, images, or equations from another source without appropriate attribution or quotation.
• Paraphrasing substantial portions of another’s work without proper citation or acknowledgment.
• Self-plagiarism, including duplicate or redundant publication, where authors republish their own previously disseminated content without disclosure or editorial approval.
• Improper reuse of figures, tables, or datasets, regardless of authorship, without permission or citation.

This policy applies to all parts of a submission, including the main manuscript, supplementary materials, abstracts, and references.

2. Author Responsibilities

Authors are solely responsible for ensuring the originality of their work. Prior to submission:

• All sources must be cited in accordance with the journal’s citation standards.
• Any reuse of previously published content (e.g., methods, figures, or data) must be clearly disclosed and justified.
• Authors must retain documentation proving ownership or permission for any third-party content used.

By submitting a manuscript, authors affirm that:

• The submission has not been previously published or simultaneously submitted elsewhere.
• All co-authors have reviewed and approved the manuscript and are aware of this plagiarism policy.

3. Editorial Screening and Detection

Every submission is subject to rigorous plagiarism screening using advanced similarity-detection tools (e.g., iThenticate, Turnitin) in combination with human editorial review. The journal reserves the right to:

• Reject manuscripts with unoriginal content or excessive similarity scores.
• Request clarifications or revisions for borderline cases.
• Report severe cases to the authors’ affiliated institutions or relevant ethics committees.

Similarity thresholds are assessed contextually and are not based on arbitrary numerical limits. Text overlap is reviewed for intent, proportion, and citation compliance.

4. Consequences of Plagiarism

Violations of this policy may result in one or more of the following actions:

• Immediate rejection or retraction of the manuscript.
• Formal notification to the authors' institutions, funding agencies, or relevant academic bodies.
• A permanent ban from future submissions to the journal.
• Public disclosure of the misconduct in accordance with international retraction protocols.

All corrective actions are implemented in accordance with COPE flowcharts and best practices for handling publishing ethics violations.

5. Post-Publication Oversight

The journal retains the right to investigate allegations of plagiarism at any time, including after publication. If post-publication plagiarism is confirmed:

• A retraction notice will be issued, indexed, and linked to the original article.
• Indexing databases, repositories, and relevant parties will be notified.
• The integrity of the scholarly record will be preserved through transparent corrective statements.

6. Ethical and Legal Alignment

This policy is informed by and aligned with:

• COPE Guidelines on plagiarism, text recycling, and ethical authorship.
• ICMJE Recommendations regarding integrity in research and publishing.
• Applicable national and international copyright laws.
• Institutional and publisher-level frameworks for research ethics compliance.

Authors, reviewers, and editors are expected to familiarize themselves with these standards and uphold them throughout the publication process.

Compliance with this Plagiarism Policy is mandatory. The journal considers the ethical conduct of authors to be fundamental to the advancement of scholarly knowledge and the trustworthiness of the academic publishing ecosystem.