Publishing Ethic Statement

1. Author

1.1 Definition of author

CHINA BIOTECHNOLOGY follows the author's guidelines set out in the recommendations of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) for academic work in medical journals. The authorship be based on the following 4 criteria:

(1) Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; AND

(2) Drafting the work or reviewing it critically for important intellectual content; AND

(3) Final approval of the version to be published; AND

(4) Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

1.2 Author contribution

All those designated as authors should meet all 4 criteria above for authorship, and all who meet the 4 criteria should be identified as authors. Contributors who meet fewer than all 4 of the above criteria for authorship should not be listed as authors, but they should be acknowledged. All listed authors should discuss and agree on the author order and contribution before submitting the manuscript. After submitting the manuscript, any change of the author list requires the consent of all authors. After the manuscript is accepted, in principle, it is not allowed to change the author list, especially to add new authors.

1.3 Corresponding author

All submitted manuscripts must designate the corresponding author. No more than two corresponding authors are allowed. The corresponding author is the one individual who takes primary responsibility for communication with the journal and is responsible for ensuring compliance with the journal policy. The corresponding author must ensure that all authors agree to the list of authors and contributions, and that all authors have read and approved the manuscript before submission and final publication. For the published works, the corresponding author is responsible for p_r_o_m_p_tly answering the questions about the papers and related content.

1.4 Joint first authors

No more than 2 co-first authors are allowed.

1.5 Author fee

Author does not need to pay the review fee; The accepted manuscript shall pay the publication fee (300 RMB/page) before publication; If colored plates need to be made, an additional production cost  will be charged (800RMB for 1 color plate, 1,600RMB for 2-4 color plates, 3,000RMB for 5 color plates and above, the maximum charge is 3000 RMB).

After the manuscript is published, the author will be payed remuneration with the standard of 60 RMB/1000 words.

2. Conflict of interest

All authors should disclose any business relationships, family relationships, or close cooperation relationships that may be deemed to have a conflict of interest with the submitted manuscript. Examples of potential conflicts of interest include financial relationships or other relationships that may compromise the author’s objectivity in presenting research results.

The author is responsible for providing a general statement in the acknowledgment section, disclosing conflicts of interest related to the research. All sources of funding for the project should be listed. In addition, if the manuscript involves commercial products, the name of the manufacturer must be clearly indicated in the "Materials and Methods" section or other appropriate places in the text.

3. Academic misconduct and its prevention

Academic misconduct refers to behaviors that violate the scientific community's code of conduct, fraud, plagiarism, or other violations of the public code of conduct in the process of academic research. Generally, there are 4 categories of academic misconduct behaviors: plagiarism, fabrication, falsification, and others. ‘Others’ mainly includes inappropriate authorship, multiple submissions of one manuscript, redundant publications and other academic misconduct behaviors.

3.1 Plagiarism

Stealing others' intellectual property constitutes plagiarism. This includes copying a sentence or paragraph from another person's work word for word (or almost word for word), even if the original work is cited in the references.

(1) Plagiarism of thesis (conclusions, opinions)

(2) Plagiarism of argument demonstrations (analysis of experimental and observation results)

(3) Plagiarism of graphs, tables, formulas and data

(4) Plagiarism of concepts (definitions, principles, formulas, etc.)

(5) Self (or team) plagiarism

(6) Serious plagiarism (duplicate publication)

3.2 Multiple submissions

The same author submits the same paper (or different topics but the same content) to two or more academic journals at the same time or almost at the same time, and they are published simultaneously or successively.

3.3 Fabrication

Instead of using real data obtained from actual observations and experiments as basis, fabricated experimental results that in accordance with certain scientific hypotheses and theories, including forged experimental data and samples, forged evidence, and other forms.

3.4 Fasification

After obtaining the experimental data, falsify or select the data according to the expected value, and draw the research conclusions that meet the expectations, usually including subjective selection of data, falsification of original data etc.

3.5 Inappropriate authorship

(1) Exclude people who have made substantial contributions to the research from the list of authors.

(2) Include people who have not made substantial contributions to the research on the list of authors.

(3) Add the names in a paper without authorization.

(4) Falsely label the author information.

(5) Order of the author list not accurately reflect actual contributions.

Any behavior that does not meet the criteria in the "Definition of Author" in Article 1 of this code but is still listed in the manuscript is considered as inappropriate authorship.

3.6 Redundant publication

Split one paper (the same work) into multiple articles for publication, repeatedly use one-time results, and split the same experiment into multiple angles of explanation.

CHINA BIOTECHNOLOGY has always adhered to strict scientific ethics standards and resolutely put an end to all academic misconduct behaviors. This journal refers to the ‘Standards for Defining Academic Misconduct in Scientific Journals’ published by China Academic Journals Electronic Publishing House (CNKI) and uses the Academic Misconduct Detection System for Scientific Journals (AMLC) to detect manuscripts and prevent academic misconduct. The workflow is as follows:

4. Relevant peer review ethics

CHINA BIOTECHNOLOGY implements online submission and strict peer review system (single-blind review, that is, the reviewer knows the identity of the author, but for the author, the reviewer is anonymous). Reviewers should abide by the ‘China Biotechnology Review Standards’, and should have the necessary professional knowledge and time to ensure the high quality of peer review. Reviewers should avoid reviewing manuscripts that are potentially conflicting or competing with their own work. Impersonating others during the peer review process is considered serious misconduct. The submission and review process of ‘China Biotechnology’ is as follows:

5. Retraction

In order to maintain the integrity of scientific research, the authenticity and repeatability of research data, and to deliver correct and authoritative scientific research information to readers, if there is any data fraud, repeated publication, plagiarism of others’ works, violation of research ethics, and violation of laws and regulations, etc., published papers will be retracted.

This journal will publish a retraction notice in accordance with the following principles:

(1) The editorial department can decide whether to retract the paper based on factual evidence; in many cases, some authors or the author's institution would propose to retract the manuscript, but whether to retract the paper is determined by the editorial department.

(2) If the facts are confirmed, the editorial department will publish the retraction notice in time to minimize the possibility of misleading readers.

(3) In principle, the editorial department will try to reach agreement with the author on the content and wording of the retraction notice. However, when there is clear evidence to retract the paper, the journal will not postpone the publication of the retraction notice due to unilateral reasons of the author.

(4) The retraction statement will be published in the body of the latest issue of the journal, with ‘Retraction Notice’ as the title and listed on the table of contents.

(5) Retract the paper from the journal website and database in time.

6. Copyright and Permission Policy

Once the manuscript is accepted, Copyright Transfer Agreement will be signed and the author transfers the following copyright of the article to the Journal:

(1) Compilation right;

(2) Translation right;

(3) Right of reproduction;

(4) Publishing right;

(5) Right of spreading on network.

The author have no rights to license others to use the above rights in any form. Others’ use of the article (such as reproduce, extract and compile) shall be licensed by the Journal.

The author himself may appropriately quote the article (some words, figures, tables) in his subsequent works or compile it in non STM journals (such as a book edited by the author himself).

If author reuses the article in other ways, please contact (email: biotech@mail.las.ac.cn) the editorial office of the Journal.