We want to ensure that the research you publish with Acta Materia Medica meets strict quality guidelines. Your reputation, and ours, depends on it. So does the reputation of your research institution on the global stage.
Here you will find guidance on the policies that help us achieve this, and what we ask of you to comply with them https://amm-journal.org/index.php/publication-ethics-and-malpractice-statement-2/.
Other adopted initiatives include:
Rigorous Peer Review
All articles submitted to Acta Materia Medica will be thoroughly peer reviewed by members of our editorial board or external reviewers. Publications of a commentary or opinion nature may not be sent for external peer review but will include extensive editorial review and revisions.
Publication and Research Ethics
Acta Materia Medica fully supports and endorses the recommendations and guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). We expect all submissions to follow COPE guidelines, particularly those regarding authorship and conflict of interest.
Anti-plagiarism Checking
A combination of pre-screening and open access is the best possible defence against plagiarism. All articles submitted to Acta Materia Medica are automatically screened for plagiarism by the CrossCheck system from Crossref. This system compares incoming articles to a large database of academic content, and alerts editors to any possible issues.
Paper Mills
Acta Materia Medica has systems in place to detect and investigate suspicious patterns across submissions that may indicate the involvement of paper mills or attempts to manipulate the peer review process. We take decisive action to address these issues, whether they are discovered before or after publication.
Use Of AI Writing Tools
While artificial intelligence (AI) tools can assist researchers in conducting and communicating their research, the increasing use of generative AI also poses risks, such as the potential for inaccurate information, lack of proper attribution, and the creation of fabricated content. Authors are required to disclose any use of AI tools in the development of their study or article. Additionally, they must ensure the accuracy of the information generated by these tools and give proper attribution where AI has contributed to the generation of ideas or content.
Image Manipulation
Acta Materia Medica screens all submitted images for signs of manipulation. Continuous tone images (e.g., photographs, immunofluorescent images, western blots) are reviewed for integrity before publication.
Image Inspection for Integrity
We use various tools to inspect image files, which serves several purposes:
- Identifying areas of potential concern, including duplication.
- Ensuring compliance with image integrity guidelines.
- Assisting authors in correcting unintentional errors.
Image Integrity Guidelines
Manipulating or electronically enhancing images in ways that violate our guidelines may be considered scientific misconduct. However, we understand that mistakes can occur, and our goal is to address concerns constructively. Below are examples of acceptable and unacceptable image modifications.
Acceptable Changes
- Linear adjustments: Changes to contrast, brightness, or colour are allowed if they clarify image details. These adjustments must be applied uniformly across the entire image, not selectively to parts.
Problematic Changes
The following alterations must be avoided:
- Removing, hiding, or adding anything in the image (except for added labels like arrows, scale bars, or text).
- Copying and pasting elements within the same image.
- Selectively enhancing specific parts of the image.
- Moving elements in the image around.
Special Cases
- Nonlinear adjustments: Adjustments like gamma correction should be applied to the entire image and must be clearly noted in the figure legend.
- Composite images: When combining multiple images or parts of images, it must be clearly indicated in the legend that it is a composite. A thin line between sections (called “tooling”) can help distinguish different parts.
- Reusing images: you may reuse images in a manuscript, but it’s essential to explain where and why in the figure legend.
Additional Examples and Resources
For cases not covered in this summary, we adhere to the recommendations and guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE):
Handling Image Concerns
If image integrity concerns arise, they are referred to our Publication Ethics Team and the Editor-in-Chief. Authors may be asked to provide original data to resolve issues.
Publication Process and Image Investigations
Image integrity investigations can delay the publication process. We aim to resolve concerns promptly while upholding the integrity of the work. In extreme cases, unresolved concerns may result in the withdrawal of acceptance or further actions.
Open Licenses
All Acta Materia Medica content is released under open licenses from Creative Commons. We believe that the CC BY license is the most useful and practical licence for journal articles, in order to fully commit to the Open Access initiative and to support global dissemination of research findings.
Research Data Submission
Acta Materia Medica encourages authors to make the research objects associated with their publications openly available. This means that the research community and wider public are able to similarly validate authors’ work, and are more easily able to extend and build upon it. See the Instructions to Authors for further details.
Indexing & Archiving
All Acta Materia Medica content is indexed with Crossref and assigned a Digital Object Identifier (DOI). All metadata is openly available for harvesting by indexing services.
Acta Materia Medica guarantees that all published material will be available for perpetuity. Acta Materia Medica is a subscriber member to the Portico digital preservation service provided by ITHAKA, a not-for-profit organization with a mission to help the academic community use digital technologies to preserve the scholarly record and to advance research and teaching in sustainable ways.
No Lock-in
Acta Materia Medica uses open, non-proprietary standards for all of its content, meaning that it can be easily transferred to archives and other publishers. All of our article XML is compliant with the Journal Archiving Tag Suite (JATS) schema.
We endorse and adhere to the NISO Transfer Code of Practice, which ensures that when a journal transfers between publishers, that librarians, editors, and other publishers are informed and treated fairly.
We do not seek to possess journals or books content, but instead to support the editors in operating them. All copyright to the published content is retained by the authors, Acta Materia Medica does not retain rights to the published content and the content can be transferred away if the journal or editorial group decided to change publisher.
Advertising Policy
Acta Materia Medica does not accept advertising.