Authors' Responsibilities

This document aims to establish international standards for authors of scholarly research publications and to describe responsible research reporting practice. We hope these standards will be endorsed by research institutions, funders, and professional societies; promoted by editors and publishers; and will aid in research integrity training.

• The research being reported should have been conducted in an ethical and responsible manner and follow all relevant legislation.

• The research being reported should be sound and carefully executed.

• Researchers should use appropriate methods of data analysis and display (and, if needed, seek and follow specialist advice on this)

• Authors should take collective responsibility for their work and for the content of their publications

• Researchers should present their results honestly and without fabrication, falsification or inappropriate data manipulation. Research images (e.g. micrographs, X-rays, pictures of electrophoresis gels) should not be modified in a misleading way.

• Researchers should strive to describe their methods and to present their findings clearly and unambiguously. Researchers should follow applicable reporting guidelines. Publications should provide sufficient detail to permit experiments to be repeated by other researchers.

• Authors should alert the editor promptly if they discover an error in any submitted, accepted or published work. Authors should cooperate with editors in issuing corrections or retractions when required.

• Authors should represent the work of others accurately in citations and quotations.

• Authors should not copy references from other publications if they have not read the cited work.

• Study limitations should be addressed in publications.

• Authors should adhere to publication requirements that submitted work is original and has not been published elsewhere in any language. Work should not be submitted concurrently to more than one publication unless the editors have agreed to co-publication. If articles are co-published this fact should be made clear to readers.

• Applicable copyright laws and conventions should be followed. Copyright material (e.g. tables, figures or extensive quotations) should be reproduced only with appropriate permission and acknowledgement.

• Relevant previous work and publications, both by other researchers and the authors’ own, should be properly acknowledged and referenced. The primary literature should be cited where possible.

• All sources of research funding, including direct and indirect financial support, supply of equipment or materials, and other support (such as specialist statistical or writing assistance) should be disclosed.

• Researchers should ensure that only those individuals who meet authorship criteria (i.e. made a substantial contribution to the work) are rewarded with authorship and that deserving authors are not omitted.