ONLINE MANUSCRIPT SUBMISSION
Authors are requested to electronically submit their papers to this journal for evaluation and submission
at https://bentham.manuscriptpoint.com/journals/mirna/
View
Submission Instructions. The Manuscript Processing System (MPS) has been designed to
ensure step-by-step online processing and tracking of manuscripts for authors,
editors and the publisher from submission to acceptance and final reproduction.
Through the submission process, this website will guide authors through each stage of the submission
process. The text, tables, and
artwork should be uploaded at (https://bentham.manuscriptpoint.com/journals/mirna) in electronic format by the
authors. However, the authors who are unable to provide an electronic version or who are facing other
difficulties must contact the editorial office by emailing at [email protected] to discuss any alternatives.
Submissions that do not adhere to these guidelines will unfortunately not be taken into consideration.
Manuscripts must be submitted by one of the authors of the manuscript, and should not be submitted by
anyone on their behalf. The principal/corresponding author will be required to submit a Copyright Letter
along with the manuscript, on behalf of all the co-authors (if any). The author(s) will confirm that the
manuscript (or any part of it) has not been published previously or is not under consideration for
publication elsewhere. Furthermore, any illustration, structure, or table that has been published
elsewhere must be reported, and copyright permission for reproduction must be obtained.
FREE FORMAT SUBMISSION
The author's time is valuable and should not be wasted on research formatting. Free Format Submission
makes it easier and faster to prepare text for submission.
When submitting to any Bentham journal, authors are not required to follow any formatting guidelines.
When an article is accepted for publication, authors can submit it in the format of their choice, and
Bentham will convert it into a journal-specific format for them.
If the submission is accepted for publication, Bentham will format it in accordance with the style and
format of the journal.
For all online submissions, please provide soft copies ofall the materials (main text in MS Word or
Tex/LaTeX), figures/illustrations in TIFF, PDF or JPEG, and chemical structures drawn in ChemDraw
(CDX)/ISISDraw (TGF) as separate files, while a PDF version of the entire manuscript must also be
included, embedded with all the figures/illustrations/tables/chemical structures, etc.
It is imperative that before submission, authors should carefully proofread the files for special
characters, mathematical symbols, Greek letters, equations, tables, references and images, to ensure
that they appear in a proper format.
References, figures, tables, chemical structures, etc. should be referred to in the text
at the appropriate place where they have been first discussed. Figure legends/captions should also be
provided.
Successful electronic submission of a manuscript will be followed by a system-generated acknowledgements
to the principal/corresponding author. Any queries therein should be addressed to [email protected]
COPYRIGHT
Authors who publish in Bentham Science print & online journals will transfer copyright to their work
to Bentham Science Publishers. Submission of a manuscript to the respective journals implies that
all authors have read and agreed to the content of the Copyright Letter or the Terms and Conditions.
It is a condition of publication that manuscripts submitted to this journal have not been published
and will not be simultaneously submitted or published elsewhere. Plagiarism is strictly forbidden,
and by submitting the article for publication the authors agree that the publishers have the legal
right to take appropriate action against the authors, if plagiarism or fabricated information is
discovered. By submitting a manuscript, the authors agree that the copyright of their article is
transferred to the publishers if and when the article is accepted for publication. Once submitted to
the journal, the author will not withdraw their manuscript at any stage prior to publication.
It is mandatory that a signed copyright letter also be submitted along with the manuscript by the
author to whom correspondence is to be addressed. The article should not contain any such material
or information that may be unlawful, defamatory, fabricated, plagiarized, or which would, if
published, in any way whatsoever, violate the terms and conditions as laid down in the copyright
agreement. Copyright letter can be downloaded from the journal's Web site. Download the Copyright letter.
PERMISSION FOR REPRODUCTION
Permission to Reuse Bentham Content
Bentham Science has collaborated with the Copyright Clearance Center to meet our customer’s
licensing, besides rights & permission needs.
The Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink® service makes it faster and easier to secure permission
from Bentham Science’s journal titles. Visit
Journals by Title and locate the desired
content. Then go to the article’s abstract and click on “Rights and Permissions” to open the
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they need, please contact us at
[email protected]
Third-Party Permissions
Authors are responsible for managing the inclusion of third-party content as an author/editor of a
work. We refer to 'third party content' as any work that authors haven't developed themselves and
have copied or adapted from other sources. Text, figures, photographs, tables, screenshots, and
other items may be included.
Unless the figure is in the public domain (copyright-free) or permitted for use under Creative
Commons or other open licences, the author must get permission from the copyright holder(s).
Published/reproduced material should not be included unless written permission has been obtained from
the copyright holder, which should be forwarded to the Editorial Office in case of acceptance of the
article for publication.
Open Access Articles
Articles are licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
Public License (CC-BY 4.0) (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode), which permits
unrestricted distribution and reproduction in any medium, as long as the work is properly
credited/attributed. For more details, please visit Open Access Policy
ARCHIVING POLICIES
SELF-ARCHIVING
By signing the Copyright Letter, the authors retain the rights of self-archiving (subject to certain
restrictions).
Following are the important features of the self-archiving policy of Bentham Science journals:
Authors can deposit the first draft of a submitted article on their personal websites or
their institution's repositories for personal use, internal institutional use, or for
permitted scholarly posting only.
Authors may deposit the ACCEPTED VERSION of the peer-reviewed article on
their personal websites, their institution's repository or the non-commercial repositories,
PMC and arXiv, after 12 MONTHS of publication on the journal website. For
personal use, internal institutional use, or for permitted scholarly posting only.
In case of (b) above, an acknowledgement must be given to the original source of publication
and a link must be inserted to the published article on the journal's/publisher's website.
The link to the original source of publication should be provided by inserting the DOI
number of the article in the following sentence: "The published manuscript is available at
EurekaSelect via
https://www.eurekaselect.com/openurl/content.php?genre=article&doi=."
If the research is funded by NIH, Wellcome Trust or any other Open Access Mandate, authors
are allowed the archiving of published versions of manuscripts in the nominated
institutional repositories, after the mandatory embargo period. Authors should first contact
the Editorial Office of the journal for information about depositing a copy of the
manuscript to a repository. Consistent with the copyright agreement, Bentham Science does
not allow archiving of FINAL PUBLISHED VERSION of manuscripts unless under an Open Access
mandate as above. Archiving, under any of the above mentioned Open Access mandates, is done
under the terms of the Creative Commons License CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 -
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International.
There is no embargo on the archiving of articles published under the OPEN ACCESS
PLUS category. Authors are allowed deposition of such articles on
institutional, non-commercial repositories and personal websites immediately after
publication on the journal website. This is done under the terms of the Creative
Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License CC-BY 4.0.
In case of any form of archiving, an acknowledgement must be given to the original source of
publication and a link must be inserted to the published article on the
journal's/publisher's website. The link to the original source of publication should be
provided by inserting the DOI number of the article in the following sentence: "The
published manuscript is available at EurekaSelect via
https://www.eurekaselect.com/openurl/content.php?genre=article&doi=."
LONG-TERM ARCHIVING OF BENTHAM SCIENCE CONTENT
To ensure permanent access to our publications, Bentham Science has an agreement with Portico
to
have a long-term preservation of the content published in its journals.
MANUSCRIPTS PUBLISHED
The journal publishes original research, peer-reviewed mini- and full-length review articles, systematic
reviews,
letters, conference reports, randomized drug clinical trials studies, commentaries, book reviews, case
reports and current frontiers written in
English. Single topic/ thematic issues may also be considered for publication.
Single Topic Issues
These special issues are peer-reviewed and may contain invited or uninvited review/mini-review
articles or a mixture of research articles, and reviews/mini-reviews. A Single Topic Issue Editor
will offer a short perspective and co-ordinate the solicitation of manuscripts between 3-5 (for a
mini-thematic issue) to 6-10 (for fulllength thematic issue) from leading scientists. Authors
interested in editing a single topic issue in an emerging topic of outstanding developments in miRNA
may submit their proposal to the Editor-in-Chief at [email protected] for
consideration.
Conference Proceedings
For proposals to publish conference proceedings in this journal, please contact us at email: [email protected].
MANUSCRIPT LENGTH
Mini-Reviews
Mini-reviews should be 3000- 6000 words with 75 or more references, structures, photographs,
schemes, tables, etc.
Randomized Drug Clinical Trial Studies
Trial studies should be 4000 to 6000 words with 50 or more references excluding figures,
structures, photographs, schemes, tables etc.
Research Articles
Research articles should be of 4000-6000 words with 75 or more references excluding figures,
structures, photographs, schemes, tables, etc.
Letter Articles
Letters should be 3000-4000 words with 40 or more references excluding figures, structures,
photographs, schemes, tables, etc.
Systematic Reviews
Systematic Reviews include systematic updates on review protocols, methods, research and results
from all relevant fields for any studies and updates on already published issues. The total
number of words for a published systematic review is from 4000 to 6000 words with 100 or more
references excluding figures, structures, photographs, schemes, tables etc.
Systematic reviews and meta-analyses must be reported according to PRISMA guidelines; (www.prisma-statement.org).
Registration of Systematic Reviews
Bentham Science Publishers supports retrospective registration of systematic reviews, in a
suitable registry (such as PROSPERO). The
registered systematic review must include the registration number as the last line of the
manuscript abstract.
Case Reports
Case reports should describe new observations of findings or novel/unique outcomes relevant to
the field. The total number of words for a published case report is 1500 to 2500 words with 40
or more references excluding figures, structures, photographs, schemes, tables etc
.
Editorials
Editorials are short papers on important topics related to the journal. The total number of words
in an editorial should not exceed 1000 to 1500, and it should contain only 10-15 references. An
abstract
is not required.
Commentaries
Commentaries present an analysis by scientists on different important issues related to the
publications in the journal. Commentaries should contain less than 3000 words, including the
abstract, main text, references, and figure legends. However, an abstract is not necessary.
Perspectives
A perspective provides a short overview of a research topic relevant to the field. The length of
a published perspective ranges from 1500 to 1800 words, with 20 or more references, excluding
figures, structures, photographs, schemes, tables, etc.
Industry News
Industry News should provide important developments in industries related to the scope of the
Journal, that could be of interest to the readers. The length of the submission should be about
1000 words, and it should ideally have 10 or more references (abstract is not required).
Patent News
Patent News may present important information about recent important patents that have been
granted, relevant to the scope of this journal. The length should be about 1000 words, and it
should ideally have 10 or more references (abstract is not required).
Position Papers
Position papers are based on thorough research and analysis and aim to influence policy
decisions, guide future research directions, or provide guidance to practitioners or
stakeholders.
They are short papers on important topics related to the journal. The length of a position paper
article is from 3000-4000 words with 40 or more references excluding figures, structures,
photographs, schemes, tables, etc.
MANUSCRIPT PREPARATION
The manuscript should be written in English in a clear, direct and active style. All pages must be
numbered sequentially, facilitating in the reviewing and editing of the manuscript.
MICROSOFT WORD TEMPLATE
It is advisable that authors prepare their manuscript using the template available on the Web, which
will assist in preparation of the manuscript according to journal’s format. Download the
Template.
SECTIONS IN MANUSCRIPTS
Manuscripts submitted for research and review articles in the journal should be divided into the
following sections:
Title
Title Page
Structured Abstract
Graphical Abstract
Keywords
Text Organization
Conclusion
List of Abbreviations (if any)
Consent for Publication
Conflict of Interest
Acknowledgements
References
Appendices
Figures/Illustrations (if any)
Chemical Structures (if any)
Tables (if any)
Supportive/Supplementary Material (if any)
Title
The title of the article should be precise and brief and must not be more than 120 characters.
Authors should avoid the use of non-standard abbreviations and question marks in titles. The
first letter of each word should be in capital letters except for articles, conjunctions and
prepositions.
As recommended by the Reporting guidelines information about the study should be a part of the
title (particularly for randomized or clinical trials,
systematic reviews and meta analyses).
Authors should also provide a short 'running title with no more than 80 characters'. Title,
running title, byline, correspondent footnote, and
keywords should be written as presented in the original manuscript.
Title Page
Title page should include paper title, author(s) full name and affiliation, corresponding
author(s) names complete affiliation/address, along with phone, fax and email.
Structured Abstract:
The abstract of an article should be a clear, concise and accurate summary, having no more than
250 words, and including the explicit sub-headings (as in-line or run-in headings in bold). Use
of abbreviations should be avoided and the references should not be cited in the abstract.
All the original research articles, systematic reviews and meta-analyses must be accompanied by a
structured abstract. Ideally, each abstract should include the following sub-headings, but these
may vary according to the requirements of the article.
Introduction/Objective: Summarize the objective or purpose of the
research in a few sentences.
Methods: Give a brief description of the research design, methodology,
and other relevant details about the conduct of the study.
Results: Outline the main conclusions or findings of the study, often
with statistical data or significant findings.
Conclusion: Provide an overview of the study's key findings and any
implications.
The headings can vary, but must state the purpose of the study, details of the participants,
measurements, methods, main findings and conclusion.
Graphical Abstract
A graphic must be included with each manuscript for use in the Table of Contents (TOC). This must
be submitted separately as an electronic file (preferred file types are EPS, PDF, TIFF,
Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and CDX, etc.). A graphical abstract, not exceeding
30 words along with the illustration, helps to summarize the contents of the manuscript in a
concise pictorial form. It is meant as an aid for the rapid viewing of the journals' contents
and to help capture the readers’ attention. The graphical abstract may feature a key structure,
reaction, equation, etc., that the manuscript elucidates upon. It will be
listed
along with the manuscript title, authors’ names and affiliations in the contents page, typeset
within an area of 5 cm by 17 cm, but it will not appear in the article PDF file or in print.
Graphical Abstracts should be submitted as a separate file (must clearly mention graphical
abstract within the file) online via Bentham's Manuscript Processing System
(MPS).
You can view a few examples of the Graphical Abstracts on
our
website.
Keywords
6 to 8 keywords must be provided. Choose important and relevant keywords that researchers in your
field will be searching for so
that your paper will appear in a database search. The keywords should be contained in the title
and they should appear several times in the
article. In biomedical fields, MeSH terms are a good ʻcommon vocabularyʼ source to draw keywords
from https://www.nlm.nih.gov/mesh/meshhome.html.
Text Organization
The main text should begin on a separate page and should be divided into separate sections. The
manuscript should be divided into title page, abstract and the main text. The text may be
subdivided further according to the areas to be discussed, which should be followed by the
Acknowledgements and Reference sections. The Review Article should mention any previous
important recent and old reviews in the field and contain a comprehensive discussion starting
with the general background of the field. It should then go on to discuss the salient features
of recent developments. The authors should avoid presenting material which has already been
published in a previous review. The authors are advised to present and discuss their
observations in brief.
For Research Articles the manuscript should begin with the title page and abstract
followed by the main text, which must be structured into separate sections as Introduction,
Materials and Methods, Results, Discussion, Conclusion, Ethics Approval and Consent to
Participate, Human and Animal Rights, Conflict of Interest, Acknowledgements and References
.
For case reports, the authors should follow the CARE
guidelines. The CARE
checklist should be submitted as a separate file.
Meta-analyses of observational studies in epidemiology must be reported according to MOOSE or
PRISMA guidelines.
All randomized clinical trials must include a flow diagram and authors should provide a
completed randomized trial checklist (see CONSORT Flow Diagram and Checklist;
www.consort-statement.org
) and a trial protocol.
The manuscript style must be uniform throughout the text and 10 pt Times New Roman font should be
used. The full term for an abbreviation should precede its first appearance in the text unless
it is a standard unit of measurement. The reference numbers should be given in square brackets
in the text. Italics should be used for Binomial names of organisms (Genus and Species), for
emphasis and for unfamiliar words or
phrases. Non-assimilated words from Latin or other languages should also be italicized
e.g.
in vivo, in vitro, per se, et al., etc
.
SECTION HEADINGS
Section headings should be numbered sequentially, left aligned and have the first letter
capitalized, starting with the introduction. Sub-section headings however, should be in
lower-case and italicized with their initials capitalized. They should be numbered as 1.1,
1.2, etc.
INTRODUCTION
The Introduction section should include the background and aims of the research in a
comprehensive manner.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
This section provides details of the methodology used along with information on any previous
efforts with
corresponding references. Any details for further modifications and research should be
included. Sufficient details should be provided to the
reader about the original data source in order to enable the analysis, appropriateness and
verification of the results reported in the study.
It is important for the Methods Section should be sufficiently detailed in respect of the
data presented, and the results produced from it. This
section should include all the information and protocol gathered for the study at the time
when it was being written. If the study is funded or
financially supported by an organization to conduct the research, then it should be
mentioned in the Methods Section. Methods must be result-
oriented. The statement regarding the approval by an independent local, regional or national
review committee (e.g. name of ethic committee
and institutional review board) should be part of the Methods Section.
Transparent reporting on AI and AI-assisted Technologies
Authors who use AI tools for the production of images or graphical elements of the paper,
or in the collection and analysis of data, must disclose the use of such tools in the
Materials and Methods (or similar section) of the paper, stating how the AI tool was
used and which tool was used.
Authors are fully responsible for the content of their manuscript, including parts
produced with the assistance of an AI tool, and are thus liable for any breach of
publication ethics.
Bentham Science Publishers will assess whether the manner AI was used and declared is
reasonable and compliant with its published principles and practices. After publication,
content may be rejected or changed due to inadequate declaration or the specific
circumstances of its use.
EXPERIMENTAL
Repeated information should not be reported in the text of an article. A calculation section
must include experimental data, facts and practical development from a theoretical
perspective.
RESULTS
The important and main findings of the study should come first in the Results Section. The
tables, figures and references should be given in sequence to emphasize the important
information or observations related to the research. The repetition of data in tables and
figures should be avoided. Results should be precise.
DISCUSSION
This should explore the significance of the results of the work, present a reproducible
procedure and emphasis the importance of the article in the light of recent developments in
the field. Extensive citations and discussion of published literature should be avoided.
This section of research articles should discuss the implications of the findings in the
context of existing research and highlight the study's limitations. The authors should
justify the sample size according to the study purpose and methods.
The Results and Discussion may be presented together under one heading of “Results and
Discussion”. Alternatively, they may be presented under two separate sections (“Results”
section and “Discussion” Sections). Short sub-headings may be added in each section if
required.
CONCLUSION
A small paragraph summarizing the contents of the article, presenting the final outcome of
the research or proposing further study on the subject, may be given at the end of the
article under the Conclusion section.
FUNDING
The authors need to declare the funding sources of their manuscripts clearly by providing the
name of the funding agency or financial support along with allotted grant/award number in
round brackets (if applied), for instance, "This work was financially supported by [Name of
the funding agency] (Grant number XXX)".
Similarly, if a paper does not have any specific funding source, and is part of the
employment of the authors, then the name of the employer will be required. Authors will have
to clearly state that the funder was involved in writing, editing, approval, or decision to
publish the article.
Greek Symbols and Special Characters
Greek symbols and special characters often undergo formatting changes and get corrupted or lost
during preparation of manuscript for publication. To ensure that all special characters used are
embedded in the text, these special characters should be inserted as a symbol but should not be
a result of any format styling (Symbol font face) otherwise they will be lost during conversion
to PDF/XML.
Authors are encouraged to consult reporting guidelines. These guidelines provide a set of
recommendations comprising a list of items relevant to their specific research design. Chemical
equations, chemical names, mathematical usage, unit of measurements, chemical and physical
quantity & units must conform to SI and Chemical Abstracts or IUPAC.
All kinds of measurements should be reported only in International System of Units (SI).
Appendices
In case there is a need to present lengthy, but essential methodological details, appendices must
be used, which can be a part of the article. An appendix must not exceed three pages (Times New
Roman, 10 point fonts, 900 max. words per page). The information should be provided in a
condensed form, ruling out the need of full sentences. A single appendix should be titled
APPENDIX, while more than one can be titled APPENDIX A, APPENDIX B, and so on.
Supportive/Supplementary Material
We do encourage to append supportive material, for example a PowerPoint file containing a talk
about the study, a PowerPoint file containing additional screenshots, a Word, RTF, or PDF
document showing the original instrument(s) used, a video, or the original data (SAS/SPSS files,
Excel files, Access Db files, etc.) provided it is inevitable or endorsed by
the journal's Editor.
Supportive/Supplementary material intended for publication must be numbered and referred to in
the manuscript but should not be a part of the submitted paper. In-text citations
as well as a section with the heading "Supportive/Supplementary Material" before the
"References" section should be provided. Here, list all Supportive/Supplementary Material and
include a brief caption line for each file describing its contents.
Any additional files will be linked to the final published article in the form supplied by the
author, but will not be displayed within the paper. They will be made available in exactly the
same form as originally provided only on our Web site. Please also make sure that
each additional file is a single table, figure or movie (please do not upload linked worksheets
or PDF files larger than one sheet). Supportive/Supplementary material must be provided in a
single zipped file not larger than 4 MB.
Authors must clearly indicate if these files are not for publication but meant for the
reviewers'/editors' perusal only.
List of Abbreviations
If abbreviations are used in the text either they should be defined in the text where first used,
or a list of abbreviations can be provided.
RESEARCH ETHICS AND POLICIES
CONFLICT OF INTEREST
AUTHORS
All potential conflicts of interest (competing interests) that could have a direct or indirect
influence on the work must be disclosed by the authors. Even if an author does not have a
conflict, disclosing affiliations and interests allows for a more comprehensive and open
approach, which leads to a more accurate and objective evaluation of the work. Conflicts of
interest, whether genuine or imagined, are a perspective to which the readers are entitled.
The publication of a conflict statement in the article itself, as well as the submission of the
conflict disclosure form, is required for all types of papers. It is not necessarily the case
that a monetary relationship with examination support or funding for counseling work is
inappropriate. Even if the authors do not have any conflict of interest, they still need to
provide a confirmation statement in their manuscripts, i.e., “The author(s) confirm(s) that
there is no conflict of interest related to the manuscript.”
The following are some examples of potential conflicts of interest that are directly or
indirectly related to the research:
Financial competing interests include (but are not limited to):
Type of support/grant number
Institutional Conflicts of Interest
Funds received by the author
Funds received by the institution
Travel allowances for the research
Funds received for article preparation and reviewing
Funds for conducting review activities
Support provided for article writing assistance, for drugs, equipment, etc
Paid lectures
Pending fund or grant
Financial conflicts of interest can be personal as well as institutional. Personal conflict of
interest occurs when a contributor involved in the publication process either receives an amount
of money or expects to receive some financial help (including any other financial benefits such
as patents or stocks, gifts or services) that may impact the work related to a specific
publication. More importantly, in academic research, such financial relationships can lead to
institutional conflicts of interest (COIs) because the economic interests of the institution or
institutional representatives may unsuitably affect the decision-making process.
An institutional conflict of interest arises in a situation when financial interests of an
institution or any institutional official (e.g., investments held by the university in a
company) have the potential to unduly influence the research conducted by its employees or
students, or pose an unacceptable risk to human subjects. Such conflicts usually arise in a
state of affairs where a research project directly offers assistance or a benefit to an external
entity via evaluation, validation, trial or test of an invention, product, drug,
service or
technology, and the institution holds a financial interest with the external entity. Such
financial interests incorporate, but are not limited to, receipt of licensing payments or
royalties from the external entity, or ownership interest with the external entity. When human
subjects are involved in any research project, and the institution supports such a financial
interest, the conflict of interest is speculated to be unreasonable.
Non-financial competing interests include (but are not limited to):
In addition, interests other than monetary and any funding (non-financial interests) should be
declared if they are relevant to readers. Personal relationships or conflicting interests
directly or indirectly related to research, as well as professional interests or personal
opinions that may impact your research, are examples of these.
Intellectual property, in basic terms, refers to any intangible property that is
the result of
creativity, such as patents, copyrights, etc. Similarly, this section seeks to know about
copyright and patent (licensed patent, pending or issued) and any payment received for
intellectual property, such as:
Patent
Licensed Patent
Issued Patent
Pending Patent
Royalties
Licensee
Remarks
DISCLOSURE STATEMENT
All conflict of interest disclosure forms are collected by the corresponding author. It is
sufficient for the corresponding author to sign the disclosure form on behalf of all authors in
author collaborations when legal agreements for representation allow it. The
templates of the form can be found here.
Disclosure
form
ICMJE
disclosure form
Before the reference list, the corresponding author will include a summary statement in the text
of the article that reflects what is reported in the potential conflict of interest disclosure
form (s). Author(s) may declare(s) names of reviewers who they think might have a potential
conflict of interest; therefore, Editorial Office could avoid inviting such reviewers for an
unbiased opinion.
UNDISCLOSED CONFLICT OF INTEREST
Undisclosed conflict of interest cases before or after the publication of an article are dealt
with as per the guidelines of COPE.
Undisclosed conflict of interest in a submitted article (View
COPE guidelines)
Undisclosed conflict of interest in a published article (View
COPE guidelines)
For more information on COIs, see the guidance from the ICMJE.
PEER REVIEWERS
Bentham Science tries to conduct a transparent peer-review process with the help of the reviewers
who do not have any conflict of interest with the authors. In this connection, reviewers who
belong to the same institute or countries as authors are not invited to review manuscripts.
However, it is not possible for the Editorial Office to be aware of all competing interests;
therefore, it is expected from authors to submit:
List of reviewers who they think have a conflict of interest to ensure a transparent and
unbiased review process.
The Editorial Office expects reviewers:
Not to accept manuscript review requests if they have any potential conflict of interest
and inform the Editorial Office accordingly.
To decline review requests if they have recently published or submitted an article with
any of the authors listed in the manuscript.
To inform the Editorial Office if they have any personal relationship with the authors or
work in the same institutes as of authors, which could affect the review transparency.
To abstain from reviewing and informing the Editorial Office/Editor-in-Chief/Handling
Editors about any scientific misconduct or fraud, plagiarism, conflict of interest, or
any other unethical behavior related to the manuscript, which they found while reviewing
it.
During the submission of review comments, reviewers are asked to reconfirm that they do not have
any conflict of interest related to the article. After confirming the below statement, they can
submit their comments.
“I hereby confirm that I don’t have any conflict of interest related to the manuscript.”
If, however, there are still any remaining interests, then reviewers must mention those in the
‘Confidential’ section of the review form.
Reviewers are not encouraged to contact authors directly regarding any of their conflicts of
interest. Peer reviewers should follow journals’ policies in situations they consider to
represent a conflict to reviewing.
UNDISCLOSED CONFLICT OF INTEREST
If reviewers intentionally undisclosed any conflict of interest, then they will be blacklisted
for any future peer reviewing activity of the journal.
The Editorial Office always ensures that an author, if added after peer review activity of a
manuscript, is not part of the reviewers’ list who have conducted a peer review of the same
manuscript.
EDITORS
Editors must not review submitted manuscripts if they have any personal, professional or
financial involvement/conflict of interest with the authors of the manuscript. Every participant
involved in the peer review process, including editorial board members, reviewers, and editors,
must declare any potential conflicts of interest to ensure a transparent and unbiased review
activity.
Editors-in-Chief or Editors who are responsible for the initial and final decision should recuse
themselves to review or take decisions on any manuscript that is written by authors affiliated
to the same institute as of editor, or if they have been a family member, competitor,
collaborator, or have published any manuscript in last 3 years with the authors associated with
the manuscript. They can however nominate someone else on the Board who could provide a neutral
opinion on the manuscript.
The Editorial office recommends editors to follow COPE and
WAME
guidelines to process such manuscripts which involves their personal relationship.
Manuscripts submission by an Editor/Editor-in-Chief
The initial and final decision on the manuscripts submitted by an Editor/Editor-in-Chief will be
taken by any other member of the Board. The Editorial Office will identify members who do not
have any potential conflict of interest with the Editor or Editor-in-Chief.
Acknowledgements
Any research assistants or other individuals who assisted with the research but do not meet all criteria for authorship, such as those who carried out the literature review, produced, computerized, and analyzed the data, or helped with the language, writing, or proofreading of the article, or offered any comments or suggestions, should be acknowledged. Briefly, everyone who has contributed significantly to the improvement of the paper should be acknowledged. It is recommended to mention the "Declared None" if there is no acknowledgement for the study.
Author Contributions/ CRediT Author Statement
The specific requirements for authorship have been defined by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE). The examples of authors' contributions are 'designed research/study', 'performed research/study', 'contributed important reagents', 'collected data', 'analyzed data', 'wrote paper' etc. This information must be included in the submitted manuscript as a separate paragraph under the heading ‘Authors' Contribution’. The corresponding author is responsible for obtaining permission from all co-authors for the submission of any version of the manuscript and making any changes in the authorship.
IMPORTANT: An Author Contribution CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy)
statement is now a strict requirement for all submissions to
MicroRNA. This policy aims to address past inconsistencies in the provision of "Author Contribution" statements by
authors. Authors are encouraged to
clearly define and document their contributions to promote transparency and accountability in the research
process.
HUMAN AND ANIMAL RIGHTS
Research Involving Humans
All clinical investigations should be conducted according to the Declaration
of Helsinki principles. For all manuscripts reporting data from studies involving human
participants, formal review and approval by an appropriate institutional review board or ethics
committee are required.
Patient Consent
Compliance with the guidelines of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (www.icmje.org) is recommended, in accordance with the patient’s
consent for research or participation in a study as per the applicable laws and regulations
regarding the privacy and/or security of personal information, including, but not limited to, the
Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 ("HIPAA") and other U.S. federal and
state laws relating to confidentiality and security of personally distinguishable evidence, the
General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) (EU) 2016/679 and member state implementing legislation,
Canada's Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act, India's Information
Technology Act and related Privacy Rules, (together "Data Protection and Privacy Laws").
It is the responsibility of the author to ensure that:
Patients' names, initials, or hospital numbers are not mentioned anywhere in the manuscript
(including figures).
Authors are responsible for obtaining the patient consent-to-disclose forms for all
recognizable patients in photographs, videos, or other information that may be published in
the Journal, in derivative works, or on the journal’s website and for providing the
manuscript to the recognizable patient for review before submission.
The consent-to-disclose form should indicate specific use (publication in the medical
literature in print and online, with the understanding that patients and the public will
have access) of the patient's information and any images in figures or videos, and must
contain the patient's signature or that of a legal guardian along with a statement that the
patient or legal guardian has been offered the opportunity to review the identifying
materials and the accompanying manuscript.
If the manuscript has an individuals’ data, such as personal details, audio-video material,
etc., consent should be obtained from that individual. In case of children,
consent should be obtained from the parent or the legal guardian.
A specific declaration of such approval and consent-to-disclose form must be made in the
copyright letter and in a stand-alone paragraph at the end of the article especially in the
case of human studies where inclusion of a statement regarding obtaining the written
informed consent from each subject or subject's guardian is a must. The original should be
retained by the guarantor or the corresponding author. Editors may request to provide the
original forms by fax or email.
All such case reports require by a proper consent being obtained prior to publishing. Please
refer COPE guidelines available at https://publicationethics.org/resources/guidelines/journals%E2%80%99-best-practices-ensuring-consent-publishing-medical-case-reports.
Editors may request that authors provide documentation of the formal review and recommendation from
the institutional review board or ethics committee responsible for oversight of the study. The
editors reserve the right to reject manuscripts that do not comply with the above-mentioned
requirements. The author will be held responsible for false statements or failure to fulfill the
above-mentioned requirements.
Non-identifiable Images
Anonymous images, that do not identify the individual directly or indirectly, such as through any
identifying marks or text, do not require formal consent, for example, X-rays, ultrasound
images, pathology slides or laparoscopic images.
In case consent is not obtained, concealing the identity through eye bars or blurring the face
would not be acceptable.
Research Involving Animals
For research involving animals, the authors should indicate whether the procedures followed were in
accordance with the standards set forth in the eighth edition of “Guide for the Care and Use of
Laboratory Animals” (grants.nih.gov/grants/olaw/guide-for-the-care-and-use-of-laboratory-animals_prepub.pdf
published by the National Academy of Sciences, The National Academies Press, Washington, D.C.).
Research work on animals should be carried out in accordance with the NC3Rs ARRIVE Guidelines. For
In Vivo Experiments, please visit https://www.nc3rs.org.uk/arrive-guidelines
Authors should clearly state the name of the approval committee, highlighting that legal and ethical
approvals were obtained prior to initiation of the research work carried out on animals, and that
the experiments were performed in accordance with the relevant guidelines and regulations stated
below.
US authors should cite compliance with the US National Research Council's "Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory
Animals"
The US Public Health Service's "Policy on Humane Care
and Use of Laboratory Animals" and "Guide
for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals"
UK authors should conform to UK legislation under the
Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986 Amendment Regulations (SI 2012/3039).
European authors outside the UK should conform to Directive
2010/63/EU.
Research on animals should adhere to ethical guidelines of the
International Council for Laboratory Animal Science (ICLAS) ethical
guidelines.
The manuscript should clearly include a declaration of compliance with the relevant
guidelines (e.g. the revised Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986 in
the UK and Directive 2010/63/EU in Europe) and/or relevant permissions or licenses obtained
by the IUCN Policy
Statement on Research Involving Species at Risk of Extinction and the Convention on the Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna
and Flora.
Animal Ethics Guidelines for Studies Involving Animal Subjects
Ethics Approval Exemption:
If a study is exempted from ethics approval, authors must indicate the reasons for exemption in the ethical statement.
Following is an example of Ethical Statements:
"This study involving animal subjects is exempted from ethics approval for [specific reasons]. The exemption was evaluated and authorized by [Full name of ethics committee], ensuring adherence to ethical standards”.
Client-Owned Animals:
Client-owned animals (non-commercially available animals such as pets or livestock) should be studied exercising best practices in veterinary care. Authors must confirm that the owner(s) (or their legal representatives) have provided written consent for this purpose.
Following is an example of Ethical Statements:
"The animal study was evaluated and authorized by [Full name of the ethics committee]. The owners provided written informed consent for their animals' involvement in this study, ensuring ethical treatment and compliance with standards."
International Standards and 3Rs Principle:
Studies involving animals must comply with internationally accepted standards and adhere to the 3Rs principles (Replace, Reduce, Refine).
- Replace: Whenever possible, replace animals with alternatives.
- Reduce: Reducing the number of animals used and
- Refine: Refining experimental settings can reduce animal damage.
Authors are encouraged to follow the ARRIVE guidelines (Reporting in Vivo Experiments) for reporting experiments involving live animals.
An example of Ethical Statements:
"This study adheres to internationally accepted standards for animal research, following the 3Rs principle. The ARRIVE guidelines were employed for reporting experiments involving live animals, promoting ethical research practices."
Euthanasia Protocols:
Studies on euthanasia, including chloral hydrate, ether, and chloroform overdose, are severely discouraged. Authors should include an in-depth description of any anesthetic, surgical, or euthanasia procedures conducted throughout the study.
If the experimental details explained in the study violate the standard animal research procedure, editors may seek extra documentation, such as approval forms and relevant literature citations.
Research Involving Plants
All experimental research on plants (either cultivated or wild), should comply with international
guidelines. The manuscript should include a declaration of compliance of field studies with relevant
guidelines and/or relevant permissions or licenses obtained by the IUCN Policy Statement on
Research Involving Species at Risk of Extinction and the Convention on the Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and
Flora.
Hazard Study
Any unusual risks associated with the use of any chemicals, procedures, or equipment used in the work
must be
explicitly stated by the author in the manuscript, preferably in both the materials and methods
section and the
declaration section. For more information, visit The World Medical Association (https://www.wma.net/what-we-do/public-health/chemicals)
SEX AND GENDER EQUITY IN RESEARCH (SAGER) GUIDELINES
We strive to promote gender and sex equity in research and adhere to the guidelines of Sex and Gender
Equity in Research (SAGER) to ensure inclusivity and rigor of the work. All authors submitting
research papers are required to follow the Sex and Gender Equity in Research (SAGER) guidelines. These guidelines are
intended to encourage the inclusion of sex and gender considerations in research in order to improve
the rigor and relevance of our publications.
The SAGER guidelines for reporting sex and gender information in methodology or study design, data
analysis, results, and interpretation of findings are strongly encouraged. Authors of review
articles are advised to address the methods used for selecting, locating, extracting, and
synthesizing data; systematic reviews are required to do so.
RESEARCH CONDUCTED IN SPECIAL OR CRITICAL SITUATIONS
Bentham Science expects all contributors to respect values of justice, benevolence, and autonomy when
conducting research. We understand that certain situations such as medical emergencies or
humanitarian crises may differ from non-emergency scenarios. Bentham Science recommends that
research efforts should not hurt human subjects/respondents or the researchers, and should be
conducted with sufficient scientific rigor as permissible in these situations, respectively. Care
should be taken to address potential problems faced by persons who may be victims of disasters or
involved in a medical emergency. These are vulnerable individuals and their privacy and dignity
should be respected. Researchers should make note of this in their research and identify potential
issues in their work that may arise because of such situations. Research directed in emergency
circumstances should be to the greatest advantage of survivors involved in the research and with the
goal of minimizing any future casualties. For guidance, the essential requirements of research in
emergency situation are the preservation of human life, wellbeing and security, along with the
rights to protection, privacy and confidentiality of subjects.
UNETHICAL BEHAVIOR
Unethical behavior and misconduct may be pointed out by anyone to the Editor and Publisher with
sufficient evidences. The Editor, in consultation with the Publisher, will initiate investigation
against this Unethical misconduct, complete the procedure till an unbiased decision is reached, and
maintain confidentiality throughout the process of the investigation. The Author should be given the
opportunity to reply to all minor or major accusations.
In case of serious breaches, the employer may be informed where appropriate, by the Editor/Publisher,
after reviewing all available information and evidences or after seeking help from experts in that
field.
Conclusion
Author(s) and Reviewers must be informed in case of misinterpretation or mishandling of
International Acceptable Standards
A strict notice should be sent to the author and reviewer to avoid future unethical
misconduct
An Editorial on the reported misconduct should be published or official notice of unethical
behavior should be posted on the website
Official letter about this misconduct should be issued to the Head of Departments, Funding
Agencies of the accused author and the reviewer, as well as Abstracting & Indexing
Agencies.
Where required, retraction and withdrawal of publication may be undertaken from the
Publisher’s journal in discussion with the Head of the Department of the author or reviewer,
and other higher authorities should be informed
The Publisher may impose restrictions for some period on future publications from the accused
author in the journals
Consent for Publication
If the manuscript has an individuals’ data, such as personal detail, audio-video material etc
., consent should be obtained from that individual. In case of children, consent should be
obtained from the parent or the legal guardian.
A specific declaration of such approval and consent-to-disclose form must be made in the copyright
letter and in a stand-alone paragraph at the end of the article especially in the case of human
studies where inclusion of a statement regarding obtaining the written informed consent from each
subject or subject's guardian is a must. The original should be retained by the guarantor or
corresponding author. Editors may request to provide the original forms by fax or email.
All such case reports should be followed by a proper consent prior to publishing.
POST-PUBLICATION DISCUSSIONS
Post-publication discussions are well-timed and engaging scientific remarks and
justifications on research articles published in "MicroRNA". These remarks must be
based on the information concurrent with the original study and not on the scientific advancements
being made subsequently.
Manuscript Preparation, Submission & Editorial Process:
- Post-publication discussion should commence with a short paragraph that outlines the summary of
the article.
- Authors are advised to avoid using inciting tone in the comments and keep the message clear and
concise.
- The main text should not exceed 1200 words with up to 15 references and may include one or two
figures and/or tables.
- References should be submitted in the ACS or Vancouver style.
- The correspondents are recommended to contact the original authors first prior to submitting
their comments to the journal as this may resolve the issues that may have arisen due to some
misunderstanding.
- The correspondence that has been done with the authors should also be submitted as an attachment
with the manuscript.
Any queries therein should be addressed to [email protected]
AUTHENTICATION OF CELL LINES
The NIH acknowledges the misidentification and/or cross-contamination of cell cultures e.g.
HeLa cells being used in a research study as a serious problem. In order to ensure the
validation of the work and proper utilization of resources, it is a prerequisite that correct reagents
be used in studies dealing with established human (tumor) cell lines that have been cultured for more
than 4 years up to the date of submission of the manuscript. Cell lines such as short-term cultures of
human tumors, murine cell lines (as a catalog of DNA profiles is not yet available) and tumor cell lines
established in the course of the study that is being submitted, are presently exempt from this rule. To
minimize the risk of working with misidentified and/or contaminated cell lines, tests such as isoenzyme
analysis, karyotyping/cytogenetic analysis and, more recently, molecular techniques of DNA profiling may
be carried out to authenticate cell cultures. These tests may help confirm or establish the identify
profile for a cell line. Bentham Science recommends that all cell lines be
authenticated prior to submitting a paper for review. Authors are therefore required to provide
authentication of the origin and identity of the cells by performing cell profiling either in their own
laboratory or by outsourcing an approved laboratory or cell bank. Authentication is required when a new
line is established or acquired, before freezing a cell line, if the performance of the line is not
consistent or results are unexpected, if using more than one cell line, and before publication of the
study.
The cell lines profile should be cross-checked with the profile of the donor tissue of other continuous
cell lines such as provided by the authentic data bank such as DSMZ (www.dsmz.de/fp/cgi-bin/str.html), ATCC® (https://www.atcc.org/en/Products/Cells_and_Microorganisms.aspx)
etc.
RANDOMIZED DRUG CLINICAL TRIAL STUDIES
Randomized drug clinical trial studies are biomedical or health-related interventional and/or
observational research studies conducted in phases in human beings who are randomly allocated to receive
or not receive a preventive, therapeutic, or diagnostic intervention that follows a pre-defined
protocol. The study is intended to determine the safety and efficacy of approaches to disease
prevention, diagnosis and treatment.
Authors of randomized controlled trials are encouraged to submit trial protocols along with their
manuscripts. All clinical trials must be registered (before recruitment of the first participant) at an
appropriate online public trial registry that must be independent of for-profit interest (e.g., www.clinicaltrials.gov). If you wish the editor(s) to
consider an unregistered trial, please explain briefly why the trial has not been registered.
All randomized clinical trials should include a flow diagram
and authors should provide a completed randomized trial
checklist (see CONSORT Flow Diagram and Checklist; www.consort-statement.org)
and a trial protocol. For further details, please visit complete
guidelines at:
http://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/publishing-and-editorial-issues/clinical-trial-registration.html
Studies of diagnostic accuracy must be reported according to STARD guidelines; (www.stard-statement.org)
Observational studies (cohort, case-control, or cross-sectional designs) must be reported
according to the STROBE statement, and should be submitted with their protocols; (www.strobe-statement.org).
Genetic association studies must be reported according to STREGA guidelines; (http://www.equator-network.org/reporting-guidelines/strobe-strega/)
Systematic reviews and meta-analyses must be reported according to PRISMA guidelines; (www.prisma-statement.org)
To find the reporting guidelines see (
www.equator-network.org)
Important points to remember while submitting clinical trials:
Each manuscript should clearly state an objective or hypothesis; the design and methods
(including the study setting and dates, patients or participants with inclusion and exclusion
criteria, or data sources, and how these were selected for the study); the essential features of
any interventions; the main outcome measures; the main results of the study; a comment section
placing the results in context with the published literature and addressing study limitations;
and the conclusions. Data included in research reports must be original.
Trial registry name, registration identification number, and the URL for the registry should be
included at the end of the abstract and also in the space provided on the online manuscript
submission form. If your research article reports the results of a controlled health care
intervention, list the trial registry, along with the unique identifying number (Please note
that there should be no space between the letters and numbers of your trial registration
number). Studies designed for other purposes, such as to study pharmacokinetics or major
toxicity (e.g., phase 1 trials), are exempted.
All reports of randomized trials should include a section entitled “Randomization and Masking”,
within the Methods section.
The manuscript must include a statement identifying the institutional and/or licensing committee
that has approved the experiments, including any relevant details.
The SI system of units and the recommended international non-proprietary name (rINN) for drug
names must be used. Kindly ensure that the dose, route, and frequency of administration of any
drug you mention are correct.
Please ensure that the clinical trials sponsored by pharmaceutical companies follow the
guidelines on good publication practice: (https://www.ismpp.org/gpp2)
The editors reserve the right to reject manuscripts that do not comply with the above-mentioned
requirements. The author will be held responsible for false statements or failure to fulfill the
above-mentioned requirements.
REFERENCES
References should be submitted preferably in the ACS or Vancouver style. All references must be complete
and accurate. The reference numbers must be finalized and the bibliography must be fully formatted
before submission.
The references should be relevant to the study and should refer to the original research sources.
Self-citation and self-interest should be avoided by the authors, editors, and peer-reviewers.
See below few examples of references listed in the ACS and Vancouver Style:
ACS Style
In ACS style, all references should be numbered sequentially [in square brackets] in the text and
listed in the same numerical order in the reference section. Superscript in the in-text citations
and reference section should be avoided.
Reference Lists
Different reference formats have different rules for citation. See below for some common format
examples.
Journal Article
The minimum required information for a journal article reference is author, abbreviated journal
title, year, publication, volume number, and initial page of cited article, though complete
pagination is possible. Journal abbreviation and volume are italicized. Year of
publication is bold. All authors must be cited and there should be no use of the
phrase et al. Journal abbreviations should follow the Index Medicus/MEDLINE.
Bard, M.; Woods, R.A.; Bartón, D.H.; Corrie, J.E.; Widdowson, D.A. Sterol mutants of
Saccharomyces cerevisiae: chromatographic analyses. Lipids
, 1977, 12(8), 645-654.
Zhang, W.; Brombosz, S.M.; Mendoza, J.L.; Moore, J.S. A high-yield, one-step synthesis of
o-phenylene ethynylene cyclic trimer via precipitation-driven alkyne
metathesis. J. Org. Chem., 2005, 70,
10198-10201.
Book Reference
Crabtree, R.H. The Organometallic Chemistry of the Transition Metals,
3rd ed.; Wiley & Sons: New York, 2001.
Book Chapter Reference
Wheeler, D.M.S.; Wheeler, M.M. D. Stereoselective Syntheses of Doxorubicin and Related
Compounds In: Studies in Natural Products Chemistry; Atta-ur-Rahman,
Ed.; Elsevier Science B. V: Amsterdam, 1994; Vol. 14, pp.
3-46.
Conference Proceedings
Jakeman, D.L.; Withers, S.G.E. In: Carbohydrate Bioengineering: Interdisciplinary
Approaches, Proceedings of the 4th Carbohydrate Bioengineering
Meeting, Stockholm, Sweden, June 10-13, 2001; Teeri, T.T.; Svensson, B.; Gilbert, H.J.;
Feizi, T., Eds.; Royal Society of Chemistry: Cambridge, UK, 2002; pp. 3-8.
URL(WebPage)
National Library of Medicine. Specialized Information Services: Toxicology and
Environmental Health. sis.nlm.nih.gov/Tox/ToxMain.html
(Accessed May 23, 2004).
Patent
Hoch, J.A.; Huang, S. Screening methods for the identification of novel antibiotics. U.S.
Patent 6,043,045, March 28, 2000.
Thesis
Mackel, H. Capturing the Spectra of Silicon Solar Cells. PhD Thesis, The
Australian National University: Canberra, December 2004.
E-citations
Citations for articles/material published exclusively online or in open access
(free-to-view), must contain the accurate Web addresses (URLs) at the end of the
reference(s), except those posted on an author’s Web site (unless editorially
essential), e.g. ‘Reference: Available from: URL’.
Some important points to remember
All authors must be cited and there should be no use of the phrase et al.
Date of access should be provided for online citations.
Punctuation should be properly applied as mentioned in the examples given above.
Abstracts, unpublished data and personal communications (which can only be included if
prior permission has been obtained) should not be given in the references section. The
details may however appear in the footnotes.
The authors are encouraged to use a recent version of EndNote (version 5 and above) or
Reference Manager (version 10) when formatting their reference list, as this allows
references to be automatically extracted.
Vancouver Style
In Vancouver style, all references should be numbered sequentially [in square brackets] in the text
and listed in the same numerical order in the reference section. Punctuation should be properly
applied as mentioned in the examples given above.
Reference Lists
Different reference formats have different rules for citation. See below for some common format
examples.
Journal Article
The required information for a journal article is author, abbreviated journal title, year,
publication, volume number, and initial page of cited article, though complete pagination is
possible. It is necessary to list all authors if the total number of author is six or less and
for more than six authors use three authors and then et al (the term "et al."
should be in italics). Journal abbreviations should follow the Index Medicus/MEDLINE. Capitalize
the first letter of the first word in the title. The rest of the title is in lower-case, with
the exception of proper names.
Al-Habian A, Harikumar PE, Stocker CJ, Langlands K, Selway JL. Histochemical and
immunohistochemical evaluation of mouse skin histology: comparison of fixation with
neutral buffered formalin and alcoholic formalin. J Histotechnol 2014; 37(4): 115-24.
Guilbert TW, Morgan WJ, Zeiger RS, et al. Long-term inhaled
corticosteroids in preschool children at high risk for asthma. N Engl J Med. 2006 May
11;354(19):1985-1997.
Edited Book
Blaxter PS, Farnsworth TP. Social health and class inequalities. In: Carter C, Peel JR,
Eds. Equalities and inequalities in health. 2nd ed. London: Academic Press 1976; pp.
165-78.
Chapter in a Book
Phillips SJ, Whisnant JP. Hypertension and stroke. In: Laragh JH, Brenner BM, Eds.
Hypertension: pathophysiology, diagnosis, and management. 2nd ed. New York: Raven Press
1995; pp. 465-78.
Patent
Larsen CE, Trip R, Johnson CR. Methods for procedures related to the electrophysiology of
the heart. US Patent 5529067, 1995.
Conference Proceedings
Kimura J, Shibasaki H, Eds. Recent advances in clinical neurophysiology. Proceedings of
the 10th International Congress of EMG and Clinical Neurophysiology; 1995 Oct 15-19;
Kyoto, Japan. Amsterdam: Elsevier 1996.
Thesis and Dissertation
Borkowski MM. Infant sleep and feeding: a telephone survey of Hispanic Americans. PhD
dissertation. Mount Pleasant (MI): Central Michigan University 2002.
URL(WebPage)
Aylin P, Bottle A, Jarman B, Elliott, P. Paediatric cardiac surgical mortality in England
after Bristol: descriptive analysis of hospital episode statistics 1991-2002. BMJ
[serial on the Internet]. 2004 Oct 9; [cited: 15 October 2004]; 329: [about 10 screens].
Available from: sis.nlm.nih.gov/Tox/ToxMain.html
Electronic Material
Journal Article in Electronic Format
Frangioni G, Bianchi S, Fuzzi G, Borgioli G. Dynamics of hepatic melanogenesis in newts
in recovery phase from hypoxia. Open Zoo J 2009; 2: 1-7. Available from: https://benthamopen.com/ABSTRACT/TOZJ-2-1
[cited: 26th Jan 2009]
Abood S. Quality improvement initiative in nursing homes: the ANA acts in an advisory
role. Am J Nurs [serial on the Internet]. June 2002 [cited: 12th Aug 2002];
102(6): [about 3 p.]. Available from: www.nursingworld.org/AJN/2002/june/Wawatch.htm.
Some important points to remember
Date of access should be provided for online citations.
Avoid using superscript in the in-text citations and reference section.
Abstracts, unpublished data and personal communications (which can only be included if
prior permission has been obtained) should not be given in the references section. The
details may however appear in the footnotes.
The authors are encouraged to use a recent version of EndNote (version 5 and above) or
Reference Manager (version 10) when formatting their reference list, as this allows
references to be automatically extracted.
AVAILABILITY OF DATA AND MATERIALS
The source of data and materials should be mentioned in the manuscript, in support of the findings.
Sharing research data is integral to its transparency and reproducibility. Data sharing involves the
citation and availability of data that support the findings of the research.
Bentham Science encourages authors to share the source of data and materials in the manuscript, in
support of the findings.
Research Data Policy Types:
The four types of research data policies are mentioned below.
Case 1: Data sharing and data citation
Case 2: Data sharing and its evidence
Case 3: Statement for Data sharing and data availability
Case 4: Data sharing, evidence of data sharing and data for peer-review
Case 1: Data Sharing and Data Citation
Wherever appropriate and possible, the journal encourages authors to publish data to support their
research findings in a public repository. Any datasets mentioned in the article that are available
in external repositories should be cited.
How to Cite the Data?
Whether the data was developed by the author(s) or researcher(s), all publicly available data
referenced in the preparation of an article should be cited in the text and reference list. The
references relating to the data availability should be presented in the following format:
Example: Name of author(s), the title of data set, data repository, document version (e.g., most
recent updated version), Digital Object Identifier (DOI), and Bentham Science reference style should
be included in data citations.
Case 2: Data Sharing and Its Evidence
When authors submit a paper to a journal, the authors agree that the data provided in the
publication, including the relevant raw data, will be freely available to any researcher who wants
to use these for non-commercial reasons without jeopardising participant anonymity.
Case 3: Statement for Data Sharing and Data Availability
Data availability declarations are required under Bentham Science research data policy types.
The statement relating to the data availability should be presented in the following format under a
separate section for ‘Availability of Data and Materials’ in the manuscript:
The authors confirm that the data supporting the findings of this study are
available within the article and its supplementary materials.
The data that support the findings of this study are available from the
corresponding author, [author initials], on special request.
The datasets generated or analysed during the current study are not publicly
available due to [mention the reason(s)].
Authors who do not wish to share their data should clearly state that the data will
not be shared, and thus mention as ‘Not applicable’.
The statement relating to the data should be presented in the following format:
"The data supporting the findings of the article is available in the [repository name] at
[URL], reference number [reference number]”.
Additional Data Availability Statements
Authors can add or change the statement(s) above, to fit their work the best. Depending on the nature
of the research, several assertions may need to be merged.
Case 4: Data Sharing, Evidence of Data Sharing and Data for Peer-Review
All datasets on which the paper's conclusions are based must be made accessible to reviewers and
readers, according to the journal's rules. Prior to peer review, authors must either deposit their
datasets in publicly accessible repositories or provide them as supplementary materials with their
submission. For further details, please visit complete guidelines at: http://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/publishing-and-editorial-issues/clinical-trial-registration.html
Data Access and Retention
Authors may provide the raw data in connection with a paper for editorial review, and should be
prepared to provide public access to such data. if practicable, and should in any event be prepared
to retain such data for a reasonable time after publication.
STANDARDS OF REPORTING
The Authors are encouraged to use industry-recognized reporting guidelines for biomedical and biological
research, if applicable, to explain that all requirements for reporting have been adopted.
All authors must strictly follow the reporting guidelines below for preparing the study for publication.
CONSORT: All randomized clinical trials must include a flow diagram and authors should provide a
completed randomized trial checklist (see CONSORT Flow Diagram and Checklist; www.consort-statement.org) and a trial
protocol. For further details, please visit complete guidelines at:
http://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/publishing-and-editorial-issues/clinical-trial-registration.html
STARD and TRIPOD: Studies of diagnostic accuracy must be reported according to STARD guidelines;
(www.stard-statement.org) and TRIPOD
guidelines; (www.tripod-statement.org)
STROBE: Observational studies (cohort, case-control, or cross-sectional designs) must be reported
according to the STROBE statement, and should be submitted with their protocols; (www.strobe-statement.org).
CARE: Case report must be reported according to CARE guidelines; (www.care-statement.org)
COREQ: Qualitative research must be reported according to COREQ guidelines; (academic.oup.com/intqhc/article/19/6/349/1791966)
CHEERS: Economic evaluations must be reported according to CHEERS guidelines; (www.bmj.com/content/346/bmj.f1049)
STREGA: Genetic association studies must be reported according to STREGA guidelines; (http://www.equator-network.org/reporting-guidelines/strobe-strega/)
PRISMA: Systematic reviews and meta-analyses must be reported according to PRISMA guidelines; (www.prisma-statement.org)
MOOSE: Meta-analyses of observational studies in epidemiology must be reported according to MOOSE
guidelines (http://www.ijo.in/documents/14MOOSE_SS.pdf)
EQUATOR: To find the reporting guidelines see (www.equator-network.org)
FIGURES/TABLES
Figures/Illustrations
All authors must strictly follow the guidelines below for preparing illustrations for publication in
MicroRNA
. If the figures are found to be sub-standard, then the manuscripts will be rejected.
The authors are expected to submit good quality figure(s) in PDF, PPT, MS Word, TIFF or JPEG
versions, which, if required, should be improved yourself or by professional graphic designers of
your organization/country. You may even consider approaching our contracted service provider Eureka Science for Graphics Enhancement
Services.
The Graphics Designing team at Eureka Science can assist in improving the quality of your images at
affordable rates. Eureka Science has contracted special rates with us of US $155 for
figure
improvement of up to five figures and subsequently US $25 per figure for any additional
figure.
The quality of Graphic Enhancement Services offered by Eureka Science can be viewed at http://www.eureka-science.com/images/Binder1.pdf,
along with valuable feedback on their services at http://www.eureka-science.com/testimonials.php.
You may contact Eureka Science at [email protected]
Note: Availing Graphics Enhancement Services does not guarantee acceptance of the manuscript
for publication. The final acceptance/decision on the manuscript is taken by the EiC.
Guideline for Figures/Illustrations
Illustrations must be provided according to the following guideline:
Illustrations should be embedded in the text file, and must be numbered consecutively in
the order of their appearance. Each figure should include only a single illustration
which should be cropped to minimize the amount of space occupied by the illustration.
If a figure is in separate parts, all parts of the figure must be provided in a single
composite illustration file.
Photographs should be provided with a scale bar if appropriate, as well as
high-resolution component files.
All the numbers, symbols and letters in figures should be consistent and clear throughout
and large enough to remain readable when the size is reduced for publication.
It must be ensured to cite each figure in the text in sequence.
Scaling/Resolution
Line Art image type is normally an image based on lines and text. It does not contain tonal or
shaded areas. The preferred file format should be TIFF or EPS, with the color mode being
Monochrome 1-bit or RGB, in a resolution of 900-1200 dpi.
Halftone image type is a continuous tone photograph containing no text. It should have the
preferred file format TIFF, with color mode being RGB or Grayscale, in a resolution of 300 dpi.
Combination image type is an image containing halftone , text or line art elements. It should
have the preferred file format TIFF, with color mode being RGB or Grayscale, in a resolution of
500-900 dpi.
Formats
For illustrations, the following file formats are acceptable:
Illustrator
EPS (preferred format for diagrams)
PDF (also especially suitable for diagrams)
PNG (preferred format for photos or images)
Microsoft Word (version 5 and above; figures must be a single page)
PowerPoint (figures must be a single page)
TIFF
JPEG (conversion should be done using the original file)
BMP
CDX (ChemDraw)
TGF (ISISDraw)
Bentham Science does not process figures submitted in GIF format.
For TIFF or EPS figures with considerably large file size restricting the file size in online
submissions is advisable. Authors may therefore convert to JPEG format before submission as this
results in significantly reduced file size and upload time, while retaining acceptable quality.
JPEG is a ‘lossy’ format. However, in order to maintain acceptable image quality, it is
recommended that JPEG files are saved at High or Maximum quality.
Zipit or Stuffit tools should not be used to compress files prior to submission as the resulting
compression through these tools is always negligible.
Please refrain from supplying:
Graphics embedded in word processor (spreadsheet, presentation) document.
Optimized files optimized for screen use (like GIF, BMP, PICT, WPG) because of the low
resolution.
Files with too low a resolution.
Graphics that are disproportionately large for the content.
Technical Requirements for Graphic/Figure Submissions
Requirement |
Width = 8.5 inches (In-between the required size) |
Height = 11 inches (In-between the required size) |
Pixels/Inches = 300 (minimum dpi) |
All figures should be in vector scale (except half tone, photograph.) |
Image Conversion Tools
There are many software packages, many of them freeware or shareware, capable of converting to
and from different graphics formats, including PNG.
General tools for image conversion include Graphic Converter on the Macintosh, Paint Shop Pro,
for Windows, and ImageMagick, available on Macintosh, Windows and UNIX platforms.
Bitmap images (e.g. screenshots) should not be converted to EPS as they result
in a much larger file size than the equivalent JPEG, TIFF, PNG or BMP, and poor quality. EPS
should oy. EPS should only be used for images produced by vector-drawing applications such as
Adobe Illustrator or CorelDraw. Most vector-drawing applications can be saved in, or exported
as, EPS format. In case the images have been originally prepared in an Office application, such
as Word or PowerPoint, then the original Office files should be directly uploaded to the site,
instead of being converted to JPEG or another format that may be of low quality.
Color Figures/Illustrations
The cost for color figures/plates/illustrations is US $660 per article for
up to 3 colour pages and subsequently US $260 per page for any additional
colour pages.
Color figures should be supplied in CMYK and not RGB colors.
Note for authors To maintain publication quality, figures submitted in colour will
be published in colour only.
Chemical Structures
Chemical structures MUST be prepared in ChemDraw/CDX and provided as separate file.
Structure Drawing Preferences
[As according to the ACS style sheet]
Drawing Settings
|
Chain angle |
120° |
Bond spacing |
18% of width |
Fixed length |
14.4 pt (0.500cm, 0.2in) |
Bold width |
2.0 pt (0.071cm, 0.0278in) |
Line width |
0.6 pt (0.021cm, 0.0084in) |
Margin width |
1.6 pt (0.096cm) |
Hash spacing |
2.5 pt (0.088cm, 0.0347in) |
Text Settings
|
Font |
Times New Roman |
Size |
10 pt |
Under the Preference Choose
|
Units |
points |
Tolerances |
3 pixels |
Under Page Setup Use
|
Paper |
US letter |
Scale |
100% |
Tables
Data Tables should be submitted in Microsoft Word table format.
Each table should include a title/caption being explanatory in itself with respect to the
details discussed in the table. Detailed legends may then follow.
Table number in bold font i.e. Table 1, should follow a title.
The title should be in small case with the first letter in caps. A full stop should be
placed at the end of the title.
Tables should be embedded in the text exactly according to their appropriate placement in the
submitted manuscript.
Columns and rows of data should be made visibly distinct by ensuring that the borders of each
cell are displayed as black lines.
Tables should be numbered in Arabic numerals sequentially in order of their citation in the
body of the text.
If a reference is cited in both the table and text, please insert a lettered footnote in the
table to refer to the numbered reference in the text.
Tabular data provided as additional files can be submitted as an Excel spreadsheet.
It is adequate to present data in Tables to avoid unnecessary repetition and reduce the
length of the text.
The citation of each table in the text must be ensured.
Symbols and nonstandard abbreviations should be explained in the end of the text.
All references should be numbered sequentially [in square brackets] in the table and listed
in the same numerical order in the reference section.
AUTHORSHIP
AUTHORSHIP CRITERIA
Bentham Science Publishers requires that all
individuals listed as authors must have made a
substantial contribution to the design, performance,
analysis, or reporting of the work. The role of
authors is judged on the basis of ICMJE
and COPE
guidelines.
Authorship Declaration
All contributing authors are required to sign a
copyright letter, mentioning complete details,
including full name, affiliation, email address,
ORCID ID and their role in the article. After
successful electronic submission of a manuscript, a
system-generated acknowledgements will be sent to all
authors on their provided email addresses.
AUTHORS AND INSTITUTIONAL AFFILIATIONS
The Corresponding Author must provide a final list of authors at the time of submission, ensuring the
correct sequence of the names of authors, which will not be considered for any addition, deletion or
rearrangement after final submission of the manuscript. The
email address of the principal author should be
provided with an asterisk. However, the complete
address, business telephone numbers, fax numbers and
e-mail address of the corresponding author must be
stated to receive correspondence and galley proofs.
Bentham Science Publishers recommends that all
contributors regularly update their profiles on
SCOPUS/ORCID and other databases.
The corresponding author must have the approval of all other listed authors for the submission and
publication of all versions of the manuscript.
AUTHOR IDENTIFICATION
Authors are strongly recommended to use their ORCID
ID when submitting an article for consideration.
Alternatively, they can acquire an ORCID ID via the
submission process. For more information about ORCID
IDs, visit here.
CHANGES TO AUTHORSHIP
At the time of initial submission, the finalized list of authors in the correct sequence should be
provided, which will not be changed once the publication process starts.
In exceptional cases, requests for the addition/deletion of an author may be considered by the
publisher subject to a) written approval from all co-authors and b) a strong justification (which
may or may not be accepted by the Publisher).
Here is some advice from COPE on authorship issues. Bentham strives to follow these
guidelines.
General Advice:
Advice
on how to spot authorship problems
Before Publication:
Corresponding
author requests addition of extra author before publication
Corresponding
author requests removal of the author before publication
After publication:
Request
for addition of extra author after publication
Request
for removal of author after publication
AUTHORSHIP AND AI TOOLS
Bentham Science Publishers recognizes that authors use a variety of tools for preparing articles
related to their scientific works, ranging from simple ones to very sophisticated ones.
According to the COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics) guidelines, "AI tools cannot meet the
requirements for authorship as they cannot take responsibility for the submitted work. As
non-legal entities, they cannot assert the presence or absence of conflicts of interest nor
manage copyright and license agreements".
The pertinence of such tools may vary and evolve with public opinion, due to which the use of
AI-powered language tools has led to a significant debate. These tools may generate useful results,
but they can also lead to errors or misleading results; therefore, it is important to know which
tools were used for evaluating and interpreting a particular scientific work.
Considering the above we require that:
- The authors to report any significant use of such tools in their works, such as instruments and
software along with text-to-text generative AI consistent with subject standards for
methodology.
- All co-authors should sign a declaration that they take full responsibility for all of its
contents, regardless of how the contents were generated. Inappropriate language, plagiarized and
biased contents, errors, mistakes, incorrect references, or misleading content generated by AI
language tools and the relevant results reported in scientific works are the full and shared
responsibility of all the authors, including co-authors.
- AI language tools should not be listed as an author; instead, authors should follow clause (1)
above.
NON-AUTHOR CONTRIBUTORS
Activities such as the acquisition of funding,
general supervision of a research group or general
administrative support, writing assistance,
technical editing, language editing, and
proofreading alone do not qualify any contributor
for authorship. Such contributors may be
acknowledged individually or together as a group in
the acknowledgement section. Further details for
writing acknowledgements are available here.
Persons not meeting authorship criteria can be
acknowledged in the acknowledgement section of the
article rather than being enlisted as authors.
GUEST OR HONORARY AUTHORSHIP
All contributing authors should contribute substantially to the article and sign the copyright letter.
MicroRNA discourages Guest or honorary authorship based solely on position (e.g., a research
supervisor or a departmental head). We use
COPE
guidelines for identifying any suspected ghost, guest, or gift authorship.
LANGUAGE AND EDITING
Authors should seek professional assistance for the correction of grammatical, scientific, and
typographical errors before submission of the revised version of the article for publication.
You may use the professional editing services of our nominated English Language editing organizations TopEdit or Eureka
Science.
Please note that we accept a language certificate, only from one of the above two language editing
organizations.
PROOF CORRECTIONS
Authors will receive page proofs of their accepted paper before publications. To avoid delays in
publication, proofs should be checked immediately for typographical errors and returned within
48 hours. Major changes are not acceptable at the proof stage.
The corresponding author will be solely responsible for ensuring that the revised version of the
manuscript incorporating all the submitted corrections receives the approval of all the co-authors
of the manuscript.
PAGE CHARGES/QUICK TRACK PUBLICATION
PAGE CHARGES
There is no publication fee to authors for publishing in this journal. However, the authors may
decide for some paid-for editorial services such as open access publication and/or a faster overall
publication for their article(s).
QUICK TRACK PUBLICATION
For this journal an optional fast publication fee-based service called QUICK TRACK is available to
authors for their submitted manuscripts.
QUICK TRACK allows online publication within 2 weeks of receipt of the final approved galley proofs
from the authors. Similarly the manuscript can be published in the next forthcoming PRINT issue of
the journal. The total publication time, from date of first receipt of manuscript to its online
publication is 12 weeks, subject to its acceptance by the referees and modification (if any) by the
authors within one week.
The author will be initially charged a small fee on receipt of the agreement form for Quick Track
publication to partially cover the initial costs incurred for expedited processing of the submitted
manuscript. Later, the full Quick Track publication fee (US
$765 per article charges) will be payable in
advance, after acceptance of the manuscript, before online publication of the article. However, if
the article is rejected at the peer-review stage, then the US
$765 per article charges will not be
charged.
Please note that whether the author opts for the QUICK TRACK facility or not, standard reviewing
practices will be followed, which will not in any way affect the acceptance or rejection of the
manuscript by the reviewers.
Authors who have availed QUICK TRACK services in a BSP journal will be entitled for an exclusive 30%
discount if they again wish to avail the same services in any Bentham journal.
For more information please contact the Editorial Office by e-mail at [email protected].
Bentham Science offers a 50% discount off the Quick Track Publication Fee for manuscripts of all
corresponding authors who reside in countries which are categorized as low-income economies by the
World Bank. To see if you qualify to the discount, please refer to the complete list of these
countries click here.
REFUND POLICY
Bentham Science offers three major services related to its publications:
- Subscription services (to subscribers, institutes, libraries, customers, etc.): Involving
access to published content based on certain charges for corporates, academic institutes, and
individuals.
- Editorial/Author Pre-publication services (to editors, authors, etc.): Quick track
processing, language editing, etc.
- Editorial/Author Post-publication Promotional Services (to authors, institutions and
organizations): Open Access Plus, Animated Abstracts, Sharing PDF on KUDOS, reprints, etc.
Since these services are optional in nature and are offered for specific services rendered, hence
refunds are not allowed against the availed and charged services, except under special cases.
OPEN ACCESS PLUS (GOLD OPEN ACCESS)/REPRINTS
OPEN ACCESS PLUS (GOLD OPEN ACCESS)
Bentham Science also offers authors the option of “Open Access Plus (Gold Open Access)” for publishing their articles. The article processing charges are US
$1200
per article for general submissions and US $1080 per article for those published within thematic issues.
This paid service allows authors to disseminate their work to a much wider audience in compliance with the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License(CC-BY 4.0) (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode). Under this license, authors are asked to indicate whether they wish to pay for the service in order to make their article more widely available on an “Open Access Plus (Gold Open Access)” basis. Where an author does not opt-in for this paid service, the article will be published under the standard subscription-based mode.
For more information please contact us at e-mail: [email protected]
Bentham Science offers a 50% discount off the Open Access Plus (Gold Open Access) Fee for manuscripts
of all corresponding authors who reside in countries which are categorized as low-income economies
by the World Bank. To see if you qualify to the discount, please refer to the complete list of these
countries click here.
Authors who select the “Quick Track” publication option and also wish to have their article made
available on an “Open Access Plus (Gold Open Access)” basis will be entitled to a 50% discount on
the “Open Access Plus (Gold Open Access)” publication fee.
REPRINTS
Reprints may be ordered from the Publisher prior to publication of the article. First named authors
may also order a personal print and online subscription of the journal at 50% off the normal
subscription rate by contacting the subscription department at e-mail: [email protected].
ANIMATED ABSTRACTS
Extend the scope and visibility of your research by creating an animated abstract. Bentham Science has
collaborated with Focus Medica, one of the world’s largest publishers of expert animated atlases and
videos in medicine and science.
An animated abstract will help summarise the essential discoveries/ key findings of your published
research or review article. Each professionally produced full-coloured animated abstract in video format
(length 3 – 5 minutes) is accompanied by an English spoken or foreign language commentary. The animated
abstract will be published online along with the published article.
The payment for an animated abstract will be US
$1320. Initially, an advance amount of US $800 will
be payable to the Publisher to start work on the Animated Abstract, while the balance of US $520
will be payable on completion of
the Animated Abstract.
Authors who opt for the “Animated Abstract” option and also wish to have their article made available on
an “Open Access Plus (Gold Open Access)” basis will be entitled to a 50% discount only on the Animated
Abstract fee and, in addition, pay the normal Open Access Plus (Gold Open Access) fee.
Authors will be asked whether they wish to opt-in for this paid animated abstract service, and if not,
the article will be published as normal. Animated abstracts are available as open access (free viewing)
for maximum visibility and awareness to readers at anytime, anywhere. The animated abstracts are
licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution – NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0
International Public License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
For a sample of an animated abstract please access here https://www.benthamscience.com/pages/animated-abstract-video
SPECIAL DISCOUNTS
Bentham Science offers discounts to those corresponding authors who are based in low-income countries*.
The authors who wish to avail this offer should request for a discount at the time of submission of their
manuscripts to Bentham Science.
Eligibility:
Bentham Science offers 50% discount on the Open Access Plus (Gold Open Access) Fee and Quick Track
Fee for manuscripts of the corresponding authors based in countries categorized as low-income
economies by World Bank. To see if you qualify to the discount, please refer
to the complete list of these countries click here
For any query or suggestion, please contact us on [email protected].
REVIEWING AND PROMPTNESS OF PUBLICATION
All papers submitted to Bentham Science for publication are immediately subjected to preliminary
editorial scrutiny by the Editorial Staff and Editor-in-Chief in connection with their suitability. The
Editor-in-Chief determines if the manuscript:
(a) falls within the scope of the journal and
(b) meets the editorial criteria of Bentham Science Publishers in terms of originality
and quality.
Manuscripts that appear to be suitable are then subjected to double-blind peer review by, usually two to
three, neutral eminent experts. The services of eminent international experts are sought through
invitations to conduct the peer review of a submitted manuscript, keeping in view the scope of the
manuscript and the expertise of the reviewers. The identities of both the reviewer and author are kept
undisclosed to each other, ensuring anonymity and maintaining confidentiality throughout the entire
review procedure. The anonymity of reviewers ensures an objective and unbiased assessment of the
manuscript by the reviewers.
Before sending the manuscripts to reviewers, Bentham Science seeks consent from
potential reviewers about their availability and willingness to review. Correspondence between the
editorial office of the journal and the reviewers is kept confidential. The reviewers are expected to
provide their reports in a timely fashion since a prompt review leads to the timely publication of a
manuscript which is beneficial not only to the authors but to the scientific community as well.
The editorial process and peer-review workflow for each journal are taken care of by a team of Senior
Editors, Editorial Board Members (EBMs) and dedicated Journal managers who have the required expertise
in their specific fields.
Bentham Science Publishers carries out independent reviews of all articles. The reviewers are selected
according to their expertise, from our, regularly updated, referee database.
On the basis of reviewer comments, the Editors may recommend acceptance, revision or rejection of a
manuscript.
After a review of the manuscript by at least two or three independent experts, in addition to the views
of the
Editor, the decision is relayed to the authors, which may be categorized as:
Requires minor changes
Requires major changes
Rejected with no resubmission
If an article receives two contradictory reports, the Editor-in-Chief retains the right to request
additional comments and the discretion to make the final decision without waiting for additional
reports, taking into consideration the content and conclusions presented in all reports. This proactive
approach ensures promptness in conveying the Editor's decision, thereby facilitating swift communication
with the author.
Bentham Science requests not to have the manuscripts peer-reviewed by those experts who
may have competing interest with the author(s) of a submitted manuscript. It is not possible for Editors
to be aware of all competing interests; it is therefore expected that the reviewers would inform the
Editor-in-Chief/Handling Editor if they notice any potential competing interest during the course of
review of a manuscript. Moreover, the reviewers are expected to inform the Editors or editorial office
of the journal if they have a conflict of interest in carrying out the review of a manuscript submitted
by any author/contributor of the manuscript.
The authors are usually requested to resubmit the revised paper within 15 days and it will then be
returned to the reviewers for further evaluation. The publishers normally allow one round of revision
and, in exceptional cases, a second round of revision may be allowed. If further revision is needed,
then the manuscript is rejected and the author is requested to resubmit the manuscript for fresh
processing.
The final decision regarding acceptance or rejection is that of the Editor-in-Chief, depending on the
quality of the revision and his assessment of the quality of the manuscript. In rare cases, manuscripts
recommended for publication by the referees may be rejected in the final assessment by the
Editor-in-Chief.
The time frame for revision of any article may vary from one to four weeks, depending on the nature of
the revision required (minor or major). However, authors who need extra time for revision should consult
the Editor-in-Chief/Handling Editor with valid reasons and the submission date of the revised manuscript
may be extended if the request is genuine.
After the successful completion of the review and acceptance of the article, the articles are typeset and
proofs are dispatched to authors for any corrections prior to final publication.
PLAGIARISM PREVENTION
Plagiarism means copying or paraphrasing another writer's content, be it a text, a result or an
observation, and stating it as one's own, without citing a reference to the original source. Therefore,
authors should acknowledge and cite references to the work of other scientists in their manuscripts. The
author should ensure that all the sources are authentic and that there is no discrepancy in the content
of the manuscript.
Bentham Science is vigilant in checking and identifying the primary sources of the data within the
content by using the iThenticate software to
detect instances of overlapping and similarity of text in submitted manuscripts. iThenticate software verifies the content
against a database of periodicals, materials on the Internet, and a comprehensive article database. The
software generates a similarity report in percentage that matches the article in process and the
published material. This similarity is further scrutinized for suspected plagiarism according to the
publisher's Editorial Policies. The generated report comprises the overall percentage of the content
reused.
The Credibility of Sources- Acknowledgements
The study of an author has to be original. If there are credible sources of the content referred to
in the manuscript, the author needs to cite all of them. Authors are advised to use iThenticate before submitting a
manuscript to ensure that there are no instances of plagiarism. Authors are required to provide
proper consent from the individuals and contributions of other authors should be acknowledged.
Bentham Science has different editorial policies for authors who have more than one publication.
Following those policies, the authors need to specify the sources of the submission in their recent
work. For further details, please visit the following link of Editorial Policies for Concurrent
Publication/Simultaneous Submission at https://benthamscience.com/pages/editorial-policies-main
Bentham Science strictly follows COPE guidelines to detect plagiarism. For clearer insight, authors
may refer to the flowcharts provided by COPE by clicking here or visiting the COPE website.
FABRICATING AND STATING FALSE INFORMATION
To ensure the scholarly integrity of every article, Bentham Science will publish post-publication
notices. The authors of the published articles, or those who have submitted the manuscripts with false
information, or fabricated the supporting data or images, will be liable for sanctions, and their papers
will be retracted. For further details, please visit complete guidelines at: https://www.benthamscience.com/fabricating-stating-false-information
GAIN MORE PUBLICATION REACH AND IMPACT VIA KUDOS
Bentham Science is a publishing partner of Kudos. All authors who publish in this journal will receive an
invitation to join the Kudos platform, an entirely free service for authors. Kudos enables authors to
help broaden their audience and readers, increase their professional profile and reputation, and
establish an impact for their publications. The website link is www.growkudos.com.
Kudos provides a free platform to researchers to have their publications accessible, read and cited
across multiple networks and channels available to researchers for the dissemination of their work. It
takes on average 15 minutes and leads to 23% higher growth in full-text downloads.
Authors are encouraged to explain their work in clear English and to attract researchers of the relevant
communities, share a trackable link that you can email to your existing network of contacts, or share on
social media and academic websites, and track how well the articles are performing through the summary
of views, downloads, citations, and altmetrics on the Kudos dashboard.
Authors may also use the new shareable PDF (S-PDF) service. The S-PDF provides researchers with the means
to write and share a high-level overview for each of their publications. Kudos thereby provides
researchers, and their publishers and institutions, with a rich understanding of which channels and
activities are most effective for broadening the reach and impact of published science.
COPE MEMBERSHIP
Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) is an advisory body
that ensures the highest standards of editorial practice in scholarly publishing, by providing guidance
to editors and publishers in all aspects of publication ethics.
Bentham Science Publishers is committed to upholding ethical standards in scholarly publishing. Our
publications are affiliated with COPE and
adhere to its guidelines. To learn more about COPE guidelines, visit COPE website.
EARLY VIEW ARTICLES
Bentham Science Publishers is pleased to offer electronic publication of accepted papers prior to
scheduled publication.
These peer-reviewed papers can be cited using the date of access and the unique DOI number. Any final
changes in manuscripts will be made at the time of print publication and will be reflected in the final
electronic version of the issue. Articles in Early View may be ordered by pay-per-view at the
relevant links by each article stated via the Early view
Disclaimer
Articles appearing in Early View sections have been peer-reviewed and accepted for
publication in this journal and posted online before scheduled publication. Articles appearing here
may contain statements, opinions, and information that have errors in facts, figures, or
interpretation. Accordingly, Bentham Science Publishers, the editors, authors and their respective
employees are not responsible or liable for
the use of any such inaccurate or misleading data, opinion or information contained of articles in
the Early View.
APPEALS AND COMPLAINTS
Generally, the editorial decisions are not reverted. However, authors who think that their manuscript was
rejected due to a misunderstanding or mistake may seek an explanation for the decision. Appeals must
give sound reasoning and compelling evidence against the criticism raised in the rejection letter. A
difference of opinion as to the interest, novelty, or suitability of the manuscript for the journal will
not be considered as an appeal. The EIC and other relevant editors will consider the appeal and the
decision thereafter taken by the journal will be deemed final. Acceptance of the manuscript is not
guaranteed even if the journal agrees to reconsider the manuscript, and the reconsideration process may
involve previous or new reviewers or editors and substantive revision.
Authors who wish to make a complaint should refer them to the Editor-in-Chief of the journal concerned.
Complaints to the Publisher may be emailed to [email protected]