Editorial Policies

Generally, functioning of the journal is overseen by an Editorial Advisory board, which consists of eminent and competent researchers in the field, who contribute by inviting contributions and proposing expert opinions on the suitability of submissions. The Editorial board consists of the following important positions:

Editor-in-Chief: The Editor-in-Chief is primarily the one responsible for activities conducted for the journal and maintains the right of final acceptance or rejection of manuscripts. An experienced academician with quality publications is appointed by the Society for Science and Nature, Bhopal India www.ssn.org the official Publishers of Biosc.Biotech.Res.Comm to oversee the entire publication process of the journal.

Executive Editor: Executive Editor is who directs processing of the manuscripts which entail soliciting manuscripts from potential contributors, assessing the suitability of the manuscript with respect to its scope, managing the peer review process, devising strategies for the progress of the journal, coordinating with the reviewers and board members, taking decisions on the revised submissions and occasionally assisting the Editor-in-chief in final acceptance or rejection of manuscripts.

Associate Editors: Their role is in handling in reporting to the Chief Editor, and supervision of the editorial team, managing submissions, assigning articles,  overseeing publication schedules and other matters related to smooth functioning of the journal.

Academic Editors: Academic  Editors  are associates who will assist the Chief / Executive Editors  in assessing the suitability of the manuscript with respect to its scope, managing the peer review process, devising strategies for the progress of the journal, coordinating with the reviewers and board members.

Editorial Board Members: The international editorial advisory board consists of a panel of researchers having expertise in the relevant field, who are appointed by the authorities of the journal for a specified term of 2 or more years. Editorial board members are required to: carry out peer-reviewing of submitted manuscripts, assess submissions based on the policy and scope of the journal, organize publication of thematic issues, invite new authors and submissions, provide editorials for thematic issues organized under their guest editorship.

Editorial Team: The editorial team  is made up of experienced and highly qualified researchers and faculty members of different subjects who help the management of editorial process. 

Peer Review

Biosc Biotech Res Comm follows the anonymized peer-review procedure for submissions of all manuscripts to its journal. All submitted manuscripts, after initial  evaluation for scope, originality, conformity to the journals instructions and check list, language and academic quality writing are  then subjected to an extensive  anonymized peer review in consultation with members of the journal’s editorial board and independent external referees (usually two reviewers). All manuscripts/chapters are assessed in a time bound frame (usually a month with the reviewers), and the decision based on all the peer reviewers’ comments, finally taken by the journal’s Editor-in-Chief, is then conveyed to the author (s).

(Ethics, Duties and Responsibilities of Authors Reviewers and Editors, Plagiarism and its Control, Malpractices and Ethical statements) Link of copy right form and Plagiarism Check Statement

1. i) Ethics

To maintain fair practice we at, Society for Science & Nature (SSN) Bhopal India, the official publishers of Bioscience Biotechnology Research Communications strongly believe in strictly following these guidelines  for   maintaining  academic quality and  scientific rigor.

These features include information about the methods of selecting articles, especially on the explicit process of external peer review; statements indicating adherence to ethical guidelines; evidence that authors have disclosed financial conflicts of interest; timely correction of errata; explicit responsible retractions as appropriate; and opportunity for comments and dissenting opinion.

We are deeply committed to fair practice of this publication, especially with regard to plagiarism, collaboration, originality, fraud and conflict of interests.

 ii)Duties and Responsibilities of Authors

Authorship of the manuscript

Only persons who meet these  following authorship criteria should be listed as authors in the manuscript as they must be able to take public responsibility for the content: (i) made significant contributions to the conception, design, execution, data acquisition, or analysis/interpretation of the study; and (ii) drafted the manuscript or revised it critically for important intellectual content; and (iii) have seen and approved the final version of the paper and agreed to its submission for publication.

All persons who made substantial contributions to the work reported in the manuscript (such as technical help, writing and editing assistance, general support) but who do not meet the criteria for authorship must not be listed as an author, but should be acknowledged in the “Acknowledgements” section after their written permission to be named as been obtained.

The corresponding author should ensure that all appropriate co -authors (according to the above definition) and no inappropriate co-authors are included in the author list and verify that all co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the manuscript and agreed to its submission for publication.

Authors of manuscripts of original research should present an accurate account of the work performed as well as an objective discussion of its significance. Underlying data should be represented accurately in the paper. There should be a clear statement of logical objectives and rationale / justification to take up the study. Study design must be robust and   all methods used must be cited properly with standard references so that they can be reproduced easily. A paper should contain sufficient detail and references to permit others to replicate the work.

Discussion must have a critical   and comprehensive   account of  statements supported by up-to-date references. Conclusions must be drawn which must corroborate the data and interpretation highlighting the novelty of the work. References need to be checked for their presence in both text and reference section with all links of refrences from Google Scholar, Pub Med etc.

Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute unethical behavior and are unacceptable. Review and professional publication articles should also be accurate and objective, and editorial ‘opinion’ works should be clearly identified as such. Submission of a certificate by all MS submitting  authors in this regard is mandatory in the form of the Copy Right Form and Plagiarism Check Report   of Biosc.Biotech.Res.Comm

 Link of copy right form  and Plagiarism Check Statement

 iii) Duties and Responsibilities of Reviewers and Editors

Any manuscript received for review must be treated as a confidential document. Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for personal advantage. Reviews should be conducted objectively, and observations should be formulated clearly with supporting arguments, so that authors can use them for improving the paper. Any selected referee who feels unqualified to review the research reported in a manuscript or knows that its prompt review will be not be possible,  should notify the editor and excuse himself from the review process.

Reviewers should not consider manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, companies, or institutions connected to the papers. They must not put their own references in the revised MS,  as citations for their benefit.

Editors of  BioscBiotec. Res.Comm will evaluate manuscripts exclusively on the basis of their academic merit and scientific rigor. An editor must not use unpublished information in the editor’s own research without the express written consent of the author. Editors should take reasonable responsive measures when ethical complaints have been presented concerning a submitted manuscript or published paper.

 iv)Plagiarism, it’s check, tools used and Actions thereof

The authors of Bioscience Biotechnology Research Communications should strictly ensure that they have written and submitted entirely original manuscripts to the journal, strictly  following all norms of academic quality. If the authors have used the work and /or words of others, it has been appropriately cited or quoted as per standard ethics and norms of publication. 

Plagiarism takes many forms, from ‘passing off’ another’s paper as the author’s own paper, to copying or paraphrasing substantial parts of another’s paper (without attribution), to claiming results from research conducted by others. Plagiarism in all its forms constitutes unethical in Bioscience Biotechnology Research Communications.

If any manuscript is found published with plagiarized material at any stage in Bioscience Biotechnology Research Communications, it will be immediately retracted with information to authors. Also, authors who fail to comply with the reviewer’s comments in revising their manuscripts,  particularly in reducing the accidental plagiarism will be informed about dropping their manuscripts from publication in Bioscience Biotechnology Research Communications, and they will be returned their APC after  standard deductions.

Instructions are given to all authors who propose to submit their contribution to Biosc.Biotech.Res.Comm. to kindly check their MS very minutely for plagiarism and similarity levels of their text matter of the manuscripts under submission using Ithenticate / Turnitin software.They have to certify in the Copy right form about this statement.

Link of copy right form and Plagiarism Check Statement

www.bbrc.in copy right and  anti-plagiarism form

MS having less than 15 % of similarity levels using standard worldwide accepted soft wares will only be considered for publication in Biosc Biotech Res Comm .

 1. Malpractice and Ethical Statements

Biosc Biotech Res Comm Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractice Statement is based, in large part, on the guidelines and standards developed by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). The relevant duties and expectations of authors, reviewers, and editors of the journal are set out below.

Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractice Statement

Biosc Biotech Res Comm follows the COPE Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors and the Code of Conduct for Journal Publishers. In addition, as a journal that follows the ICMJE’s Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals, it is expected of authors, reviewers and editors that they follow the best-practice guidelines on ethical behaviour contained therein. A selection of key points is included below, but always refer to the three documents listed above for full details of Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractices.

Link of copy right form and Plagiarism Check Statement

Duties of Editors

Fair play and editorial independence

Editors evaluate submitted manuscripts exclusively on the basis of their  scientific rigor and academic merit (importance, originality, study’s validity, clarity) and its relevance to the journal’s scope, without regard to the authors’ race, gender, sexual orientation, ethnic origin, citizenship, religious belief, political philosophy or institutional affiliation. Decisions to edit and publish are not determined by the policies of governments or any other agencies outside of the journal itself. The Editor-in-Chief has full authority over the entire editorial content of the journal and the timing of publication of that content. 

Confidentiality

Editors and editorial staff will not disclose any information about a submitted manuscript to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, potential reviewers, other editorial advisers, and the publisher, as appropriate.

Disclosure and conflicts of interest

Editors and editorial board members will not use unpublished information disclosed in a submitted manuscript for their own research purposes without the authors’ explicit written consent. Privileged information or ideas obtained by editors as a result of handling the manuscript will be kept confidential and not used for their personal advantage. Editors will recuse themselves from considering manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships/connections with any of the authors, companies or institutions connected to the papers; instead, they will ask another member of the editorial board to handle the manuscript.

Publication decisions

The editors ensure that all submitted manuscripts being considered for publication undergo strict anonymized peer-review by at least two reviewers who are expert in the field. The Editor is responsible for deciding which of the manuscripts submitted to the journal will be published, based on the validation of the work in question, its importance to researchers and readers, the reviewers’ comments and  levels of academic quality. The Editor may confer with other editors or reviewers in making this decision.

Involvement and cooperation in investigations

Editors (in conjunction with the publisher and/or society) will take responsive measures when ethical concerns are raised with regard to a submitted manuscript or published paper. Every reported act of unethical publishing behavior will be looked into, even if it is discovered years after publication. If, on investigation, the ethical concern is well-founded, a correction, retraction, expression of concern or other note as may be relevant, will be published in the journal.

Duties of Reviewers

Contribution to editorial decisions

Peer review assists editors in making editorial decisions and, through editorial communications with authors, may assist authors in improving their manuscripts. Peer review is an essential component of formal scholarly communication and lies at the heart of scientific endeavor. The journal shares the view of many that all scholars who wish to contribute to the scientific process have an obligation to do a fair share of reviewing, maintaining all standards of academic quality, particularly the scientific rigor.

Promptness

Any invited referee who feels unqualified to review the research reported in a manuscript or knows that its prompt review will be impossible should immediately notify the editors and decline the invitation to review so that alternative reviewers can be contacted.

Confidentiality

Any manuscripts received for review are confidential documents and must be treated as such; they must not be shown to or discussed with others except if authorized by the Editor-in-Chief (who would only do so under exceptional and specific circumstances). This applies also to invited reviewers who decline the review invitation.

Standards of objectivity

Reviews should be conducted objectively and observations formulated clearly with supporting arguments so that authors can use them for improving the manuscript. Personal criticism of the authors is inappropriate.

Acknowledgement of sources

Reviewers should identify relevant published work that has not been cited by the authors. Any statement that is an observation, derivation or argument that has been reported in previous publications should be accompanied by the relevant citation. A reviewer should also notify the editors of any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other manuscript (published or unpublished) of which they have personal knowledge.

Disclosure and conflicts of interest

Any invited referee who has conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, companies or institutions connected to the manuscript and the work described therein should immediately notify the editors to declare their conflicts of interest and decline the invitation to review so that alternative reviewers can be contacted. Unpublished material disclosed in a submitted manuscript must not be used in a reviewer’s own research without the express written consent of the authors. Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for the reviewer’s personal advantage. This applies also to invited reviewers who decline the review invitation.

Data access and retention

Authors may be asked to provide the raw data of their study together with the manuscript for editorial review and should be prepared to make the data publicly available if practicable. In any event, authors should ensure accessibility of such data to other competent professionals for at least 10 years after publication (preferably via an institutional or subject-based data repository or other data centre), provided that the confidentiality of the participants can be protected and legal rights concerning proprietary data do not preclude their release.

Supplementary data or information (SI) which are important for scientific progress help in  reproducibility, being one of the golden standards of the scientific method. This   can be shared as per submission guidelines of Biosc. Biotech. Res. Comm.  Authors   must ensure that all submitted manuscripts have been prepared following academic quality writing, consisting of quality contents. All supplementary information like large data files, tables etc that are not practical to include in the manuscript itself, must be made readily available for the readers, reviewers as  files uploaded  when required. We encourage the authors to share their supplementary data which can make their articles more discoverable, giving people alternative ways to find their valuable research work.

Originality and plagiarism

The authors of Bioscience Biotechnology Research Communications should strictly ensure that they have written and submitted entirely original manuscripts to the journal, strictly  following all norms of academic quality. If the authors have used the work and /or words of others, it has been appropriately cited or quoted as per standard ethics and norms of  quality publication. 

Plagiarism takes many forms, from ‘passing off’ another’s paper as the author’s own paper, to copying or paraphrasing substantial parts of another’s paper (without attribution), to claiming results from research conducted by others. Plagiarism in all its forms constitutes unethical in Bioscience Biotechnology Research Communications.

If any manuscript is found published with plagiarized material at any stage in Bioscience Biotechnology Research Communications, it will be immediately retracted with information to authors. Also, authors who fail to comply with the reviewer’s comments in revising their manuscripts,  particularly in reducing the accidental plagiarism will be informed about dropping their manuscripts from publication in Bioscience Biotechnology Research Communications, and they will be returned their APC after  standard deductions.

Instructions are given to all authors who propose to submit their contribution to Biosc.Biotech.Res.Comm. to kindly check their MS very minutely for any accidental  plagiarism and similarity levels of their text matter of the manuscripts under submission using only  Ithenticate / Turnitin software.They have to certify in the Copy right form about this statement.

Link of copy right form and Plagiarism Check Statement

www.bbrc.in copy right and  anti-plagiarism form

MS having less than 15 % of similarity levels using standard worldwide accepted soft wares will only be considered for publication in Biosc Biotech Res Comm .

Multiple, duplicate, redundant or concurrent submission/publication

Papers describing essentially the same research should not be published in more than one journal or primary publication. Hence, authors should not submit for consideration a manuscript that has already been published in another journal. Submission of a manuscript concurrently to more than one journal is unethical publishing behaviour and unacceptable.

The publication of some kinds of articles (such as clinical guidelines, translations) in more than one journal is sometimes justifiable, provided that certain conditions are met. The authors and editors of the journals concerned must agree to the secondary publication, which must reflect the same data and interpretation of the primary document. The primary reference must be cited in the secondary publication.

Authorship of the manuscript

Only persons who meet these  following authorship criteria should be listed as authors in the manuscript as they must be able to take public responsibility for the content: (i) made significant contributions to the conception, design, execution, data acquisition, or analysis/interpretation of the study; and (ii) drafted the manuscript or revised it critically for important intellectual content; and (iii) have seen and approved the final version of the paper and agreed to its submission for publication. All persons who made substantial contributions to the work reported in the manuscript (such as technical help, writing and editing assistance, general support) but who do not meet the criteria for authorship must not be listed as an author, but should be acknowledged in the “Acknowledgements” section after their written permission to be named as been obtained. The corresponding author should ensure that all appropriate co -authors (according to the above definition) and no inappropriate co-authors are included in the author list and verify that all co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the manuscript and agreed to its submission for publication.

Disclosure and conflicts of interest

Authors should—at the earliest stage possible (generally by submitting a disclosure form at the time of submission and including a statement in the manuscript)—disclose any conflicts of interest that might be construed to influence the results or their interpretation in the manuscript.

Examples of potential conflicts of interest that should be disclosed include financial ones such as honoraria, educational grants or other funding, participation in speakers’ bureaus, membership, employment, consultancies, stock ownership, or other equity interest, and paid expert testimony or patent-licensing arrangements, as well as non-financial ones such as personal or professional relationships, affiliations, knowledge or beliefs in the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript. All sources of financial support for the work should be disclosed (including the grant number or other reference number if any).

Acknowledgement of sources

Authors should ensure that they have properly acknowledged the work of others, and should also cite publications that have been influential in determining the nature of the reported work. Information obtained privately (from conversation, correspondence or discussion with third parties) must not be used or reported without explicit, written permission from the source. Authors should not use information obtained in the course of providing confidential services, such as refereeing manuscripts or grant applications, unless they have obtained the explicit written permission of the author(s) of the work involved in these services.

Hazards and human or animal subjects

If the work involves chemicals, procedures or equipment that have any unusual hazards inherent in their use, the authors must clearly identify these in the manuscript. If the work involves the use of animals or human participants, the authors should ensure that all procedures were performed in compliance with relevant laws and institutional guidelines and that the appropriate institutional committee(s) has approved them; the manuscript should contain a statement to this effect. Authors should also include a statement in the manuscript that informed consent was obtained for experimentation with human participants. The privacy rights of human participants must always be observed.

Peer review

Authors are obliged to participate in the peer review process and cooperate fully by responding promptly to editors’ requests for raw data, clarifications, and proof of ethics approval, patient consents and copyright permissions. In the case of a first decision of “revisions necessary”, authors should respond to the reviewers’ comments systematically, point by point, and in a timely manner, revising and re-submitting their manuscript to the journal by the deadline given.

Fundamental errors in published works

When authors discover significant errors or inaccuracies in their own published work, it is their obligation to promptly notify the journal’s editors or publisher and cooperate with them to either correct the paper in the form of an erratum or to retract the paper. If the editors or publisher learns from a third party that a published work contains a significant error or inaccuracy, then it is the authors’ obligation to promptly correct or retract the paper or provide evidence to the journal editors of the correctness of the paper. For guidelines on retracting or correcting articles, please contact the editor at www.bbrc.in

Duties of the Publisher

Handling of unethical publishing behavior

In cases of alleged or proven scientific misconduct, fraudulent publication or plagiarism, the publisher, in close collaboration with the editors, will take all appropriate measures to clarify the situation and to amend the article in question. This includes the prompt publication of an erratum, clarification or, in the most severe case, the retraction of the affected work.  The publisher, together with the editors, shall take reasonable steps to identify and prevent the publication of papers where research misconduct has occurred, and under no circumstances encourage such misconduct or knowingly allow such misconduct to take place.

Access to journal content

The publisher is committed to the permanent availability and preservation of scholarly research and ensures accessibility by partnering with organizations and maintaining our own digital archive as well as in international repositories like Portico, JStor/Ithaka and others. For details on Biosc.Biotech.Res.Comms archiving policy, please click www.bbrc.in