Editorial Policies
For journals, the following publication policies are applied by Bentham Science.
Bentham Science Publishers follows the single blind peer-review procedure for submissions of all manuscripts to its journals, except for a selected number of patent journals where double blind review is followed.
All submitted articles are subjected to an extensive peer review in consultation with members of the journal’s editorial board and independent external referees (usually three reviewers). All manuscripts/chapters are assessed rapidly and the decision based on all the peer reviewers' comments, taken by the journal’s Editor-in-Chief, is then conveyed to the author(s).
Submissions from the Editor-in-Chief / Co-Editor/ Editorial Board Members will undergo independent peer-review and will be submitted to another Editor for his decision on acceptance.
Articles must be written in good English in a clear and correct style in order to maintain uniformity throughout the text. Articles submitted are copyedited before they are published.
High-quality, bound/unbound, print/e-prints can be purchased for all published articles.
Articles 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.
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 info@benthamscience.net
Financial contributions and any potential conflict of interest must be clearly acknowledged under the heading ‘Conflict of Interest’. Authors must list the source(s) of funding for the study. This should be done for each author.
Bentham Science uses the iThenticate software to detect instances of overlapping and similar text in submitted manuscripts. iThenticate software checks content against a database of periodicals, the Internet, and a comprehensive article database. It generates a similarity report, highlighting the percentage of overlap between the uploaded article and the published material. Any instance of content overlap is further scrutinized for suspected plagiarism according to the publisher’s Editorial Policies. Bentham Science allows an overall similarity of 20% for a manuscript to be considered for publication. The similarity percentage is further checked keeping the following important points in view
The text of every submitted manuscript is checked using the Content Tracking mode in iThenticate. The Content Tracking mode ensures that manuscripts with an overall low percentage similarity (but may have a higher similarity from a single source) are not overlooked. The acceptable limit for similarity of text from a single source is 5%. If the similarity level is above 5%, the manuscript is returned to the author for paraphrasing the text and citing the original source of the copied material.
It is important to mention that the text taken from different sources with an overall low similarity percentage will be considered as a plagiarized content if the majority of the article is a combination of copied material.
There may be some manuscripts with an overall low similarity percentage, but a higher percentage from a single source. A manuscript may have less than 20% overall similarity but there may be 15% similar text taken from a single article. The similarity index in such cases is higher than the approved limit for a single source. Authors are advised to thoroughly rephrase the similar text and properly cite the original source to avoid plagiarism and copyright violation.
We all know that scholarly manuscripts are written after thorough review of previously published articles. It is therefore not easy to draw a clear boundary between legitimate representation and plagiarism. However, the following important features can assist in identifying different kinds of plagiarized content. These are:
- Reproduction of others words, sentences, ideas or findings as one’s own without proper acknowledgement.
- Text recycling, also known as self-plagiarism. It is an author’s use of a previous publication in another paper without proper citation and acknowledgement of the original source.
- Poor paraphrasing: Copying complete paragraphs and modifying a few words without changing the structure of original sentences or changing the sentence structure but not the words.
- Verbatim copying of text without putting quotation marks and not acknowledging the work of the original author.
- Properly citing a work but poorly paraphrasing the original text is considered as unintentional plagiarism. Similarly, manuscripts with language somewhere between paraphrasing and quoting are not acceptable. Authors should either paraphrase properly or quote and in both cases, cite the original source.
- Higher similarity in the abstract, introduction, materials and methods, and discussion and conclusion sections indicates that the manuscript may contain plagiarized text. Authors can easily explain these parts of the manuscript in many ways. However, technical terms and sometimes standard procedures cannot be rephrased; therefore Editors must review these sections carefully before making a decision.
Published manuscripts which are found to contain plagiarized text are retracted from the journal’s website after careful investigation and approval by the Editor-in-Chief of the journal. A ‘Retraction Note’ as well as a link to the original article is published on the electronic version of the plagiarized manuscript and an addendum with retraction notification in the particular journal.
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.eurekaselect.com/fabricating-stating-false-information
Accepted articles can be published online for free open access. Open access publishing provides maximum dissemination of the article to the largest audience. All authors will be asked to indicate whether or not they wish to pay to have their paper made freely available on publication. If authors do not select the 'Open Access Plus (Gold Open Access)' option, then their article will be published with standard subscription-based access.
Editors/Authors who contribute in a Bentham’s Journal will transfer copyright to their work to Bentham Science Publishers. Submission of a manuscript to the respective journals implies that all editors/authors have read and agreed to the content of the copyright letter.
A preprint is an early version of an article that has not yet been accepted for publication in a journal.
Articles submitted to a journal which have not been published and will not be simultaneously submitted elsewhere for publication can be considered for publication. Preprints are usually deposited on the author's own web page in an institutional repository, or on a preprint server. However, they are not considered as ahead-of-print or early access publications.
Preprint archiving on any recognised, non-profit preprint server is entirely supported and encouraged by the BSP. Preprints deposited in designated preprint repositories at the same time as, or before, submission to a journal are not considered as prior, citable publications by the BSP Journals.
Authors and readers are encouraged to notify the Editor-in-Chief if they find errors in published content, authors’ names and affiliations or if they have reasons for concern over the legitimacy of a publication. In such cases the journal will publish an ERRATUM or a CORRIGENDUM, in consultation with Editor-in-Chief and authors of the article, and/or replace or retract the article.
Articles in Press (articles that have been accepted for publication or published as E-pub Ahead of Schedule but which have not been formally published with volume/issue/page information) that include errors, or are determined to violate the publishing ethics guidelines such as multiple submission, fake claims of authorship, plagiarism, fraudulent use of data or the like, may be “Withdrawn” from the journal. Withdrawal means that the article files are removed and replaced with a PDF stating that the article has been withdrawn from the journal in accordance with BSP Editorial Policies.
If any manuscripts are published, having certain assigned information of volume / issue / page number, and it is found that there are infringements of professional ethical codes in their content, such as plagiarism, excess similarity with some other article, fraudulent use of data, etc., then such manuscripts are retracted.
- A retraction note entitled “Retraction: [article title]” (for example Retraction: ABC experiment involving XYZ species) is published in the paginated part of the next scheduled issue of the journal and is also listed in the table of contents.
- The retraction note is approved by the Editor-in-Chief of the concerned journal.
- A link to the original article is displayed in the online (electronic) version.
- A screen containing the note of retraction appears before the electronic version of the article present on the website. On the screen, a link for the complete article is present, i.e. to access the retracted article.
- The link / webpage of the original article remains unchanged, however a watermark is shaded on its downloadable PDF document, in order to explicitly give the message that the article was retracted.
It is a condition of publication that manuscripts submitted to the Bentham 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.
Abstracts and posters of conferences, results presented at meetings (for example, to inform investigators or participants about findings), results databases (data without interpretation, discussion, context or conclusions in the form of tables and text to describe data/information where this is not easily presented in tabular form) are not considered prior publication.
Authors who wish to publish translations of the articles that have been published elsewhere should ensure that they have appropriate permission(s), indicate clearly that the material has been translated and re-published, and indicate clearly the original source of the material. The Editor-in-Chief may request copies of related publications if he/she is concerned about overlap and possible redundancy.
Bentham Science has collaborated with the Copyright Clearance Center to meet its 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 journal titles. Simply 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 RightsLink’s page. If you are unable to locate the content you wish to use or are unable to secure the rights you are seeking, please e-mail us at permissions@benthamscience.net
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.
Responsibility for the content published by Bentham Science Publishers in any of its journals, including any opinions expressed therein, rests exclusively with the author(s) of such content. To the maximum extent permitted by applicable law, BSP (on its own behalf, and on behalf of its staff and members of its editorial board) disclaims responsibility for any and all injury and/or damage (whether financial or otherwise) to persons or property, resulting directly or indirectly from any ideas, methods, instructions or products (including errors in the same) referred to in the content of any of BSP’s journals. Any dispute arising, including any claim shall be governed exclusively by the laws of the United Arab Emirates, as applied in the Emirate of Sharjah.
