Publication ethics serves as the cornerstone of credibility for academic institutions. Establishing clear publication ethics standards can effectively prevent academic misconduct and safeguard trust within the academic community. To provide clear guidance for editors, authors, and reviewers, and to promote the healthy development of academic publishing ecosystems, the Editorial Office of Control Engineering of China hereby explicitly outlines the responsibilities and requirements for all parties involved in the publication of journal articles.
Editorial Responsibilities
1. Strict Compliance with Legal and Ethical Standards: Enforce relevant national laws and regulations, adhere to academic publishing ethics and norms, and uphold research integrity. Process all submissions promptly, fairly, and impartially to ensure high-quality and timely publication of accepted manuscripts.
2. Peer Review Implementation: Employ a peer review system for manuscript evaluation. Decisions on acceptance or rejection are based solely on academic merit, the journal’s scope, and editorial policies, without regard to the author’s gender, race, religion, nationality, status, seniority, or institutional affiliation.
3. Academic Misconduct Identification: Assess potential academic misconduct in accordance with the *Academic Publishing Standards—Definition of Journal Academic Misconduct (CY/T174-2019)*. Manuscripts found to involve misconduct at any stage (submission, external review, acceptance, or editing) will be rejected immediately. For published papers later identified with misconduct, corrective actions—such as corrections or retractions—will be taken to mitigate adverse impacts. Severe cases will be reported to the author’s affiliated institution.
4. Respect for Authors and Reviewers: Honor the intellectual contributions of authors and the expertise of reviewers. Maintain the authenticity and integrity of review records and ensure confidentiality throughout the review and revision processes. Information related to manuscripts shall only be disclosed to corresponding authors, reviewers, or editorial board members on a need-to-know basis.
5. Balancing Editorial Standards and Authorship Rights: Prioritize adherence to publishing norms while respecting authors’ perspectives. No unauthorized modifications to critical academic viewpoints or conclusions are permitted during editing.
Author Responsibilities
1. Originality and Integrity: Submitted manuscripts must be original works with verifiable foundational data, objective analysis, and accurate conclusions. Authors shall ensure the absence of academic misconduct, including but not limited to fabrication, falsification, plagiarism, or misrepresentation of data. The content must not involve state secrets, nor shall it entail issues such as duplicate submission, redundant publication, or intellectual property disputes.
2. Substantive Contribution and Consent: All listed authors must have made substantive contributions to the research or manuscript, including participation in study design, data acquisition/analysis, critical revisions, or drafting of the work. All authors must approve the final version of the manuscript and sign a copyright agreement prior to publication.
3. Fixed Authorship Order: Upon formal acceptance by the journal, authors are prohibited from altering the authorship order or composition without exceptional justification.
4. Institutional Affiliation Integrity: The primary institution credited for the research must not be arbitrarily modified due to changes in authors’ affiliations.
5. AI Usage Restrictions:
Prohibition of AI Authorship: AI tools shall not be listed as authors.
Core Content Integrity: The core content (e.g., hypotheses, data, results) must not be generated or altered by AI tools.
Controlled AI Assistance: If AI tools are used for auxiliary tasks (e.g., literature review, data processing, language polishing), authors must:
Verify and validate all AI-generated content for accuracy and authenticity.
Explicitly disclose AI usage in relevant sections (e.g., Methods, Data Sources) to ensure transparency.
Reviewer Responsibilities
1. Confidentiality Commitment: Reviewers must maintain strict confidentiality regarding the manuscript under review and all related information. They shall not use, disclose, or publish any data, arguments, or conclusions from the reviewed work without authorization.
2. Objective and Rigorous Evaluation:
Assess manuscripts based on academic rigor, objectivity, and impartiality, focusing solely on scholarly merit. Avoid personal critiques or ad hominem remarks.
Scrutinize research data for originality. If similarities or overlaps are identified with ongoing research or publicly available studies, reviewers must promptly notify the editorial office and provide verifiable evidence.
Recommendations for acceptance or rejection must be free from bias related to the author’s race, gender, religion, nationality, status, seniority, or authority. Review comments should clearly articulate the manuscript’s academic value and final recommendation, avoiding ambiguity.
3. Prohibition of Misconduct: Reviewers found exploiting the peer review process for personal gain or plagiarizing content from the manuscript will face disciplinary actions, including warnings, suspension of review privileges, or permanent exclusion, depending on severity.
4. Conflict of Interest Disclosure: Reviewers must recuse themselves from evaluating manuscripts if they have competitive, collaborative, or financial ties to the authors, institutions, or entities involved, to ensure impartiality.
5. AI Usage Restrictions:
No AI-Assisted Review: Reviewers are prohibited from uploading manuscripts to AI tools or platforms for analysis or drafting feedback.
Invalidation of AI-Generated Content: Any review comments proven to be AI-generated will be deemed invalid, and the reviewer may face sanctions.