Publication Ethics
This statement clarifies ethical behavior of all parties involved in the act of publishing an article in the Annual Journal of Technical university of Varna (AJTUV), including the authors, peer-reviewers, and section editors. This statement is based on COPE’s Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors.
The publication of an article in a peer-reviewed AJTUV is an essential building block in the development of a coherent and respected network of knowledge. It is a direct reflection of the quality of the sciefintic work of the authors and the institutions that support them. Peer-reviewed articles support and embody the scientific method. It is, therefore, important to agree upon standards of expected ethical behavior for all parties involved in the act of publishing: the author, the section editors, the peer-reviewers, the publisher and the society.
Technical university of Varna as publisher of AJTUV takes its duties of guardianship over all stages of publishing seriously and we recognize our ethical and other responsibilities. We are committed to ensuring that advertising, reprint or other commercial revenue has no impact or influence on editorial decisions.
Publication decisions
The Section editors are responsible for deciding which of the articles submitted to the AJTUV should be published. The validation of the work in question and its importance to researchers and readers must always drive such decisions.
Fair play
Section editors at any time evaluate manuscripts for their intellectual content without regard to race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy of the authors.
Confidentiality
The section editor and any editorial staff must 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
Unpublished materials disclosed in a submitted manuscript must not be used in an editor's own research without the express written consent of the author.
DUTIES OF REVIEWERS
Contribution to Editorial Decisions
Peer review assists the Section editor in making editorial decisions and through the editorial communications with the author may also assist the author in improving the paper. The AJTUV uses double-blind review, which means that both the reviewers and authors identities are concealed from the reviewers, and vice versa, throughout the review process.
Promptness
Any selected referee who feels unqualified to review the research reported in a manuscript or knows that its prompt review will be impossible should notify the editor and excuse himself from the review process.
Confidentiality
Any manuscripts received for review must be treated as confidential documents. They must not be shown to or discussed with others except as authorized by the editor.
Standards of Objectivity
Reviews should be conducted objectively. Personal criticism of the author is inappropriate. Referees should express their views clearly with supporting arguments. Critical or negative judgements must be
fully supported by detailed reference to evidence from the paper under review or other relevant sources.
Acknowledgment of Sources
Reviewers should identify relevant published work that has not been cited by the authors. Any statement that an observation, derivation, or argument had been previously reported should be accompanied by the relevant citation. A reviewer should also call to the editor's attention any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other published paper of which they have personal knowledge.
Disclosure and Conflict of Interest
Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for personal advantage. 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. In the case of establishment of any conflict of interest, the Reviewer must immediately notify Sectional Editor and ask to be detached from the process of peer review.
DUTIES OF AUTHORS
Reporting standards
Authors of reports 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. A paper should contain sufficient detail and references to permit others to replicate the work. Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute unethical behavior and are unacceptable. Such articles, as well as forwarders will not be allowed to be published in AJTUV.
Originality and Plagiarism
The authors should ensure that they have written entirely original works, and if the authors have used the work and/or words of others that this has been appropriately cited or quoted.
Multiple, Redundant or Concurrent Publication
An author should not, in general, publish manuscripts describing essentially the same research in more than one journal or primary publication. Submitting the same manuscript to more than one journal concurrently constitutes unethical publishing behavior and is unacceptable.
Acknowledgment of Sources
Proper acknowledgment of the work of others must always be given. Authors should cite publications that have been influential in determining the nature of the reported work. It is advisable for authors to avoid self-citation when it is possible, and where this is inevitable, they should be limited to the possible minimum of self-citation.
Authorship of the Paper
Authorship should be limited to those who have made a significant contribution to the conception, design, execution, or interpretation of the reported study. All those who have made significant contributions should be listed as co-authors. Where there are others who have participated in certain substantive aspects of the research project, they should be acknowledged or listed as contributors. The corresponding author should ensure that all appropriate co-authors and no inappropriate co-authors are included on the paper and that all co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the paper and have agreed to its submission for publication.
Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest
All authors should disclose in their manuscript any financial or other substantive conflicts of interest that might be construed to influence the results or interpretation of their manuscript. All sources of financial support for the project should be disclosed.
Fundamental errors in published works
When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in his/her own published work, it is the author’s obligation to promptly notify the journal editor or publisher and cooperate with the editor to retract or correct the paper.
For further instructions, please refer to the Paper Withdrawal Policy
DUTIES OF SECTION EDITORS
Every Section editor of AJTUV is responsible for deciding which of the articles submitted by the journal submission system should be published in the corresponding section. The section editor may be guided by the Publication ethics and constrained by such legal requirements as shall then be in force regarding libel, copyright infringement and plagiarism. The section editor may confer with other section editors or reviewers in making this decision.
Fair play
The section editor of AJTUV evaluates manuscripts for their intellectual content without regard to race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy of the authors.
Preventing bad publishing practices and misconducts
The Section editors should strive to avoid coercive citation practices, protect freedom of expression of the autors, maintain the integrity of the academic records, and preclude business needs from compromising intellectual and ethical standards. They should strive to avoid publishing research papers and publication misconduct. Section editors should not simply reject papers that raise concerns about possible misconduct. They are ethically obliged to pursue alleged cases. Section editors have a duty to inform imidiately the Leadership of the AJTUV if they suspect misconduct or if an allegation of misconduct is brought to them. This duty extends to both published and unpublished papers.
Disclosure information about publications
The Section editor and any editorial staff must 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. Unpublished materials disclosed in a submitted manuscript must not be used in an editor's own research without the express written consent of the author. Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer-review process must be kept confidential and not used for personal advantage.
Appeals and signals
Section editors should give an official written response without undue delay of appeals or signals from Author(s) or other stakeholders involved in the process of publication, such as: disagreement with the conclusions made or given assessments after peer-reviewing, decisions to return the articles for corrections, decline to publishing, signals for plagiarism, etc. The procedure for filing complaints by the authors is described on the page "Appeal procedure".
