As an important component of academic research, academic journals bear significant responsibilities and missions in purifying the academic environment, maintaining a sound academic ecosystem, advocating for a good academic atmosphere, and promoting the healthy development of academic undertakings. Modern Transportation and Metallurgical Materials emphasizes academic ethics and promotes the spirit of innovation; maintains academic integrity and resists academic misconduct; strengthens the development of the editorial and peer-review teams and abides by the professional ethics of publishing. The journal solemnly declares that the authors, editors, and reviewers of its papers bear important responsibilities for upholding the ethics of journal publishing and resisting academic misconduct. All parties need to reach a consensus on recognized publication ethics, jointly observe them, and fulfill the following responsibilities and related requirements:
I. Editorial Department
1. Publishers should treat each manuscript fairly during the publishing process, based on its academic quality and practical value, and should not make publication decisions based on the author's race, religion, nationality, gender, qualifications, or position.
2. The editorial department will use tools such as the "Academic Misconduct Document Detection System" to screen and detect academic misconduct in manuscripts, in order to prevent potential academic misconduct during the journal editing and publishing process. After thorough investigation and communication, the editorial department will reject manuscripts for which there is sufficient evidence of misconduct. After the manuscript passes the screening, the editorial department should review the manuscript in a timely, objective, and fair manner (including inviting peer experts for review) in accordance with the purpose and requirements of the journal, without being driven by commercial interests, and provide detailed revision suggestions or reasons for rejection to the authors. The editorial department should also decide whether to accept the manuscript as soon as possible, select excellent papers that meet the requirements of the journal, and ensure high-quality and timely publication.
3. The editorial department fully respects the author's research results and the opinions of peer reviewers. The editorial department shall keep confidential the relevant information of both parties. Except for providing necessary information to facilitate the normal review and publication of the paper, no information related to the submitted paper shall be disclosed to others. If the author has objections to the review comments, they are allowed to appeal.
4. In the process of editing and publishing, editors should not only pay attention to publishing standards, but also respect the author's views, and must not make unauthorized modifications to key academic viewpoints. Editors are not allowed to use unpublished manuscripts submitted by authors for their own research.
5. Under normal circumstances, this journal does not accept authors’ requests for corrections or retractions. However, in the following circumstances where it is truly necessary, the journal will issue corrections or retract articles.
Correction: If an already published article is found to contain unintentional scientific errors that do not materially affect the results and conclusions of the article, the editorial department will publish a correction notice in the journal as soon as possible, explaining the changes made to the original text. The journal will publish a corrected new version of the article and specify in detail the changes made to the original article in the new version, together with the date of update. When citing the article, the latest version should be cited.
Retraction: In the following circumstances, the editorial department will retract published articles: (1) when the article contains serious scientific errors that render the results and conclusions unreliable; (2) for articles suspected of academic misconduct such as plagiarism or data fabrication, the editorial department will initiate an investigation and issue a statement informing readers that the article may present risks; if academic misconduct is confirmed, the editorial department will retract the article and publish a retraction statement.
II. Authors
1. The author assumes full responsibility for the content of the paper. The papers published in this journal must comply with national laws and regulations and do not contain confidential information. The paper should be original, and all experiments, data, and other content should be truthful, without any academic misconduct such as plagiarism or misappropriation. The paper must comply with the relevant requirements in the journal's "Submission Guidelines" and must not involve multiple submissions, duplicate publication, or intellectual property disputes. If academic misconduct is found to exist after the publication of the paper, the author shall bear corresponding responsibility for the consequences that have already occurred.
2. All named authors must have substantially participated in the relevant work of the research or article and cannot be arbitrarily added or removed. The affiliations of all authors should be listed in the article, and the corresponding author must be designated for the paper (which cannot be modified later). In principle, when students submit articles, the supervisor should be the corresponding author. It is necessary to ensure that all authors agree to the final published version and sign a copyright transfer agreement when submitting through the journal's submission system.
3. To safeguard the interests of all relevant parties and avoid conflicts of interest, relevant funding projects and sources, including project fund names and numbers, should be explained, and other funding information unrelated to the research should not be included.
4. If the author discovers obvious errors after the publication of the paper, they should promptly notify the editorial department to request retraction or correction of the paper.
5. Authors should respect the opinions of the peer reviewers, and if there are any objections, they may submit a written appeal to the editorial department. Authors must provide detailed explanations and clarifications regarding the review comments in the appeal letter and send it to the journal's email address. Upon receipt of the appeal, the editorial department will review it as soon as possible and provide the handling result to the author.
6. If authors or readers have any comments or suggestions regarding articles published in this journal or the editorial and publishing process, they are welcome to send them to the editorial department by email. The editorial department will process them as soon as possible after receipt and provide feedback as appropriate.
III. Reviewers
1. Reviewers should make every effort to fulfill their review responsibilities. If unable to review, they should promptly withdraw from the review system or recommend other experts for review.
2. Reviewers shall keep the manuscripts they review and all related review information confidential, shall not circulate or discuss them with others, and shall not make unauthorized use of the authors' research findings.
3. Reviewers should adhere to the principles of objectivity, impartiality, and prudence in evaluating the manuscript and make every effort to provide a fair evaluation of the significance of the topic selection, theoretical level, writing quality, innovativeness, and scientificity of the manuscript. Reviewers should confirm the source of the data used in the study, provide accurate academic evaluations and review conclusions to help editors decide whether to accept or reject the manuscript. Reviewers should provide detailed revision suggestions for the existing problems in the article to help the author improve the quality of the paper.
4. Reviewers shall not make personal evaluations or engage in personal attacks. If plagiarism or multiple submissions are found, the editorial department should be informed in a timely manner, and relevant evidence should be provided. The selection of papers is not influenced by the author's race, gender, religion, beliefs, status, qualifications, or authority.
5. Reviewers should recuse themselves from reviewing articles that involve conflicts of interest arising from competition or cooperation with the author, organization, or enterprise.
IV. Statement on the Use of Generative Artificial Intelligence
The journal’s policy on the use of Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) in manuscript preparation and peer review is as follows:
(1) GenAI cannot assume the responsibilities of an author. The journal does not accept GenAI tools, their outputs, or their development teams as listed authors of any manuscript.
(2) GenAI must not be used to write an entire manuscript or any essential parts of it (such as research methods, results, and interpretation or analysis of the results). All content involving scientific contribution or intellectual work must be completed by humans. If the main content of a manuscript is found to have been generated by GenAI, the editorial department will treat it as academic misconduct.
(3) GenAI may be used for auxiliary purposes such as literature retrieval, research topic exploration, statistical analysis, language polishing, drafting figures, and formatting checks. Authors bear full responsibility for any GenAI-generated content included in their manuscript and will also be liable for any violations of publication ethics or infringement arising therefrom.
(4) To improve efficiency and reduce workload, GenAI may be used to assist with routine editorial department tasks, but it must not be used to support manuscript evaluation or make acceptance decisions. Editorial staff must be responsible for manuscript review, acceptance decisions, and communication with authors. To prevent potential infringement, privacy breaches, or confidentiality risks, uploading manuscripts or supplementary materials to publicly accessible GenAI platforms during peer review is strictly prohibited.
(5) If the editorial department determines that authors have violated the GenAI usage policies, the manuscript will be directly rejected or retracted. In serious cases, the authors will be blacklisted, and the case will be reported to other journals in the discipline. Reviewers who violate these policies and cause information breaches or infringements will be prohibited from further reviewing for the journal and may bear corresponding responsibilities if necessary.
Note: In order to maintain academic ethics and safeguard the academic reputation of the journal, all authors who submit manuscripts to this journal and experts who participate in the peer-review process are deemed to have accepted these guidelines and are requested to comply with them conscientiously.