Plagiarism Policy

All submissions undergo plagiarism detection through CrossRef Similarity Check (powered by iThenticate). This compares the manuscript to millions of published works. The editorial office reviews similarity reports: generally, a similarity index above 20% (excluding references and quoted text) triggers manual review. Minor overlap (e.g. methodological text) may be tolerable with citation. Any unoriginal content must be properly cited or will be flagged. Detected plagiarism will lead to rejection or retraction following COPE standards. Figures are also examined for manipulation. The policy (posted under Submission Checks) will briefly describe this screening to deter unethical overlap.