- News
Announcement of COPE Council elections
Due to vacancies on Council, we are seeking nominations for three new candidates. These are voluntary positions. Council is responsible for COPE’s policy and management. Council members are expected to attend four meetings a year (at least 2 of which are in London and 2 may be attended by phone or other media). There is also an annual 1 day strategy meeting which Council Members… Vacancies on COPE Council
Due to three council members coming to the end of their first term on council, we are seeking nominations for three new candidates. We are specially seeking candidates from Mainland Europe, Scandinavia and South America, and from the social sciences/humanities areas. COPE Council is an active, working council. Council meets three times a year; two of the meetings are held by webinar,…- Case
Co authors’ unwillingness to support retraction of a review
A review by three authors, with Dr X as the lead author, was published in Journal A. Five months later, the editor of Journal A was informed by Professor W that a figure in the review by Dr X had originally appeared in a research paper, co-authored by Professor W in Journal B in 1990. The professor also said that Dr X had published the same or very similar figures in journals C, D (research… - Case
Online posting of confidential draft by peer reviewer
As recommended by COPE, the editor’s posted a note on the case in the journal, presenting an account of the events.… - Case
A severe case of plagiarism?
…submitted manuscript with the publications provided by the reviewer and concluded that the submission presents a severe case of plagiarism with multiple copy-and-paste examples throughout the entire manuscript. The editor contacted the corresponding author by email and requested an explanation within a week. The corresponding author replied within the deadline but the editor did not find the… Case Submitted
…meetings is specific to the particular case under consideration and may not necessarily be applicable to similar cases either past or future. COPE accepts no liability for any loss or damage caused or occasioned as a result of advice given by them or by any COPE member. Advice given by COPE and its members is not given for the purposes of court proceedings…- Event
Developing Young and Established Journals – Management Planning
Run by KnowledgeE with Pippa SmartWorkshop endorsed by EASE (the European Association of Science Editors)Objective: By the end of this workshop editors should have an outline plan for developing their journal to increase visibility, quality and impact.Target Audience: This workshop is aimed at editors already experienced in managing their… - Event
Council of Science Editors Annual Meeting 2021
…Shaping our future by embracing adaptability We are pleased to announce that COPE Council Members Rachel Safer and Trevor Lane have been invited to speak at the 2021 Council of Science Editors virtual annual meeting. On 4 May, Rachel Safer will present at the CSE session on - Case
Duplicate submission
The authors submitted a paper to journal A on genetic analysis of a potentially pathogenic organism isolated from children, analysed by school attended. Six days later, the same authors submitted a paper to journal B on genetic analysis of the same organism isolated from children, analysed by socio-economic class. The papers appear to be different analyses of the same data, and substantial… - Event
COPE Forum: 9 December 2014
COPE's December Forum will be on Tuesday, 9 December 2014 at 9am (GMT). The Forum will be by Webinar. Click here for full details.… - Event
ISMTE Asian-Pacific Conference 2017
Empowering editorial offices around the world. Register by Saturday 11 February for early bird registration and hotel rates. Register & more information… - Case
Paper published that is a verbatim copy of another published one by another author
This is a report of two cases of possible misconduct by the same author(s): one that was identified during the review process and one only after it was published. We believe the author tried to publish a paper that was a verbatim copy of one that had appeared in another journal a few years earlier. A vigilant reviewer of the “copied” paper alerted the editor that, on verifying… - News
COPE advice to editors on geopolitical intrusions on editorial decisions
…follows: "Editorial decisions should not be affected by the origins of the manuscript, including the nationality, ethnicity, political beliefs, race, or religion of the authors. Decisions to edit and publish should not be determined by the policies of governments or other agencies outside of the journal itself, except where a decision might place the journal in violation of applicable law." - News
Survey reveals need for guidance on places to publish
A survey carried out by Think. Check. Submit. has revealed a strong demand from both researchers and librarians for guidance about where to publish and an appreciation of the… - Case
Corrigendum or erratum?
The publisher of a journal has found a spelling mistake in a published manuscript (an abbreviation was explained incorrectly in the original published manuscript). Having in mind COPE's guidelines, "The term erratum usually refers to a production error, caused by the journal. The term corrigendum (or correction) usually refers to an author error", is a corrigendum the proper way to correct… - Case
Potential peer reviewer misconduct
A journal received the recommendation of a peer reviewer which expressed doubts about the validity of some of the data in an article. The editor-in-chief got in touch directly with the author and mediated to have the data validated by an outside contributor. The authors responded by providing data validation by a colleague, who is now becoming a potential coauthor. The initial data were… - Case
Falsification of certificates of deposit of new bacterial species in culture collections
The process of naming and describing novel species of bacteria is governed by the Bacteriological Code. As part of this process, authors are required to deposit the type strain of the novel species in at least two culture collections located in different countries, and they are also required to provide documentary evidence that the strains have been so deposited and that the deposited strains… - Case
Authorship dispute
A manuscript was published by journal X and submitted by author A (last author). Author B claims that fraud occurred in relation to authorship for the following reasons. (1) Author A did not take part in producing the data for the paper and has never been a co-author on any version of the manuscript.(2) A paper with very similar content ,which was part of the PhD thesis of author… - Case
Simultaneous publication
About a month after our journal (Journal A) published a paper (Paper X), the journal received emails from readers that Paper X was very similar to a paper (Paper Y) that had just been published by another journal (Journal B). Some of these emails were sent to both journal offices. Paper X was submitted to Journal A a few days before Paper Y was submitted to Journal B and Paper…