Ukrainian Journal of Ecology

Submission Preparation Checklist

As a part of the submission process, authors are required to check their submission's compliance with all of the following items:

1. Manuscripts submitted for peer-reviewed section have had the authors' names removed. If an author is cited, "Author" and year are used in the bibliography and footnotes, instead of author's name, paper title, etc. The author's name has also been removed from the document's properties, which in Microsoft Word is found in the File menu.
2. The text adheres to the stylistic and bibliographic requirements outlined in the Author Guidelines, which can be found in the “About the Journal” section.
3. The text is single-spaced; uses a 11-point font; and all illustrations, figures, and tables are placed within the text at the appropriate positions within the text, rather than at the end.
4. All URL addresses in the text (e.g.,http://ojs.mdpu.org.ua) are hyperlinked.
5. The submission has not been previously published, nor is it under consideration for publication in any other journal (in case the manuscript is being considered for publication in any other journal, an explanation must be provided in the Comments to the Editor section).
6. The submission file must be in Microsoft Word, RTF, or WordPerfect document file format.
   
   Submissions that do not adhere to these guidelines may be returned to the authors.

Copyright Notice

The Ukrainian Journal of Ecology is fully transparent about the rights of the authors.

Authors may present and discuss their findings ahead of publication: at biological or scientific conferences, on preprint servers, in public databases, and in blogs, wikis, tweets, and other informal communication channels.

The Ukrainian Journal of Ecology allows authors to deposit manuscripts (currently under review or those for intended submission, in non-commercial, pre-print servers such as ArXiv.

Authors who publish with this journal must agree to the following terms:

• Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
   
• Authors can enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
   
• Authors can post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).

Privacy Statement

The names and email addresses entered in this journal site will be used exclusively for the stated purposes of this journal and will not be made available for any other purpose or to third parties.

Our journal Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractice Statement is based, in large part, on the guidelines and standards developed by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). The relevant duties and expectations of authors, reviewers, and editors of the journal are set out below.

Responsibilities of Authors

By submitting a manuscript to Ukrainian Journal of Ecology, the author(s) state that the manuscript is their own, original work and that it has neither been published previously nor is it currently being considered for publication elsewhere. They also agree that the sources of any ideas and/or words in the manuscript that are not their own have been properly attributed appropriate citations and/or quotes.

An author should not normally publish manuscripts describing essentially the same research in multiple journals or publication venues. Such redundant publication is generally considered to constitute unethical publishing behavior, and if discovered may result in a manuscript under consideration being rejected, or a published article being retracted.

Authors of manuscripts reporting on original research should present an accurate account of the work performed, accompanied by an objective discussion of its significance. Underlying data should be represented accurately in the manuscript. The manuscript should contain sufficient detail and references to permit others to replicate the work. The fabrication of results and the making of fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute unethical behavior and may be cause for rejection or retraction of a manuscript or published article.

Where the manuscript reports on commercial software, hardware, or other products, authors must include a declaration at the beginning of the manuscript in which they must either state that no conflict of interest exists or describe the nature of any potential conflict. All sources of financial support for the research should also be disclosed in the manuscript.

The author(s) of a manuscript agree that if the manuscript is accepted for publication in Ukrainian Journal Of Ecology, the published article will be copyrighted using a Creative Commons “Attribution-Unported” license. This license allows the author(s) to retain the copyright, but also allows others to freely copy, distribute, and display the copyrighted work, and derivative works based on it, with certain specified conditions.

The authors’ names should be listed on the article in order of their contribution to the article, and all authors take responsibility for their own contributions. Only those individuals who have made a substantive contribution should be listed as authors; those whose contributions are indirect or marginal (e.g., colleagues or supervisors who have reviewed drafts of the work or provided proofreading assistance, and heads of research institutes/centers/labs) should be named in an “Acknowledgments” section at the end of the article, immediately preceding the Reference List. The corresponding author must ensure that all appropriate co-authors are included on the article, and that all the listed co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the article and agreed to its publication.

Where an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in an article of his/hers that has been published in Ukrainian Journal of Ecology, he/she has an obligation to promptly notify the editors and cooperate with them to correct the article or retract it as appropriate.

Responsibilities of Reviewers

The reviewers at the Ukrainian Journal of Ecology work for the journal on a voluntary basis. Given that most of these individuals are in full-time employment, their reviewing activities must, by necessity, not be their top priority. Reviewers are free to decline invitations to review a particular manuscript at their discretion, for example, if their current employment workload and/or other commitments make it prohibitive to complete a review in an appropriate and timely fashion. They should also not accept review assignments for which they feel unqualified.

Reviewers who have accepted manuscript assignments are normally expected to submit their reviews within three weeks. They should remove themselves from the assignment if it becomes apparent to them at any stage that they may have a potential conflict of interest in performing the review (e.g., one resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, institutions, or companies associated with the manuscript) or lack the required expertise to perform the review.

Privileged information or ideas obtained by reviewers through the peer review process must be kept confidential and not used for any personal gain. Any manuscript under review must be treated as a confidential document, and must not be shown to or discussed with others except as authorized by the editor of the Ukrainian Journal of Ecology.

When conducting their reviews, reviewers are asked to do so as objectively as possible, refraining from engaging in personal criticism of the author(s). They are encouraged to express their views clearly, explaining and justifying all recommendations made. Reviewers should always attempt to provide detailed and constructive feedback to assist the author(s) in improving their work, even if the manuscript is, in their opinion, not publishable.

Reviewers should identify in their reviews relevant published work that has not been cited by the author(s), together with any instances in which proper attribution of sources has not been provided. They should call to the responsible editor’s attention any major resemblance between a manuscript under consideration and other published articles or papers of which they are aware, as well as any concerns they might have in relation to the ethical acceptability of the research reported in the manuscript.

Responsibilities of Editors

The editor of the Ukrainian Journal of Ecology has the ultimate responsibility for deciding if a manuscript submitted to Ukrainian Journal of Ecology should be published, and in doing so is guided by the journal’s policies as determined by the editorial board of the Ukrainian Journal of Ecology. The editor may consult with the Associate Editor and other members of the editorial team, as well as with reviewers, in making decisions regarding publication of any manuscript.

The editors will evaluate manuscripts for their intellectual content without regard to the race, color, gender, sexual orientation, religious beliefs, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy of the author(s). They will not disclose any information about a manuscript under consideration to anyone other than the author(s), reviewers and potential reviewers, and in some instances the members of the editorial board and the management team of the Ukrainian Journal of Ecology, as is deemed appropriate. Additionally, the editors will make every effort to ensure the integrity of the double-blind review process by not revealing the identity of the author(s) of a manuscript to the reviewers of that manuscript, and vice versa.

When evaluating a manuscript for publication, in addition to the standard criteria, the editors will also seek evidence that ethical harms have been minimized in the conduct of the reported research. They will question whether the benefits outweigh the harms in the particular study’s case. Since the Ukrainian Journal of Ecology welcomes the submission of manuscripts from any country, it is necessary to recognize that laws and regulations regarding research ethics and ethical approval vary worldwide. As such, the editors may need to seek clarification in this regard with the author(s) and request that they supply a letter from the relevant institutional ethics committee or board that approved the research.

The editors will be guided by COPE’s Guidelines for Retracting Articles when considering article retraction, or issuing corrections pertaining to articles that have been published in the Ukrainian Journal of Ecology. The editors at the Ukrainian Journal of Ecology are committed to working closely with research organizations and institutions in line with COPE’s advice on Cooperation between Research Institutions and Journals on Research Integrity Cases

The Ukrainian Journal of Ecology follows an open access format, which amounts to free availability of articles to the readers without any charge to the user or his/her institution. Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, the full texts of articles in the journal without asking for permission from the publisher or the author(s). This is in accordance with the BOAI definition of open access.

Our website shows the Creative Commons sign and it is up to the author if he/she wants to have his/her articles freely available or held back from being published. But, abstracts must be published online.