Publication ethics

1. Authorship and contributorship

Authorship carries credit and accountability. Following the ICMJE recommendations, every listed author must meet all four criteria:

1. Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work, or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data;
2. Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content;
3. Final approval of the version to be published; and
4. Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work, including investigating and resolving questions about its accuracy or integrity.

Contributors who do not meet all four criteria — for example, those who provided funding, general supervision, technical assistance, or language editing only — should be named in the Acknowledgements with their permission, not listed as authors. Lumora journals encourage describing each author's role using the CRediT contributor roles taxonomy. Gift, guest, and ghost authorship are unacceptable.

Changes to authorship

Requests to add, remove, or reorder authors after submission require a written explanation to the editorial office and the explicit written agreement of all authors, including any author being added or removed. Changes requested after acceptance may delay publication while they are verified; changes are not made after publication except through a formal correction. Authorship disputes that cannot be resolved among the authors are referred to the authors' institution(s), consistent with COPE guidance.

AI tools and authorship

Generative AI tools cannot be listed as authors: they cannot take responsibility for the work, declare conflicts of interest, or approve the final version. Any use of AI tools in preparing a manuscript must be disclosed transparently in the methods or acknowledgements — see our AI Policy for full requirements covering authors, reviewers, and editors.

2. Originality, plagiarism, and text recycling

Submissions must be the authors' own original work. Plagiarism — presenting others' ideas, text, data, or images as one's own, with or without verbatim copying — is a serious form of misconduct and grounds for rejection or retraction at any stage.

• All submissions are screened with similarity-detection software during editorial checks, and concerns may also be investigated after publication.
• Verbatim text must appear in quotation marks with a citation; paraphrased material must still be attributed to its source.
• Text recycling (reuse of the authors' own previously published wording, sometimes called self-plagiarism) must be minimal, limited mainly to standardized methods descriptions, disclosed to the editor, and properly cited.
• Permission must be obtained for any reproduced third-party material, including figures and tables.

3. Data fabrication and falsification

Fabrication (inventing data or results) and falsification (manipulating research materials, processes, or data so the record does not accurately reflect the research) are among the most serious forms of misconduct. Authors must retain raw data and supporting records and be prepared to provide them to the editorial office on request during review or investigation. Inability to produce underlying data when reasonably requested may itself trigger an integrity investigation. See also our Data Availability Policy.

4. Image integrity

Images must faithfully represent the original data. The following standards apply to all figures, including micrographs, gels, blots, and clinical images:

• No specific feature within an image may be enhanced, obscured, moved, removed, or introduced.
• Adjustments to brightness, contrast, or color balance are acceptable only if applied to the whole image and only if they do not obscure or eliminate information present in the original.
• Grouping or splicing of images from different sources (e.g., different gels or exposures) must be made explicit in the figure layout and legend.
• Editors may request original, unprocessed image files at any point. Evidence of undisclosed manipulation is handled as suspected misconduct.

5. Duplicate and redundant submission or publication

• Manuscripts must not be under consideration by another journal at the same time.
• Work that has already been published — in whole or in substantial part, in any language — must not be resubmitted as new. Translated versions require the agreement of both editors, full citation of the original, and clear labelling as a secondary publication, per ICMJE.
• Splitting one study into multiple smaller papers to inflate output (“salami slicing”) is discouraged and may be treated as redundant publication.
• Prior posting of a preprint or conference abstract does not count as duplicate publication, but must be disclosed in the cover letter.

6. Citation manipulation

Citations must serve readers, not metrics. The following are unacceptable for authors, reviewers, and editors alike:

• Adding citations that do not contribute to the scholarly content, solely to raise the citation count of a person, journal, or group;
• Reviewers or editors pressuring authors to cite their own work or their journal as a condition of acceptance (coercive citation);
• Excessive, unjustified self-citation by authors.

Editors' requests to add citations must always be based on genuine scholarly relevance, and authors are free to decline requests they consider unjustified.

7. Ethics approval and informed consent

Research involving human participants, identifiable human data or tissue, or sensitive populations must have been conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki and approved by an appropriate ethics committee or institutional review board (IRB) before the research began. Manuscripts must state the approving body, the approval reference number, and how informed consent was obtained (or why a waiver was granted by the committee).

• For researchers in Saudi Arabia, approval within the National Committee of Bioethics (NCBE) framework is expected where applicable. The Saudi IRB Review Platform can be a structured starting point for preparing an application; final approval must come from the competent ethics authority for your institution and jurisdiction.
• Case reports and images that could identify a patient require documented informed consent for publication from the patient or their legal guardian, even when identifiers are removed.
• Research involving animals requires institutional approval and should follow the ARRIVE reporting guidelines.
• Editors may reject work that raises ethical concerns even where formal approval exists.

8. Clinical trial registration

In line with ICMJE policy, clinical trials must be registered in a public trials registry (e.g., a WHO ICTRP primary registry or ClinicalTrials.gov) before enrolment of the first participant. The registry name and registration number must appear in the abstract and methods. Trials that were not prospectively registered must explain why; the editor may decline to consider them or require the explanation to be published with the article.

9. Use of artificial intelligence

Authors must disclose any use of generative AI in drafting, editing, analysis, or image creation; AI tools may not be listed as authors; and authors remain fully responsible for AI-assisted content, including its accuracy and freedom from plagiarism. Reviewers must not upload manuscripts to AI tools. The full requirements — including permitted and prohibited uses for authors, reviewers, and editors — are in the Lumora AI Policy.

10. Conflicts of interest

All participants in the publication process — authors, reviewers, and editors — must disclose financial and non-financial interests that could reasonably be seen to influence the work or its assessment, following ICMJE disclosure standards. Editors recuse themselves from submissions in which they have a conflict. The complete requirements, including examples and the handling of undisclosed conflicts, are set out in the Conflict of Interest Policy.

11. Corrections, retractions, and expressions of concern

The published record is corrected — never silently altered — when errors or integrity problems come to light. Depending on the nature and severity of the issue, journals publish a correction, an expression of concern, or a retraction following COPE guidelines. Retracted articles remain available, clearly watermarked as retracted, with a linked retraction notice explaining who is retracting the article and why. Full criteria and procedures are in our Corrections & Retractions Policy.

12. Handling allegations of misconduct

Allegations of research or publication misconduct — including plagiarism, fabrication or falsification, image manipulation, undisclosed conflicts, authorship abuse, peer review manipulation, or ethics violations — are taken seriously whether the work is under review or already published, and regardless of who raises the concern.

1. Acknowledgement. Concerns sent to Support@lumora.sa are acknowledged within 24 hours and handled confidentially.
2. Assessment. The editor-in-chief, supported by the publisher, assesses the concern following the relevant COPE flowcharts.
3. Response. The authors are given the opportunity to respond to the allegation before conclusions are reached.
4. Escalation. Where the response is unsatisfactory or the issue is serious, the matter may be referred to the authors' institution(s) or funder(s) for formal investigation.
5. Outcome. Outcomes may include correction, expression of concern, retraction, rejection, notification of institutions, or restrictions on future submissions. Anonymous but evidenced concerns are assessed on their merits; whistleblowers acting in good faith are protected from retaliation.

13. Appeals and complaints

Authors may appeal an editorial decision by writing to Support@lumora.sa with a reasoned, evidence-based case — for example, a documented factual error in the reviews. Appeals are considered once per manuscript by the editor-in-chief, whose decision is final. Complaints about editorial processes, ethical conduct, or the publisher itself are investigated by a person not involved in the original decision, and complainants receive a substantive reply. Complaints that cannot be resolved internally may be referred to COPE guidance for benchmarking.

14. Responsibilities at a glance

Publisher

• Safeguard editorial independence; commercial considerations never influence editorial decisions.
• Maintain transparent policies on peer review, fees, copyright, corrections, and archiving.
• Provide the infrastructure and training for ethical editorial work, and act on COPE guidance in investigations.
• Respond to inquiries at Support@lumora.sa within 24 hours, 24/7.

Editors

• Judge manuscripts on scholarly merit, relevance, and integrity — never on author identity, affiliation, nationality, or ability to pay.
• Keep submissions confidential, manage conflicts of interest, and ensure fair, timely peer review.
• Act promptly and even-handedly on credible integrity concerns about submitted or published work.

Reviewers

• Provide objective, constructive, confidential assessments within the agreed time.
• Declare conflicts and decline assignments where impartiality is not possible.
• Flag suspected ethical problems to the editor rather than investigating personally.

Authors

• Report research honestly and completely; retain and share underlying data when requested.
• Meet authorship criteria, disclose conflicts and funding, and obtain all required ethics approvals and consents.
• Notify the journal promptly if a significant error is discovered in their published work and cooperate with correction or retraction.

Raising a concern

To report a suspected ethical problem with a Lumora journal, submission, or published article, contact Support@lumora.sa. Concerns are handled confidentially and acknowledged within 24 hours.

Last updated: July 2026 · Related: Conflict of Interest Policy, Corrections & Retractions, AI Policy, Peer Review Policy, All Policies