POLICY

 

Editorial Policy

Portos adopts core editorial policies outlined below to ensure the accurate, timely and ethical publication of scientific journals.

 

Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing published by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), the Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA), and the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME) on https://publicationethics.org/resources/guidelines-new/principles-transparency-and-best-practice-scholarly-publishing is followed in shaping the publication process. Recommendations and guidelines of International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICJME) and Council of Science Editors (CSE) are taken into consideration as well.

 

Portos journals aims to contribute to the dissemination of ever-growing scientific knowledge through publication of high quality scientific journals and books in accordance with the international publishing standards.

 

All submitted manuscripts go through a double blind, non-biased peer review process before publication.

 

Plagiarism, duplication, fraud authorship/denied authorship, research/data fabrication, salami slicing/salami publication, breaching of copyrights, prevailing conflict of interest are unethical behaviours. Manuscripts not in accordance with the accepted ethical standards will be removed from the publication. This also contains any possible malpractice discovered after the publication.

 

Plagiarism

Submitted manuscripts that pass preliminary control are scanned for plagiarism using iThenticate software. If plagiarism/self-plagiarism will be found authors will be informed. Editors may resubmit manuscript for similarity check at any peer-review or production stage if required. High similarity scores lead to rejection of a manuscript before and even after acceptance.

 

Double Blind Peer-Review

After plagiarism check, the eligible manuscripts are evaluated for their originality, methodology, the importance of the subject covered and compliance with the scope. The editor provides a fair double-blind peer review of the submitted manuscripts and hands over the ones matching the formal rules to at least two national/international referees for evaluation and gives green light for publication upon modification by the authors in accordance with the referees’ claims.

 

Authorship

Individuals named as authors in a manuscript should meet all of the following criteria recommended by International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICJME):

 

1. Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work;
2. Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content;
3. Final approval of the version to be published;
4. Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

Individuals who do not meet all the criteria above or who make contributions in some other aspects, must be listed in the “Acknowledgement” section. No one, other than the ones listed as authors should have contributed to manuscript; ghost writing is not acceptable.

 

In case of a need to make changes in the authorship of a manuscript or a published article, the changes are implemented according to COPE guidelines.

 

 

Correction, Retraction

Publishing correction is considered if minor errors that do not affect the results, interpretations and conclusions of the published paper/content are detected. Retraction is considered if major errors and/or mis-conduction that invalidate results and conclusions are detected. An expression of concern is considered if there is evidence of research or publication misconduct by the authors; there is evidence that the findings are not reliable and institutions of the authors do not investigate the case or the possible investigation seems to be unfair or nonconclusive. The guidelines of COPE and ICJME are taken into consideration regarding correction, retractions or expression of concern.

 

Open Access

All publications of Portos are open access and all content is freely available without charge to the user or his/her institution. Except for commercial purposes, users are allowed to read, download, copy, print, search, or link to the full texts without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author. This is in accordance with the  BOAI definition of open access. All journals are published under a Creative Commons license.

 

Ethics

Portos journals is committed to upholding the highest standards of publication ethics and follows recommendations and guidelines developed by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), the Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA), and the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME) (https://publicationethics.org/resources/guidelines-new/principles-transparency-and-best-practice-). Recommendations and guidelines of Council of Science Editors (CSE) and the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) are taken into consideration as well.

 

Research Ethics

Portos journals adheres to the highest standards in research ethics and follows the principles of international research ethics as defined below.

–  Principles of integrity, quality and transparency should be sustained in designing the research, reviewing the design and conducting the research.

– The research team and participants should be fully informed about the aim, methods, possible uses and requirements of the research and risks of participation in research.

– The confidentiality of the information provided by the research participants and the confidentiality of the respondents should be ensured. The research should be designed to protect the autonomy and dignity of the participants.

–  Research participants should participate in the research voluntarily, not under any coercion.

–  Any possible harm to participants must be avoided. The research should be planned in such a way that the participants are not at risk.

–  The independence of research must be clear; and any conflict of interest or must be disclosed.

–  In experimental studies with human subjects, written informed consent of the participants who decide to participate in the research must be obtained. In the case of children and those under wardship or with confirmed insanity, legal custodian’s assent must be obtained.

–  If the study is to be carried out in any institution or organization, approval must be obtained from this institution or organization.

– In studies with human subject, it must be noted in the method’s section of the manuscript that the informed consent of the participants and ethics committee approval from the institution where the study has been conducted have been obtained.

 

Human Subjects and Animal Research

Portos journals publications take as principle to comply with the ethical standards of World Medical Association (WMA) Declaration of Helsinki – Ethical Principles for Medical Research Involving Human Subjects and WMA Statement on Animal Use in Biomedical Research.

 

Informed Consent and Ethics Committee Approval

Approval of research protocols from national or local ethics committees must be submitted together with the manuscripts. Manuscripts that report the results of experimental investigation with human subjects must include a statement that informed consent was obtained after the procedure(s) had been fully explained. In the case of children and those under wardship or with confirmed insanity, authors are asked to include information about whether the legal custodian’s assent was obtained.

 

Conflict of Interest

Authors, editors and reviewers are required to disclose existing or potential conflicts of interest. Conflict of interest exists when a participant in the publication process (author, peer reviewer or editor) has a competing interest that could unduly influence (or be reasonably seen to do so) his or her responsibilities in the publication process (submission, peer review, editorial decisions, and communication between authors, reviewers and editors).

 

To disclose potential conflicts of interest, the ICMJE Potential Conflict of Interest Disclosure Form (http://www.icmje.org/) should be filled in and submitted by all contributing authors. Cases of a potential conflict of interest of the editors, authors, or reviewers are resolved by the  Editorial Board within the scope of COPE and ICMJE guidelines.

 

Disclosure of Funding Sources

All financial support received to carry out research must be declared while submitting the paper. The role of the funder in the research must also be declared.

 

Artificial Intelligence Policy
The use of generative artificial intelligence (GAI) tools in articles published in Portos journals must be conducted within an ethical, transparent, and responsible framework. This policy defines the boundaries for the use of AI-assisted tools for authors, editors, and reviewers.

Portos journals follow the guidelines established by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and ICMJE regarding the use of GAI-supported technologies in the manuscript preparation process. GAI tools cannot be accepted or listed as authors in academic or scientific studies. GAI has no authorship or evaluative authority; scientific publications must be based on the researcher’s original ideas and findings. GAI may be used for language editing during manuscript preparation (and this must be clearly stated in the article).

Portos is committed to supporting copyright and publication ethics regulations. Due to ongoing legal uncertainties or potential copyright violations related to AI-generated visual content, the use of such materials is generally not permitted in our publications, except in the following cases:

For visuals directly referenced in research on artificial intelligence, a statement must be included in the note section indicating that the image was generated using generative AI and specifying which AI was used. Example: Note. The image was generated using artificial intelligence (DALL·E, OpenAI, 2026). This statement must also be described in detail in the article before the references.

Responsible and human-controlled use of generative AI is essential. To ensure that the use of generative AI systems is explainable and auditable, authors must verify the accuracy and appropriateness of AI-generated visuals and clearly describe the AI methodology used in the manuscript. All content generated using generative AI must comply with scientific standards and ethical rules.

Authors may use generative AI tools for language editing, proofreading, or technical improvement. However, the scientific content, analyses, and conclusions of the study remain entirely the responsibility of the authors. Original idea generation and hypothesis development are the responsibility of the author. Interpretation of findings, discussion, and conclusions must not be delegated to generative AI. Methods used in data analysis generated by GAI may raise ethical concerns. GAI systems cannot be listed as authors. If GAI is used, this must be clearly disclosed in the manuscript. The authors bear final responsibility for the accuracy and ethical compliance of AI-generated content. Confidential patient data, ethics committee–required data, or copyrighted materials must not be uploaded to GAI systems. GAI tools cannot create the scientific content of the study.

Editors may use GAI-supported systems for limited purposes such as language quality checks or similarity analysis during preliminary evaluation. However, editorial decisions are made solely by editors. Confidential patient data, ethics committee–required data, or copyrighted materials must not be uploaded to GAI systems.

Reviewers may not upload manuscript content under review to any GAI system, as this would violate data confidentiality. Reviewers may use AI tools only for language editing of the text they themselves have written. Reviewers are responsible for the scientific content of their reports.

Failure to provide proper disclosure, incomplete disclosure, or prohibited use constitutes a violation. In such cases, one or more of the following sanctions may be applied: manuscript rejection, post-publication retraction, editorial sanctions imposed by the journal, and institutional notification procedures.