Conflict of Interest

Conflict of Interest

The Journal of Mechanical Engineering, Science, and Innovation requires everyone involved in the publication process to be open about any interest that could influence, or appear to influence, the research, its review, or its publication. Declaring an interest does not by itself disqualify a manuscript or a person. Failing to declare one is a breach of publication ethics.

1. What Is a Conflict of Interest

A conflict of interest exists when a financial, professional, personal, or institutional relationship could affect the objectivity of the work or of a decision about it. Examples include:

  • funding, grants, or employment related to the subject of the research;
  • consulting fees, ownership of shares or patents, or other commercial interests in a product, method, or company discussed in the manuscript;
  • close personal or professional relationships, or recent collaboration, between those involved in the manuscript; and
  • competing academic or institutional interests.

2. Authors

All authors must disclose any conflict of interest and every source of funding or support for the work. The disclosure is placed in a separate statement before the References section:

Declaration of Competing Interest

The author(s) declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

If conflicts exist, the statement must describe them. If an undisclosed conflict is discovered after publication, the journal may publish a correction or take further action under its publication ethics policies.

3. Reviewers

Reviewers must tell the editor about any conflict of interest and decline the review when they cannot be objective. Typical reasons are a close working or personal relationship with an author, a recent collaboration, belonging to the same institution as an author, or a financial or competing interest in the work. Reviewers must not use information from a manuscript under review for their own advantage.

4. Editors and Editorial Board Members

Editors and editorial board members must not handle a manuscript when they have a conflict of interest. In that case, the manuscript is assigned to another editor, and the conflicted editor has no access to the review process or decision. Manuscripts submitted by the Editor-in-Chief, editors, or editorial board members, or by their institutions or close colleagues, are handled by an independent editor, and the review and decision are made without the involvement of the author concerned.

5. Funding and Publisher

The sources of funding or support of the journal do not influence editorial decisions. Editorial decisions are based only on the quality, originality, and relevance of the manuscript and on the outcome of peer review.