Submissions

Submission Preparation Checklist

As part of the submission process, authors are required to check off their submission's compliance with all of the following items, and submissions may be returned to authors that do not adhere to these guidelines.

• I, the submitting author, guarantee that I have obtained authorization from all co-authors, where applicable, to submit this version of the manuscript in accordance with the journal’s editorial policies , and to serve as their spokesperson throughout the review process and thereafter. I also approve distribution under the CC BY-NC-SA license, and this has likewise been approved by all co-authors.
• All authors of the manuscript qualify for authorship in accordance with the guidelines outlined in the authorship criteria, and all have granted their permission to be named in the submitted manuscript.
• The manuscript has not been previously published in its currently submitted version, nor is it under consideration by another journal. If the manuscript has been published in an earlier version, this must be clearly stated; see the editorial policies. (Please provide an explanation in the "Comments for the Editor" box if relevant).
• The submitting author has provided their ORCID iD in their author metadata. Any co-authors are strongly recommended to provide one as well, in accordance with journal policy.
• All material presented in the manuscript whose copyright is held by third parties has been properly attributed, and the necessary permissions have been obtained by the submitting author.
• The text adheres to the stylistic and bibliographic requirements specified in the instructions for authors.
• The manuscript files uploaded for review are anonymized in accordance with the journal's policy.
• All individuals or groups of individuals who can be identified in a study, or their guardians, have signed informed consent documents, thereby granting their permission for the submitted manuscript to be published under a CC BY-NC-SA license.
• Where applicable, the research has been reviewed and approved by an appropriate ethics committee, and the name of the committee as well as the approval reference number have been included in the submitted manuscript.