1. Editorial Policies

1.1 Peer Review Policy

The peer review process in TMU journals is mostly double-blinded in which the reviewer’s name is unknown to the author and, vice versa. Each manuscript is reviewed by at least two referees.  The review process is done as quickly as possible, and an editorial decision is normally made within 6 - 8 weeks of submission.

Manuscripts are initially reviewed by the Editors and only those in accord with the aims and scope of the journal which advance its scientific and editorial standards are sent for outside review.

1.2 Authorship

The list of authors should include anyone who has significantly contributed to the writing of the article. Relative scientific or professional influences of contributors should be considered while specifying principal authorship, authorship order, and other publication credits. In multiple-authored articles that are derived from a student’s dissertation or thesis, normally the name of the student is listed as the principal author. Authors are expected to consider the list and order of authors carefully before submitting their manuscript and provide the definitive list of authors at the time of the original submission. Any addition, deletion, or rearrangement of author names in the authorship list should be made only before the manuscript has been accepted and only if approved by the journal Editor. To request such a change, the Editor must receive an official E-mail from the corresponding author that contains: (a) the reason for the change in author list and (b) written confirmation (e-mail, letter) from all authors that they agree with the addition, removal or rearrangement. In the case of addition or deletion of authors, this includes confirmation from the author being added or removed. Only in exceptional circumstances will the Editor consider the addition, deletion, or rearrangement of authors after the manuscript has been accepted. While the Editor considers the request, the publication of the manuscript will be suspended. If the manuscript has already been published in an online issue, any requests approved by the Editor will result in a corrigendum.
 

2. Publishing Policies

2.1 Publication Charges

TMU Publishing does not require page or color charges for The Journal of Crop Protection.

2.2 Archiving Policy

Scientific Information Database (SID) and Islamic World Science Citation Center (ISC), the national library of scholarly journals in Iran, protect and preserve all the academic publications in all journals. The Journal of Crop Protection (JCP) upload all published articles in both servers to keep forever online. JCP a SID and ISC systems to create a distributed archiving system among participating libraries and permits those libraries to create permanent archives of the journal for purposes of preservation and restoration. SID is an Iranian free accessible website for indexing academic journals and access to full text or metadata of Academic publishing.

2.3 TMU Press

TMU Press accepts all the terms and conditions of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). Authors may refer to the Committee on Publication Ethics’ International Standards for Authors for comprehensive information.

2.3.1 Plagiarism

Plagiarism or other breaches in publication are taken extremely seriously in TMU Press. The rights of authors are protected and claims of plagiarism or misuse of articles published in the journal are investigated. Articles submitted are checked using duplication-checking software. If an article is found to have plagiarized other work or contained third-party copyright material without authorization or adequate acknowledgment, or where authorship of the article is contested, TMU Press reserves the right to take action including, but not limited to: publishing an erratum or corrigendum; removing the article from the journal; taking up the matter with the head of department or dean of the author’s institution and/or relevant academic bodies or societies; proscription of the author from publication in the journal or proper legal action.

Plagiarism as it is described in Wikipedia “is the "wrongful appropriation" and "stealing and publication" of another author's "language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions" and the representation of them as one's own original work. The idea remains problematic with unclear definitions and unclear rules.

Plagiarism is not in itself a crime but can constitute copyright infringement. In academia and industry, it is a serious ethical offense. Plagiarism and copyright infringement overlap to a considerable extent, but they are not equivalent concepts, and many types of plagiarism do not constitute copyright infringement, which is defined by copyright law and may be adjudicated by courts. Plagiarism is not defined or punished by law, but rather by institutions (including professional associations, educational institutions, and commercial entities, such as publishing companies).”

2.2 Experimentation ethics

Authors who study on human subjects need to state that in the materials and methods section: a) patients’ consent and b) authors specify whether the procedures followed have been gauged by a responsible review committee. Where no formal committee is available the research must be in accordance with Helsinki Declaration as revised in 2013. Where animals are included in the research all animals should have received human care according to the criteria outlined in the Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals prepared by the National Academy of Science and published by the National Institutes of Health (NIH publication 23-86, revised 1985). 

2.3 Compliance with Ethical Standards

To ensure objectivity and transparency in research and to ensure that accepted principles of ethical and professional conduct have been followed, authors should include information regarding sources of funding, potential conflicts of interest (financial or non-financial) research. It is the policy of JCP to discourage all coercive citation practices. Citation suggestions will only be recommended on the basis that they are scientifically appropriate, without preference for any authors or journals. Equally, the journal discourages authors from using any strategic citation practices in their submitted manuscripts. References should only be included because they are scientifically appropriate to the paper.
JCP takes ethical concerns very seriously. If concerned, please contact the Editorial Office jcp@modares.ac.ir.
Papers will only be sent to review if the Editor-in-Chief determines that the paper meets the appropriate quality and relevance requirements.
The corresponding author should be prepared to collect documentation of compliance with ethical standards and send if requested during peer review or after publication.
The Editors reserve the right to reject manuscripts that do not comply with the TMU guidelines. The author will be held responsible for false statements or failure to fulfill the mentioned guidelines. Authors are responsible for the correctness of the statements provided in the manuscript.
 

3. How to submit your manuscript

Prior to submitting your manuscript, make sure you have carefully read and adhere to all the following guidelines and instructions to authors. Needless to say, manuscripts not in line with these instructions will be returned.

TMU journals have no word limit. Preliminary demands on appropriate topics may be emailed to the Editor. Each manuscript should comprise of a title page with a full title. In order for a double-blinded review to happen, each author’s full name with their affiliation and current address/phone/fax/email information along with a brief biographical note needs to be provided on a separate page. Manuscripts that meet all the criteria in the Manuscript Submission Guidelines can be sent to the Editor. 

Covering letter: To every submission attach a covering letter approving that all authors have agreed to the submission. The letter should be written and signed by the corresponding author on behalf of all authors. It should also confirm that the manuscript has not been previously published nor is being considered for publication elsewhere. It also should include authors’ completed contact information such as addresses, telephone and fax numbers, and e-mail.
 

 4. Journal copyright issues

JCP is published under an Open Access license agreement and is freely available online immediately upon publication, without subscription barriers to access. Authors will be asked to sign an open access license agreement. This Journal agree Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (CC BY-NC). This license permits users to use, reproduce, disseminate or display the article provided that the author is attributed as the original creator and that the reuse is restricted to non-commercial purposes i.e. research or educational use.
For the author, as the holder of the rights, it is required by TMU Press to sign Journal Contributor’s Publishing Agreement. The Journal Contributor’s Publishing Agreement is an exclusive license agreement assuring that the author will preserve the work’s copyright, however, it also provides TMU Press with the only and exclusive right and license to publish for the complete lawful period of copyright. Nevertheless, there may be cases of exception, when the copyright is needed or proffered to be assigned by some owner other than TMU Press.

Issues related to copyright violation, plagiarism, or any other deviations from best practice in publication are taken very seriously by TMU Press. We are dedicated to protecting our authors’ rights, and shall always investigate any reports concerning plagiarism or misapplication of articles you publish in the journal. Likewise, we are bound to keep the journal away from any case of misuse. We employ duplication-checking software to check the articles submitted to the journal. If it turns out that the article is an instance of plagiarism from other works, or if some copyrighted material is included in the submitted article without prior permission or proper acknowledgment, or if there are disputes over the authorship of the article, we shall maintain our right to take necessary actions. We may publish an erratum or corrigendum (correction); remove the article from Journal; take up the issue to the head of the institution, department, or any other pertinent academic society, or take any other lawful action, such as prohibiting the author from publishing articles in this specific journal or all the journals belonging to TMU Press.

It is essential for you to confirm a statement of conflicting interests in your Journal Contributor’s Publishing Agreement.
 

5. Declaration of conflicting interests

Your statements should be placed at the end of your manuscript, after acknowledgments, and before the references. This part should have a heading: ‘Statement of Conflicting Interests. If there is no statement, in your article under this heading will be printed ‘None Stated’. Conversely, you may prefer to express that  "The Author(s) state(s) that there is no conflict of interest".

 When you make a statement, please bear in mind that the disclosure information needs to be specific and include any financial relationship that exists among authors of the article and any supporting institute and the for-profit interests the institute signifies as well as any for-profit product which is discussed or implicitly mentioned in the article.

Any marketable or monetary contributions that may signify the presence of a conflict of interest should be made known in the covering letter that goes with your article to help the Editor decide if you have made adequate disclosure in the Statement of Conflicting Interests you provide in your article.
 

6. Acknowledgments

You should include your acknowledgments at the end of your article, before the Statement of Conflicting Interests (if there are any). It should also precede your notes and References.

The ‘Acknowledgments’ section should include a list of any contributors who lack the necessary conditions for authorship. For example, you may acknowledge those who only provided technical help, those who assisted you in writing, or any authority who helped you merely through general support. Authors are required to mention if they have been helped in writing and should disclose the identity of the party that has paid for this help.

 6.1 Funding Acknowledgment

All writers are asked to report their funding on a regular basis and under a separate heading. You need to affirm that: “this research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.”

 All research articles are required to have a funding acknowledgment in the form of the sentence below. The name of the funding agency must be written in full, followed by the grant number in square brackets: for example, "This work was supported by the Tarbiat Modares University [grant number xxx]".

In case the paper has various grant numbers, they should be divided by comma and space. If the research was financed by numerous agencies, the different agencies should be mentioned in the acknowledgment, separated by semi-colon, with ‘and’ before the final name, as follows: Example: "This work was supported by the Tarbiat Modares University [grant numbers xxxx, yyyy]; the Tehran University [grant number zzzz]; and the Ministry of Technologies and Sciences [grant number aaaa]".

 Occasionally, a research is not funded by a particular project funding, but from the block grant and other resources of a university, college, or other research institution. In cases where no specific granting has been provided, researchers are required to use the following sentence: “This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.”

Under the separate heading of Funding, take in this information directly after any other Acknowledgments and before your Declaration of Conflicting Interests, any Notes, and References.
 

 7. Permissions

It is the authors’ responsibility to attain permission from copyright holders for copying figures, tables, illustrations, etc. previously published. 
 

8. Manuscript style

8.1 File types

Electronic files conforming to the journal's guidelines will be accepted. A preferred format for the text and tables of your manuscript is Word DOC.

8.2 Journal Style

To review TMU Press guidelines click here.

 8.3 Reference Style

TMU Press journals operate either Vancouver or Harvard reference style, depending on the journal. Journal of Crop Protection (JCP) operates Harvard style. 

Click here to review the guideline on Harvard style to make sure your text accords with this style of referencing.

 EXAMPLE OF A REFERENCE LIST

 Book Print:

Abivardi, C. 2001. Iranian Entomology-An Introduction: Volume 1: Faunal Studies. Volume 2: Applied Entomology (Vol. 2). Springer Science & Business Media.

 Book: online / electronic

Simons, N. E., Menzies, B. and Matthews, M. 2001. A Short Course in Soil and Rock Slope Engineering. London, Thomas Telford Publishing. Available from: http://www.myilibrary. com?ID=93941 [Accessed 18th June 2015].

 Book: chapter in an edited book

Fathipour, Y. and Mirhosseini, M. A. 2017. Diamondback moth (Plutella xylostella) management. In: Reddy, G. V. P. (Ed.), Integrated Management of Insect Pests on Canola and Other Brassica Oilseed Crops. CABI. pp.13-43. doi: 10.1079/9781780648200.0013.

 Journal article: print

Baghaee-Ravari, S., Rahimian, H., Shams-Bakhsh, M., Lopez-Solanilla, E., Antúnez-Lamas, M. and Rodríguez-Palenzuela, P. 2011. Characterization of Pectobacterium species from Iran using biochemical and molecular methods. European Journal of Plant Pathology, 129(3): 413-425.

Journal article: online / electronic

Khani, A. and Moharramipour, S. 2010. Cold hardiness and supercooling capacity in the overwintering larvae of the codling moth, Cydia pomonella. Journal of Insect Science, 10(1): 83. Available from: doi: 10.1673/031.010.8301. [Accessed 20th January 2015].

or

Khani, A. and Moharramipour, S. 2010. Cold hardiness and supercooling capacity in the overwintering larvae of the codling moth, Cydia pomonella. Journal of Insect Science, 10(1): 83. Available from: http://www.bioone.org/doi/full/10.1673/031.010.8301. [Accessed 20th January 2015].

 Pre-print journal articles

Saeidi, M. and Moharramipour, S. 2017. Physiology of cold hardiness, seasonal fluctuations, and cryoprotectant contents in overwintering adults of Hypera postica (Coleoptera: Curculionidae). Environmental Entomology, nvx089. doi: 10.1093/ee/nvx089.

 Conference proceeding: individual paper

Wittke, M. 2006. Design, construction, supervision and long-term behaviour of tunnels in swelling rock. In: Van Cotthem, A., Charlier, R., Thimus, J. F. and Tshibangu, J. P. (Eds.), Eurock 2006: Multiphysics Coupling and Long Term Behaviour in Rock Mechanics. Proceedings of the International Symposium of the International Society for Rock Mechanics, EUROCK 2006, 9–12 May 2006, Liège, Belgium. London, Taylor & Francis. pp. 211–216.

 Reference to Institution

British Standards Institution. 2003. BS 5950–8:2003. Structural Use of Steelwork in Building:code of Practice for Fire Resistant Design. London, BSI.

Software
SAS Institute. 1985. SAS User's Guide: Statistics (Vol. 2). Cary, NC, USA.

 Report

Leatherwood, S. 2001. Whales, Dolphins, and Porpoises of the Western North Atlantic. US Department of Commerce. Report Number: 63.

 Web page / website

European Space Agency. 2015. Rosetta: Rendezvous with a Comet. Available from: http://rosetta.esa.int [Accessed 15th June 2015].

8.4 Manuscript Preparation

• Double-spaced
• Right and left margins: a minimum of 3 cm
• Head and foot. 3.5 cm
• Text should be standard 10 or 12 points.

8.4.1 Title, Keywords and Abstracts

The title, keywords and abstract help readers find your article easier and ensure a better readership.

8.4.2 Corresponding Author Contact details

Full contact details are needed for the corresponding author. For other authors academic affiliation is required. To assist anonymous peer review this information should be presented independently to the main text of the article.

8.4.3 Guidelines for submitting artwork, figures, and other graphics

8.4.3.1 Figures

1. Figures are supposed to include in the Microsoft Word file of the text.

2. Number figures should appear in the order of appearance in the manuscript

3. The abbreviation ‘Fig’ should be used to cite the figures in the manuscript and in the Figure legend.

4. For figures with several parts, each part should be labeled alphabetically (A, B, C, etc.) as part of the figure in the upper left spot of the figure.

5. Captions should start, for instance, Figure 1 with a full stop at the end. In case there is more than one line captions should be left aligned and justified.

6. Figures used from other publications need permission. Some publishers ask for certain text, e.g. Elsevier.

7. Where there is permission entailed it should appear underneath the number (Vancouver), author, and date (Harvard).  

8. Photographs and other scanned images must have a resolution of at least 300 dpi.

9. Only Microsoft Word type is acceptable. In case you do try to convert from PowerPoint to one of the following file types, PDF, PowerPoint, Adobe Photoshop, TIFF, be very careful to compare the final version with your original.

10.  Legends for figures appear on a different page after the References. Figures and legends need to be apprehensible without reading the manuscript.

 8.4.3.2 Tables

1. Table headings need to be aligned left in all cases such as when they are related to various columns.

2. Tables need to be prepared using the "Table" feature of Microsoft Word software. Tables prepared using Excel or other spreadsheet programs are not usable.

3. Number tables sequentially and cite in the manuscripts as Table 1, Table 2, etc.

4. The word ‘Table’ should be written in full.

5. Number the tables in their order of appearance in the manuscript.

6. Rules used for tables must be minimal horizontal to ensure clarity

7. Tables should have clear titles and explanatory footnotes (labeled with lower-case letters, in alphabetical order)

8. Do not repeat the details provided in the main document.

9. Dates in Tables should be shortened to, for instance, 5 Jun 12.

10. Captions should appear left aligned, above the table.

11. Use superscripts numberss 1, 2, 3, etc., for footnotes in the table
 

 9. After acceptance

9.1 Proof

PDF of the proofs will be emailed to the corresponding author.

9.2 E-Prints

TMU Press journals are all open access free journals and the PDF of all their articles will be available after acceptance.
 

10. Manuscript Main File

The main file of the manuscript should include the following parts:

 10.1 Full Title of Manuscript

The title should be a short, clear, concise, and declarative sentence that describes the major conclusion suggested by the results. 

10.2 Author names, Affiliations, Email of the corresponding author

Write the name, affiliation, and e-mail of all authors. Specify the corresponding author.

10.3 Abstract

The manuscript first page starts with an Abstract. The Abstract should be clear enough to provide the reader with a comprehensive list of the article. Avoid using reference citations.

 10.4 Keywords

Provide up to 5 keywords. Keywords should express the precise content of the manuscript, as they are used for indexing purposes.

10.5 Introduction

In the introduction, the background needs to be briefed, with no subheadings, and should provide the reader with the information needed for understanding the manuscript. Objectives should describe the main purpose(s) of the research.

 10.6 Materials and Methods

It contains necessary information and procedures in order for other researchers to be able to repeat it. Subsections can be considered where a variety of different methods are used.

10.7 Results

This part may contain tables, lists, and figures. Focus on the important points of results in this section but avoid repeating information provided in tables or figures. This section can contain up to 6 tables/figures.

 10.8 Discussion

Information here is different from that of the results. This part should indicate the final conclusion of the study in brief.

10.9 Conflict of Interests

The authors must declare any kind of conflict of interest in their research.

 10.10 Authors’ Contributions

All authors' contributions in the research process need to appear in this section.

 10.11 Acknowledgments

Refer to part 6 of this guide.

 10.12 References

The accuracy of all references needs to be checked by the author. Authors need to ensure that the cited references in the text match with the list of references at the end of the article. JCP uses Harvard style for referencing. References come right after the Funding acknowledgments and before the legends.