What is the Journal for?
The Journal publishes high-quality articles by scientists from all around the world, and is devoted to topics related to the water environment, both freshwater and saltwater.
What purpose does it serve?
The objective pursued by the Journal is to collect and publish the findings of worldwide studies on various types of water environment and climatic conditions in one medium. This will facilitate a comparison of the studies and, in the long run, will help establish contacts and close cooperation between scientists with similar areas of interest.
Target Readers
The target readers are all scientists researching the water environment irrespective of their scientific degree, experience or individual area of interest.
Editorial services
All articles are peer-reviewed by experts from around the world; Proofreading services for non-English authors; Fast review and editing process; Worldwide dissemination and accessibility of articles; Graphical improvement; Color printing.
Aims and Scope
Aims and scope
Fields: Marine and freshwater biology, chemistry, geology, and physics.
Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies is open to all matters concerning the water environment, thus providing the readers with a wide spectrum of topics in every issue.
Articles written by both fledgling and experienced scientists are published so that their individual work is mutually complemented, and readers are provided with a sound basis for the comparison of different approaches to a given issue.
The Journal is open to young scientists with fresh or polemical views on a given subject matter, provides them with significant support, and juxtaposes their knowledge and experience with scientifically mature publications written by acclaimed specialists.
Handling allegations
When investigating and dealing with allegations of unethical behavior, the Editorial Board of OandHS follows the guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), developed and retained at its premises.
Authorship and contributorship
The list of authors provided during the registration of a manuscript is a clear indication of who was involved in the creation of a paper and who is responsible for the presented results. The corresponding author is a person responsible for contact with the Editorial Board and it is through this person that the editorial staff will convey all information and decisions concerning the progress of work on the preparation of the manuscript for printing. In case of failure to contact the indicated corresponding author, the Editorial Board reserves the right to contact the other co-authors. The corresponding author is obliged to communicate the information sent by the Editorial Board to other co-authors and to ensure that all corrections and guidelines are followed throughout the process of accepting and preparing the manuscript for publication.
Co-authorship
The co-author of a scientific article to be listed should meet the following criteria:
- Make a significant contribution to the creation, collection or analysis of data and their interpretation;
- Make a significant contribution to the preparation of the manuscript or the revision of its important substantive content contained therein;
- Be actively involved in the preparation of the final version of the article to be published.
Conditions (1), (2) and (3) must be met simultaneously.
Raising funds, collecting data or general supervision of a research group, alone, do not justify the authorship; such a person should be indicated in the “Acknowledgements” section in the form of e.g. personal expressions of gratitude, or a description of their contribution to the manuscript. Pursuant to the generally accepted principles of publishing ethics, the corresponding author should notify the persons listed in the “Acknowledgements” section of the intention to include their names.
Should an article prove unreliable, inaccurate, erroneous, in some respects dishonest or non-compliant with the observance of the publication ethics, the liability shall be shared between all co-authors listed, pursuant to the standard publication ethics.
In the event of suspicions of the unjustified inclusion of persons on the list of co-authors, the Editorial Board may ask the corresponding author (or another co-author if suspicions concern the corresponding author) for clarifications, on the basis of which a decision on the further processing of the manuscript or its rejection will be made.
In order to avoid misunderstandings and malpractice, all co-authors are required to sign “Copyright transfer agreements with a declaration of no conflict of interest and compliance with the ethics of authorship and co-authorship of scientific works” before the editorial staff proceeds with the production of the submitted manuscript.
If a person participating in the preparation of a manuscript or the research work described therein discovers that they have been intentionally or erroneously omitted from the list of authors, they should immediately report that fact to the Editorial Staff of OandHS, using the contact form posted on the Journal’s website or directly via e-mail to the Editorial Board.
In accordance with the principles adopted by the Editorial Board of Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies governing the authorship and co-authorship, ghost and gift authorship shall be deemed unethical:
Ghost authors – all persons included on the list of authors should meet the criteria described in this section, and all those who meet the criteria should be included on the list;
Gift authors – adding persons to the list of authors whose contribution to the work on the manuscript is inadequate and their inclusion results from professional, personal or commercial dependence.
In the event of irregularities found in the ethical principles governing the authorship and co-authorship, the Editorial Board reserves the right to discontinue the work on the manuscript until they are removed or the submitted text is rejected. The decision may be appealed against, first to the Manager of the Editorial Office, the Editor-in-Chief, and then to the Dean of the Faculty of Oceanography and Geography of the University of Gdańsk within seven (7) days from the date of its receipt.
Complaints and Appeals
Journal:
Complaints against the Journal can be submitted via the OandHS website or directly by e-mail addressed to the Editorial Office. Any information received will be reviewed by the Editorial Board within a maximum of 14 days from the date of receipt. A reply will be sent to the address entered in the field “e-mail address” in the contact form during registration, or directly to the address from which the complaint was received. The decision will address the reported situation and propose a solution to the problem. The decision of the Editorial Board may be appealed against, first to the Manager of the Editorial Office, the Editor-in-Chief, and then to the Dean of the Faculty of Oceanography and Geography of the University of Gdańsk within seven (7) days of receiving the response to the complaint.
Members of the Editorial Office
Complaints against the editorial staff can be submitted through the OandHS website or directly by e-mail addressed to the editorial office. Any information received will be reviewed first by the Manager of the Editorial Office, the Editor-in-Chief, except when the complaint pertains to the aforementioned, in which case the Dean of the Faculty of Oceanography and Geography of the University of Gdańsk will have the final say. A reply to the complaint will be sent to the address entered in the field “e-mail address” in the contact form during registration, or directly to the address from which the complaint was received. The decision will address the reported situation and propose a solution to the problem. The decision may be appealed against, first to the Manager of the Editorial Office, the Editor-in-Chief, and then to the Dean of the Faculty of Oceanography and Geography of the University of Gdańsk within seven (7) days of receiving the first response to the complaint.
Editorial Board
A complaint against the Editorial Board or a specific person sitting on it can be submitted through the OandHS website or directly by e-mail addressed to the editorial office. Any information received will be reviewed by the Editorial Board within a maximum of 14 days from the date of receipt. The reply will be sent to the address entered in the field “e-mail address” in the contact form during registration, or directly to the address from which the complaint was received. The decision will address the reported situation and propose a solution to the problem. The decision of the Editorial Board may be appealed against, first to the Manager of the Editorial Office, the Editor-in-Chief, and then to the Dean of the Faculty of Oceanography and Geography of the University of Gdańsk within seven (7) days of receiving the response to the complaint.
Publisher
A complaint against the measures undertaken by the Publisher representing Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies, or the lack thereof, resulting from generally accepted principles regarding the rights and obligations of the Publisher or from the conditions of production and distribution of OandHS, can be submitted through the website of the Journal or directly by e-mail addressed to the Editorial Office. Any information received will be reviewed by the Editorial Board within a maximum of 14 days from the date of receipt. The reply will be sent to the address entered in the field “e-mail address” in the contact form during registration, or directly to the address from which the complaint was received. The decision will address the reported situation and propose a solution to the problem. The decision of the Editorial Board may be appealed against, first to the Manager of the Editorial Office, the Editor-in-Chief, and then to the Dean of the Faculty of Oceanography and Geography of the University of Gdańsk within seven (7) days of receiving the response to the complaint.
Conflicts of interest (COI)/competing interest
The Editorial Staff of the scientific quarterly Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies, which is part of the Faculty of Oceanography and Geography, University of Gdańsk, hereby declares that the decision-making process regarding the acceptance or rejection of the manuscripts sent is governed and guided solely by content-related and qualitative aspects of the texts, and not political, geographical, or personal motives.
In order to minimize the risk of COI, the Editorial Staff of OandHS has decided to apply the “Double Blind” type of review.
By signing the “Copyright transfer agreement with a declaration of no conflict of interest and compliance with the ethics of authorship and co-authorship of scientific works”, each of the co-authors of the manuscript confirms that no potential conflicts of interest exist or are likely to occur.
The Editorial Board of Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies makes every effort to avoid any potential conflict of interest between the Author and the Reviewer when selecting reviewers for a specific text. In the registration form of a new manuscript submitted for publication, it is possible to notify the Editorial Staff of a potential conflict of interest between the Author and a specific reviewer (Opposed Reviewer), which will certainly be taken into account when selecting reviewers for the review.
Any suspicion of a conflict of interest involving two Authors, the Author and the Reviewer or other relationships at any stage of the manuscript processing should be reported to the Editorial Staff using the contact form available on the Journal’s website or directly to the e-mail address. Each complaint or notification will be followed up and clarified to the extent possible.
Potential conflicts:
Financial-economic conflict is defined as an affiliation of any kind with a company that has a share in the subject of the manuscript or is engaged in competitive business in relation to that subject.
Patent conflict occurs when an existing invention or process (officially filed for patent protection before the submission of a manuscript for publication) is in any way related to the subject matter of the submitted manuscript.
Content-related conflict occurs when the submitted text is a clear response to the results of the research published in an article by another author(s), explicitly opposing those results.
Institutional conflict occurs when the employer of the author(s) may have a financial interest or may disagree with the subject or materials discussed in the manuscript.
All funding sources (if any) of research described in the paper should be disclosed in the “Acknowledgements” section.
Disclosed conflicts may have a significant impact on the decision of the Editorial Staff as to whether the submitted text is suited for publication.
If no potential conflicts of interest are disclosed, the Editorial Staff of Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies will publish the following statement: “The authors have not declared any potential conflict of interest”.
A reviewer who has been asked to review a submitted manuscript and suspects a potential conflict of interest between themselves and the author(s) should report this fact to the Editorial Staff before proceeding with the review.
Data and reproducibility
The Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies scientific journal operates pursuant to a publishing contract signed with the Publishing House Walter de Gruyter GmbH, based on paid access to data contained in articles published by the Journal. Under the terms of the contract, all articles published in this journal are protected by copyright, which includes exclusive rights to reproduce and disseminate a given article, as well as all rights for translation. No material published in the Journal may be reproduced photographically or stored on microfilm, in electronic databases, DVDs, etc. without the prior written consent of the Publisher. The use of general descriptive names, trade names, trademarks, etc. in this publication, even if not explicitly stated, does not mean that the names are not protected by relevant laws and regulations. When signing the “Copyright transfer agreement with a declaration of no conflict of interest and compliance with the ethics of authorship and co-authorship of scientific works”, the author(s) of the article agrees to grant exclusive rights to the dissemination, reproduction, translation, photographic and other types of reproduction in the exclusive competence of the University of Gdańsk and the Publishing House Walter de Gruyter GmbH.
The author may place a link on their website to the full text of the article published on the Publisher’s website. The link should be accompanied by the following text: “The original publication is available at www.degruyter.com”. The author may deposit the copyright version of the publication in the repository of their institution and funding institution (designated by the sponsor) upon request from the sponsor or as a result of legal commitment, including its final version, provided that it is not made available to the public within 12 months of the date of its official publication. The author may not use the Publisher’s PDF version, which is published on the www.degruyter.com website for the purpose of archiving or depositing a printout as a deposit.
Ethical oversight
Research on humans
In the case of research involving human subjects, a mandatory written consent is required and all experiments and clinical trials must be conducted in accordance with the ethical standards detailed in the Declaration of Helsinki of 1975.
All studies conducted on human subjects must be approved by the relevant committee appointed by the authors’ institution and its name must be listed in the manuscript.
The manuscript should contain statements included in the “Materials and methods” section of the manuscript, with the following content:
“All applied procedures complied with the ethical standards of a relevant committee on human experimentation (institutional and national) and the Declaration of Helsinki of 1975 as amended in 2008” and “The informed consent of all patients was obtained before inclusion in this study”.
If no informed consent was obtained, an explanation should be provided as to why this is the case. It should be specified whether the informed consent was given in writing or orally. If the informed consent is available in oral form, the manuscript should provide an explanation:
- a) why written consent cannot be obtained,
- b) whether the institution’s committee of appeal or the relevant research committee approved the use of oral consent,
- c) how the oral consent was documented.
Authors may be requested by the Editorial Staff to submit statements from the institution’s committee of appeal or the research ethics committee, confirming their consent to the conducted research. If a patient consent form was used to obtain a patient’s written informed consent, this form should be attached to the submitted manuscript.
Research on animals
Descriptions of conducted research that involves experiments on animals must state that their use was in accordance with the guidelines of relevant national institutions, research councils or national regulations on the breeding and use of laboratory animals. All work involving animals must be carried out in accordance with the relevant national and international guidelines. The experimental procedures on animals should be as humane as possible and details on anesthetics and analgesics should be clearly defined.
The proof of approval by the local ethics committee (both in the case of research on humans and animals) must be presented by the authors at the request of the Editorial Staff.
The manuscript should contain the following statement in the “Materials and methods” section:
“All institutional and national guidelines on the breeding and use of laboratory animals for scientific research were followed.”
If ethical approval was not required or if the research was not conducted in accordance with the guidelines of the Helsinki Declaration, the authors must explain why this was the case in a letter addressed to the Editorial Board.
Intellectual property
Confidentiality
The Editorial Board of Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies treats all manuscripts and correspondence between the Journal, its editors, reviewers and authors as confidential information.
Authors should treat all correspondence with editors, reviewers and the Editorial Board as well as all materials and documents received as confidential. They may not be published on any website, or in any other form or medium, without the prior consent of the Editorial Board, before or after publication, if the submitted manuscript was accepted.
Plagiarism
Plagiarism prior to publication
If plagiarism is detected by Editors or Reviewers at any stage before the manuscript is published, the Editorial Board will notify the Author(s) of the need to correct the manuscript. If plagiarism is significant, the article may be rejected and the Author’s institution or employer notified of the situation.
When do we perform an antiplagiarism check?
Each manuscript submitted for publication in Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies is checked for plagiarism after its submission to the Editorial Board, after registration of the manuscript in the system and again after the review, before a decision is made whether to accept it for publication. The Editorial Board is also sensitive to any suggestions from reviewers that could indicate plagiarism.
How do we check?
The Editorial Board of OandHS uses all available methods and CrossCheck software (powered by iThenticate) to detect cases of overlapping and similar texts in submitted manuscripts.
What if plagiarism is detected?
The measures undertaken by the Editorial Board of OandHS largely depend on the scale of the detected plagiarism.
If up to 10% of the entire manuscript is plagiarized, the text is sent back to the authors without initiating the review process and the authors are requested to clarify and correct the problematic part, if necessary. If more than 10% of the text is plagiarized, the manuscript is rejected and the institution of the corresponding author is informed of the situation.
Plagiarism detected after publication
In the case of a justified suspicion of plagiarism in a paper published in Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies, please contact the Editorial Board immediately, stating the title of that paper, the name of the author(s), volume number, issue number, year of publication and any other information that may help to identify plagiarism. The Editorial Board will deal with any reported issue in accordance with the adopted ethics policy. If plagiarism is confirmed, the Editorial Board will contact the author’s institute and funding entities. An article containing plagiarism will be marked accordingly on each page of the PDF file. Depending on the degree of plagiarism found, the article may also be formally withdrawn.
Editing process management (Journal management)
The owner of Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies is the University of Gdańsk in Gdańsk, with its seat in Poland.
In the editing process, we use professional and licensed software from leading manufacturers, i.a. Corel Draw, Adobe Acrobat, InDesign and we always try to keep up with the latest novelties and introduce them to the extent possible and the changing needs of our readers.
Charges
The Journal is currently issued in the OPEN ACCESS format licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), supported by the Sciendo publishing platform. The pay access type of publishing used by Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies does not involve any fees on the part of authors.
Manuscript withdrawal
Texts may be withdrawn by the authors at any time, before being sent in their final form for publication. If authors decide to withdraw their paper, they will be requested to send a “Manuscript withdrawal letter” to the Editorial Board, signed by all co-authors; the form will be provided by the Editorial Board upon the request of the authors or will be available on the website. The manuscript may be withdrawn at any stage by the Editorial Board as a result of non-compliance with the ethical guidelines relating to publishing, such as duplicate publication, plagiarism, misuse of data, multiple submission, etc.
The Editorial Board may withdraw the manuscript from further processing if no communication from authors exceeds 90 days.
Paper corrections
If any error is found in a published paper, corrections (Erratum, Corrigendum, Addendum) will be published in the following edition or as soon as the Editors and Authors agree on the proposed changes. Revisions will only be published if a significant error is found in the text, which affects the subject matter of that text. Minor errors that do not significantly affect the content and understanding of the text, such as spelling and grammatical errors, shall not be corrected after publication.
Addendum – published when authors unintentionally omitted important information at the time of submitting the manuscript and want to add this content to the paper after its publication. All information sent as an addendum will be reviewed before being accepted by the Editorial Board.
Corrigendum – published when authors discover errors after the paper was published, which significantly affect the content of the paper, its accuracy and repeatability of methods or results.
Erratum – published when errors are the result of the editing or production process, such as significant typographical errors, errors in the number or numbering of tables or their legends, revisions sent by authors but not included in the paper during the editing process, incorrect data in the affiliation or e-mail addresses of authors.
Paper’s removal
A published paper may be removed in exceptional circumstances. This may happen if any legal issues arise or are expected to arise in connection with the paper, the distribution of the paper is suspended by a court order, the content of that paper may pose a serious threat to life or health, the paper violates the copyright of others, or if the paper is deemed to defame or infringe the rights of third parties.
Paper’s replacement
If it is established that a published paper (with a positive outcome of the review) contains untrue or inaccurate data that may pose a serious threat to the health of other people, the authors may request the withdrawal and replacement of that paper with a revised version.
Digital data preservation
The materials of Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies are published in electronic format. We have established a digital preservation policy that will be periodically reviewed and adapted to the available technologies.
We strive to ensure that all our electronic content (website, articles, manuscripts, etc.) is stored on several different, independent servers. In the event of failure of one of the servers, we are able to recover the data and make it available again in the shortest possible time.
The entire content published by Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies is stored in Portico. Portico is a digital research data storage service provided by ITHAKA – a non-profit organization. Portico cooperates with publishers and libraries to preserve the content of e-journals for the academic community.https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Peer review process
Double-Blind Review
In accordance with the principles adopted by the Editorial Board of Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies, all manuscripts submitted for publication are subject to a review carried out by two independent reviewers, i.e. a Double-Blind review. After receiving the manuscript, the Journal undertakes to proceed immediately with the technical evaluation and the subsequent review process. The time needed for this process depends on the availability of suitable experts, but usually does not take more than 40 days from the date of the correct submission of the manuscript meeting the editorial standards.
Peer review process
The submitted manuscript is verified by a member of the Editorial Board. After a positive initial verification, two independent experts are selected to whom the manuscript is sent for review. The selection of reviewers allows for suggestions made by authors during the manuscript submission process, regarding both preferred and non-preferred (opposed) reviewers. In the Double-Blind review process, reviewers and authors do not know each other. This enables an impartial and accurate review of the manuscript.
Reviewer Selection
Reviewers are selected on the basis of their specialization and interests, their reputation and previous experience of the Editorial Board. Selected reviewers will receive an invitation, followed by a complete manuscript and a review form if the offer is accepted.
Conflict of interest
In each case, reviewers are requested to report a conflict of interest if they suspect that it may occur based on the content of the manuscript received. If the conflict of interest is confirmed by the Editorial Board, the reviewers are asked to reject the review offer.
Peer review time
The Editorial Board makes every effort to provide the authors with the shortest possible duration of the review. According to the guidelines, a reviewer has 30 days to complete the review after receiving the complete manuscript. We ask our reviewers to help us reduce the decision-making time as much as possible by providing timely feedback. We ask reviewers to inform us if they are unable to complete their assignment on time or whether they are unavailable for a longer period of time.
Review Form
Using the review form saves time and ensures a more structured and accurate review. It consists of two parts – “Remarks and comments addressed to the authors” and “Confidential information for the Editorial Board”. All information contained in the “Remarks and comments addressed to the authors” are made available to the authors. Reviewers can use the “Confidential information for the Editorial Board” section to send comments intended only for members of the Editorial Staff involved in reviewing a manuscript, which will not be made available to the authors.
Content of the review
Reviewers are expected to provide an objective evaluation of the manuscript in terms of the concepts of the conducted research or experiments, their usefulness for current scientific knowledge, scientific content, language and grammar. Reviewers make recommendations concerning the publication of the manuscript along with a substantiation.
If the manuscript requires some improvements before it can be accepted, reviewers are asked to make suggestions for such improvements. If the comments are negative, reviewers are asked to explain the shortcomings in the scientific content or language. We do not tolerate offensive or unethical comments or remarks. The Editorial Board allows for the possibility of editing the comments of reviewers in terms of factual or linguistic errors or to remove confidential information.
Confidentiality of the review
The reviewing process is confidential communication between reviewers, editors, the editorial staff and the corresponding author. Reviewers are obliged not to discuss the manuscripts received with people who are not directly involved in the evaluation process.
Decision based on the results of the review
Based on the comments submitted by reviewers, the Editor-in-Chief decides whether to accept or reject a given paper. The Editor-in-Chief can make a decision whether:
- to accept the manuscript without any corrections – the text is forwarded to further stages of the production process;
- to ask authors to resend the manuscript after a minor or major revision, depending on the extent of the corrections. The Editorial Board makes its own decision or, in the case of doubts, sends the revised text for review to reviewers, provided they have agreed to it;
- to reject the manuscript – mainly in the case of negative reviews, the text is removed from the system without the possibility of correcting it in its current form.
Each of these decisions may be appealed against by the authors, preferably by e-mail addressed to the Editorial Board within seven (7) days from the date of its receipt.
Discussions and revisions after the publication of the paper
Each paper posted on our website can be commented (comments are moderated by the Editorial Staff in respect of ethics of expression). Comments and remarks on the published texts can be also sent by e-mail to the Editorial Board.