Yellow River adheres to the publishing ethics standards set by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). All authors, editors, and reviewers are required to fulfill the responsibilities outlined below, in addition to adhering to other regulations and requirements specific to the journal.

1. Responsibilities of Authors

All authors must meet the authorship criteria of the journal, i.e., they must have significantly contributed to the article and research in aspects such as the concept and design of the study, data acquisition, analysis and interpretation of data, writing the article, or making critical revisions to the content. Funding or providing laboratory space alone does not constitute authorship. The ethical requirements that authors should abide by mainly include the following aspects:

1) Authors should proactively disclose the academic research process in detail, reveal key research information fully to promote transparency in scientific research, and provide honest support materials for the publication of their research findings.

2) If the work of others is used in the article, a clear statement should be made and permission should be obtained from the original author in accordance with the Copyright Law so as not to violate the intellectual property rights of others.

3) In addition to ensuring the authenticity of the content of manuscripts, authors must guarantee that their manuscripts are not simultaneously submitted to multiple journals, have not been previously published, are not split into several parts for publication, do not involve confidential information, and have no authorship disputes.

4) Authors are obliged to declare that their articles are original research works, free of any academic misconduct such as data fabrication and plagiarism.

5) Authors should include all individuals who have made substantial contributions to the research work, and should be listed in order of their contributions. Changes to authorship should not be arbitrary. These changes (e.g., adding or deleting authors, reordering authors) should be made before the acceptance of the manuscript. If any changes are required after acceptance, the corresponding author must provide a justification for the changes and submit a letter of agreement signed by all authors to the editorial office. When adding or deleting authors, the letter should also include the consent of the added or deleted authors.

6) For articles supported by funding projects, the project numbers and sources should be listed to ensure authenticity.

7) For all manuscripts submitted to the journal, it is assumed that the authors agree to peer review. Authors may recommend reviewers or request the exclusion of specific individuals from the review process.

8) Authors are obligated to revise their manuscripts according to the comments of the reviewers and the editorial office. If there are objections to the review comments or results, authors may submit a written appeal to the editorial office.

9) Data sharing can promote the repeatability and availability of research data. The journal encourages authors to share research data, such as original data, observational records, experimental results, etc. Authors can also share materials used in research, such as software, codes, models, algorithms, etc. Authors can upload shared data or materials to an open storage platform (such as the Science Data Bank of the Chinese Academy of Sciences) and place the access link at the end of the article.

10) To disclose their specific contributions to the research and any potential conflicts of interest related to the research, authors should complete and submit the "Declaration of Authors" document provided by the journal. When the financial/personal/affiliated relationships of authors (or authors' institutions/employers) may affect the authors' decisions, work, or manuscripts, there may be potential conflicts of interest. When mentioning certain products in the manuscript, authors should also disclose whether there are conflicts of interest with competing products of these products.

2. Responsibilities of Editors

1) Editors should handle all submissions in a fair, equitable, and timely manner.

2) Editors are responsible for detecting academic misconduct in all submissions. If instances of duplicate submission, plagiarism, or other forms of academic misconduct are discovered, the manuscript should be immediately rejected.

3) Editors must adhere to the confidentiality requirements of the journal, keeping the information of reviewers and the research content of authors strictly confidential.

4) To ensure fairness in review, editors should carefully consider any requests by authors to exclude certain reviewers. Regarding peer reviewers recommended by authors, editors should verify the authenticity of their information and decide whether to use the recommended reviewers based on their field of research, expertise, and potential conflicts of interest with the authors.

5) Editors should not interfere with the peer review process to ensure the independence and fairness of reviewers' evaluations.

6) Editors should respect the opinions of reviewers and provide authors with detailed feedback for revisions. If authors have objections, they should be allowed to appeal.

7) Editors are responsible for ensuring the authenticity of each review stage. Editors have the responsibility to keep review materials safe and strictly confidential.

8) Editors should handle all submissions in a timely manner within a reasonable timeframe, ensure that research achievements meeting the journal's requirements and quality standards are published promptly, and strive to shorten the duration between manuscript acceptance and publication.

3. Responsibilities of Reviewers

1) Peer reviewers are required to conduct a comprehensive evaluation of the manuscript, maintaining objectivity and fairness, adhering to professional ethics, and not seeking personal gain.

2) Reviewers are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of the review materials and must not disclose the content of the manuscript or the results of the review to others.

3) Review comments should be based on scientific facts, remain objective and unbiased, avoid prejudices, and provide constructive feedback to address weaknesses in the research. Reviewers should decline the review if the manuscript falls outside their area of expertise.

4) Reviewers should complete their review tasks in a timely manner. If they are unable to complete the review or return their review comments on time, they should promptly inform the editorial office.

4. Advertising

The journal offers advertising services, publishing advertisements for organizations and products related to the water resources and hydropower industry. Advertisements must comply with the Advertising Law and relevant regulations. In addition, advertisers must provide business licenses and other relevant qualification materials. Advertisements that violate the Advertising Law or lack the required documents will not be published. The placement of all advertisements is discussed and collectively decided upon at the working meetings of the editorial office.

Advertisements are mainly published on the insert pages and back cover of the print journal. The presentation of advertisements in the journal is completely separate from academic articles, and academic articles do not contain any advertising content. Moreover, the published advertisements will not affect the journal's review, editing, or acceptance decisions of any submissions, and advertisers cannot interfere with the publication of any academic content.

5. Comments & Feedback

If authors or readers have any comments or feedback regarding the articles published in this journal, or any opinions on the journal's ethical requirements for publication, they can send their comments to the email of the editorial office. We will review the comments at our earliest convenience and provide appropriate feedback. We welcome readers and authors to jointly monitor our work and actively provide feedback to the editorial office to create a positive academic environment.