The partners in the process of research/scientific publication are the authors, editor(s), reviewer(s) and the publisher, all taking their duties and responsibilities conscientiously. Ethics and malpractice statements need to be aligned with Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) Best Practice Guidelines. In case of Acta Pharmaceutica, ethical considerations and concerns are also covered by the Authors Agreement and Open Access Licence forms, and through general information and Instructions to Authors.

The post of the editor implies liability, high standards of objectivity and fairness of judgement, and confidentiality; any conflict of interest by the editors and editorial board must be excluded. The editor of a peer-reviewed journal is responsible for any material published in the journal. When making publication decisions, the editor works according to editorial board policy and in collaboration with other editors and reviewers. The editor should evaluate manuscript for scientific content and originality, on the understanding of fairness and confidentiality of the submitted material, not compromising intellectual and ethical standards. Editors should take care of the integrity of the published content by issuing corrections and retractions when needed and taking adequate measures against any kind of publication misconduct.

From the reviewer it is expected to obey the standards of objectivity, confidentiality and promptness, not benefiting in any way of the fact that they have access to confidential information. Their fair evaluations contribute in the process of appropriate editorial decision. Reviewers should decline evaluating the manuscript if any kind of conflict of interest might be involved.

Both editors and reviewers should refrain from using the yet non-published data in their own research.

Authors are invited to accurately report on the original research results, acknowledge the sources and authorship. No plagiarism, parallel submissions, nor multiple, redundant and concurrent publication are acceptable. This implies submittance by the authors on an exclusive basis of only their own and new data; novelty and originality are prioritized. The work of others needs to be appropriately cited or quoted. High level of similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other published data is not allowed. The author for correspondence ensures that all appropriate co-authors are listed and that they all approved the final version of the paper and its submission for publication. Apart from the co-authors, the persons who have taken part in a certain aspect of the research, should be acknowledged. The authors should disclose any conflict of interest (financial or other).

The paper could be retracted by the author(s)/editor(s)/editorial board/publisher if a significant error or inaccuracy has been discovered in the published work, or in the case of proven scientific misconduct, deceitful publication or plagiarism. Alternatively, appropriate erratum could be published. Publisher should together with the editor promptly publish the erratum or retraction of the paper.