Manuscripts reporting studies involving human participants, human data or human tissue must: include a statement on ethics approval and consent (even where the need for approval was waived) include the name of the ethics committee that approved the study and the committee's reference number if appropriate.

For manuscripts reporting studies involving human subjects, statements identifying the committee approving the studies and confirming that informed consent was obtained from all subjects must appear in the Experimental Procedures section. All experiments on live vertebrates or higher invertebrates must be performed in accordance with relevant institutional and national guidelines and regulations. In the manuscript, a statement identifying the committee approving the experiments and confirming that all experiments conform to the relevant regulatory standards must be included in the Experimental Procedures section. The editors reserve the right to seek comments from reviewers or additional information from authors on any cases in which concerns arise.

This journal follows the core practices of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and handles cases of research and publication misconduct accordingly (https://publicationethics.org/core-practices).