Every listed author must have made a substantial scholarly contribution to the work, participated in drafting or critically revising the manuscript, approved the final version, and agreed to be accountable for the accuracy and integrity of the contribution. The journal encourages use of the CRediT Contributor Roles Taxonomy to describe individual contributions.

• Guest or honorary authorship.
• Gift authorship based only on position, supervision, funding, or personal relationship.
• Ghost authorship or deliberate omission of a qualifying contributor.
• Sale, purchase, or transfer of authorship.

The corresponding author must ensure that all authors approve the submission, the author order, declarations, revisions, and final version; maintain communication with the journal; and disclose relevant conflicts, funding, ethics approval, data availability, and AI use.

Requests to add, remove, or reorder authors must be justified in writing and approved by all affected authors. Changes after acceptance are permitted only in exceptional circumstances. Changes after publication require a formal correction notice.

Contributors who do not meet authorship criteria should be acknowledged with their permission. Professional editing, technical assistance, funding support, and other non-author contributions should be disclosed when relevant.