Verification Before Publication

Overview

Claiming results are publication-ready without verification is not confidence — it is a liability to your co-authors, your field, and your career.

Core principle: Evidence before submission, always.

Violating the letter of this rule is violating the spirit of this rule.

The Iron Law

NO SUBMISSION CLAIM WITHOUT FRESH VERIFICATION EVIDENCE

If you haven't re-run the verification in this session, you cannot claim it is ready for submission.

The Gate Function

BEFORE claiming publication-ready:

1. IDENTIFY: What evidence proves each claim?
2. RUN: Re-run key analyses fresh (not cached results)
3. READ: Full output, check every number
4. VERIFY: Does output match manuscript claims?
   - If NO: State actual values with evidence
   - If YES: State verification WITH evidence
5. ONLY THEN: Claim ready for submission

Skip any step = asserting, not verifying

Common Failures

Claim	Requires	Not Sufficient
Results are accurate	claims-audit PASS	"I checked last week"
Figures are correct	Re-generated figures match manuscript	"They look right"
Analysis is reproducible	Single command reproduces all results	"It worked on my machine"
Statistics are proper	hypothesis-first INTERPRET standards met (effect size + CI + correction)	"p-values are significant"
All results reported	Experiment log cross-referenced with manuscript	"Main results are in"

Red Flags — STOP

• Using "should be", "probably fine", "I'm confident"
• Expressing readiness before verification ("It's ready", "We're good to go", "Just needs a polish")
• About to submit or share without re-running analyses
• Relying on results from a previous session
• Trusting cached outputs without checking they match current code
• Thinking "just this once — deadline is today"
• Under pressure from collaborators or journal deadlines
• ANY wording implying submission-readiness without having run fresh verification

Rationalization Prevention

Excuse	Reality
"Should be ready now"	RUN the verification
"I'm confident in the numbers"	Confidence is not evidence
"Checked last week"	Last week's check is not this week's evidence
"Just minor revisions since last check"	Minor changes can invalidate figures and tables
"Deadline pressure"	A retraction is worse than a delayed submission
"The reviewer will catch errors"	Peer review is not your QC pipeline
"I know this codebase"	Knowing the codebase does not prevent stale outputs
"Different wording so rule doesn't apply"	Spirit over letter
"Co-authors approved it"	Co-authors approved what they saw, not what is current
"The analysis passed review last month"	Results are only as valid as the last verified run
"We've published this method before"	This manuscript's numbers still need fresh verification
"The figures look identical to the last version"	Look identical is not verified identical

Publication-Specific Verification Checklist

Complete every item before claiming submission-ready. No skipping.

Claims and Accuracy

• claims-audit PASS — every manuscript claim has a traceable evidence source
• Freshness check — read the most recent docs/eureka/audits/YYYY-MM-DD-claims-audit.md frontmatter. Verify manuscript_hash and results_hash match the current manuscript + results. If hashes mismatch, soft-warn: the audit may be stale; consider re-running. Proceed at user's discretion (soft warning, not hard block)
• Upstream artifact presence — confirm the following canonical-path artifacts exist and are fresh (YAML frontmatter status: passed):
  • docs/eureka/audits/YYYY-MM-DD-claims-audit.md
  • docs/eureka/reviews/YYYY-MM-DD-review.md (research-reviewer ≥ 95/100)
  • docs/eureka/novelty-audits/YYYY-MM-DD-novelty-audit.md (novelty-competitive-audit PASS)

Figures

• Figures regenerated from scripts (not loaded from stale file)
• Every figure number and label matches the manuscript text
• Every figure legend states n, statistical test, error bar type (SEM/SD/95%CI), and center value (or confirms N/A for the figure type)
• Every figure with statistical inference has exact p-values OR in-legend-defined asterisks
• Every image panel labeled "representative of N independent experiments" or states quantification N
• No dynamite plots (bar + whisker of mean alone) where raw overlay is feasible (N per group ≤ 50)

Reproducibility

• Experiments reproducible from configs + recorded seeds
• Environment specification committed (requirements.txt / environment.yml)
• Seeds recorded for every experiment with stochastic components
• Single command reproduces the full results pipeline (reproduce.sh or equivalent)

Review

• research-reviewer PASS at pre-submission threshold (≥ 95/100)
• All CRITICAL issues resolved
• All MAJOR issues resolved (no open MAJOR issues deferred to revision)

Reporting Completeness

• Negative results reported, not selectively omitted
• All pre-registered outcomes reported, including null results

Manuscript Metadata

• Data availability statement present and accurate
• Data version and preprocessing pipeline version explicitly stated in Methods section
• Code availability statement present and accurate
• Author contributions clear and complete
• Conflicts of interest declared

Reproducibility Sub-Check

These must pass independently before the main checklist is considered complete.

• Random seeds fixed and recorded for every experiment
• Config files saved alongside every result file
• Environment spec committed (requirements.txt / environment.yml)
• reproduce.sh or equivalent exists, is committed, and runs end-to-end
• Results directory has README explaining file structure and how outputs map to manuscript
• Raw → processed data is regeneratable from a single command (preprocessing pipeline scripted, versioned, and runnable)
• Data version claimed in the manuscript matches the data actually used in the analysis (verified by file hash comparison against the registration)

Failure on any sub-check item means the analysis is not reproducible. An irreproducible analysis cannot be submitted.

Key Patterns

Results match manuscript:

PASS: [Re-run analysis] [Compare output values to Table 2] [All numbers match]
FAIL: "The numbers should match — I haven't changed anything"

Figures regenerated:

PASS: [Run figure scripts] [Diff outputs against manuscript PDFs] [Match confirmed]
FAIL: "The figure looks the same as last time"

Reproducibility verified:

PASS: [Run reproduce.sh from scratch in clean environment] [All results regenerated]
FAIL: "It worked on my machine before"

Statistics verified:

PASS: [Verify every result has effect size + 95% CI + correction method per docs/references/statistical-guide.md] [No uncorrected multiple comparisons]
FAIL: "The p-values are significant — statistics are fine"

Completeness verified:

PASS: [Cross-reference experiment log] [Every run in log accounted for in manuscript]
FAIL: "The main results are all in there"

Why This Matters

Publication errors propagate. A wrong number in a published table becomes a cited number in the next paper, a misinterpreted figure becomes a consensus, and an irreproducible analysis becomes a failed replication. Post-publication corrections damage credibility and waste the field's resources. The gate function exists because the cost of verifying before submission is hours; the cost of a published error is years.

When To Apply

ALWAYS before:

• Submitting to any journal, conference, or preprint server
• Sharing results externally (collaborators, supervisors, funders)
• ANY claim that results are publication-ready
• Responding to reviewer comments with "we have verified..."
• Uploading final manuscript files to any submission system

Rule applies to:

• Exact "ready to submit" phrases
• Paraphrases: "good to go", "polished", "final version"
• Implications of readiness
• ANY communication suggesting the manuscript is in final state

Integration

• Requires: eureka:claims-audit PASS — every claim must be traceable before this skill's checklist begins
• Requires: eureka:requesting-research-review PASS at ≥ 95/100 — scientific rigor validated by independent review
• Requires: eureka:hypothesis-first INTERPRET standards met — every statistical result reports effect size, CI, and correction method
• Requires: eureka:novelty-competitive-audit PASS — external competitiveness verified against recent literature (internal rigor is necessary but not sufficient for submission)
• Feeds into: submission-readiness assessment — this gate is the final check before external submission
• Called by: eureka:using-eureka when submission intent is detected
• Reference: docs/references/statistical-guide.md — statistical reporting checklist
• Reference: docs/references/data-checklist.md — data version locking, preprocessing reproducibility, raw→processed regeneration
• Reference: docs/references/figure-guide.md — see sections "Figure Legend Requirements (Reviewer-Grade)" and "Common Reviewer Rejection Reasons for Figures" for the legend reporting checklist and the dynamite-plot anti-pattern
• Reference: docs/references/novelty-audit-guide.md — search strategy, preemption rubric, differentiation templates, verdict decision tree for the novelty-competitive-audit prerequisite

The Bottom Line

No shortcuts for submission verification.

Re-run the analyses. Regenerate the figures. Check every number. THEN claim it is ready.

This is non-negotiable.

Skill Type

RIGID — The checklist is not optional. The gate function sequence is enforced. The Iron Law is not a guideline.

The only flexibility is in the tooling used to re-run analyses — adapt scripts, commands, and environments to your domain. The requirement to produce fresh verification evidence before claiming submission-readiness does not flex.