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Terms of Use

Access to Qscience.com is provided by Hamad bin Khalifa University Press (HBKU Press), a division of Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development, a private institution of public utility re-established by a decision of His Highness Sheikh Hamad Bin Khalifa Al-Thani dated 22 January 2007 in conformity with Law No. 21 of 2006 concerning Private Institutions of Public Utility (Qatar).  Qatar Foundation's headquarters are at Post Office Box 5825, Doha, Qatar.

This page (together with any documents referred to on it) tells you the terms on which you may make use of QScience.com, whether as a guest or a registered user. Please read these terms of use carefully before you start to use QScience.com. By using QScience.com, you indicate that you accept these terms of use and that you agree to abide by them. If you do not agree to these terms of use, please do not access or use QScience.com.

1. General practices regarding use
Access to QScience.com is permitted on a temporary basis, and HBKU Press reserves the right to amend the service, limit, suspend or terminate your access and use of QScience.com at any time without prior notice.

For specific parts of QScience.com, registration may be required. As a result, additional terms and conditions will be available for you to read and consent to at the time of registration.

2. Ownership of content
Unless noted otherwise, QScience.com and its contents are the property of HBKU Press. The copyrights of all material contained on QScience.com belong to HBKU Press or its licensors. 

3. Reproduction of articles
All articles and accompanying materials published by HBKU Press on QScience.com marked "Open Access" are licensed by their respective authors for use and distribution by you, subject to citation of the original source in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution License.

Save as expressly set out herein, no license is granted in respect of any intellectual property rights vested in QScience.com, HBKU Press or other third parties.

4. Privacy
You confirm that you have read and accept our Privacy Policy.

5. Information about you and your visits to QScience.com
HBKU Press process information about you in accordance with our privacy policy.  By using and/or registering with QScience.com, you consent to such processing and you warrant that all data provided by you is accurate.

6. Your account
In order to register and open an account on QScience.com, you must:
a)    Agree to these Terms of Use;
b)    Agree to the Creative Commons Attributions License;
c)    Provide any additional required information during the process of registration and maintain the accuracy of the information;
d)    Maintain the security of your account and password;
e)    Notify HBKU Press immediately of any unauthorized use of your account or suspected breach of security;
f)    Take all reasonable measures to avoid or stop any unauthorized activity on your account.

Accounts registered with someone else's email address, or with temporary email addresses, may be terminated without notice.  You are responsible for making all arrangements necessary for you to have access to QScience.com. You are responsible for ensuring that all persons who access QScience.com through your internet connection are aware of these terms and that they fully comply with them.  HBKU Press has the right to disable your account, user identification code or password, whether chosen by you or allocated by HBKU Press,  at any time and terminate your registration at any time without notice to you, if in our opinion you have failed to comply with any of the provisions of these terms of use.  Furthermore, you are responsible for all content that you post on QScience.com and all activity that occurs under your account.

7. Notification of claims of infringement
If you believe that your copyrights or intellectual property rights have been violated, please notify us at [email protected] 

8. Reproduction of QScience.com content
With the exception of material marked "Open Access", which use is stipulated in clause 3, you may not redistribute any of the content of QScience.com or create an electronic database or manually download and store any QScience.com content without prior authorization of HBKU Press.

9. Linking and framing
With the exception of material marked "Open Access" you are allowed to link to, but not replicate the content of QScience.com. You are allowed to link to the content of QScience.com provided that:
a)    You do not create a frame or any other bordered environment around the content;
b)    Any such linking does not imply any endorsement of any product or services;
c)    The linking website does not infringe any intellectual property right, including without limitation copyright, trademark, design right or patent, and contains any infringing, distasteful or offensive material.
d)    HBKU Press reserves the right to require you to remove any link to the QScience.com website.

10. Viruses, hacking and other offences
You must not misuse QScience.com by knowingly introducing viruses, trojans, worms, logic bombs, spyware, adware or other material which is malicious or technologically harmful or designed to adversely affect the operation of QScience.com or any associated computer software or hardware. You must not attempt to gain unauthorized access to QScience.com, the servers on which QScience.com is stored or any server, computer or database connected to QScience.com. You must not attack QScience.com via a denial-of-service attack or a distributed denial-of service attack.
By breaching this provision, you may be committing a criminal offence. HBKU Press will report any such breach to the relevant law enforcement authorities and will co-operate with those authorities by disclosing your identity to them. In the event of such a breach, your right to use QScience.com will cease immediately.

HBKU Press will not be liable for any loss or damage caused by a distributed denial-of-service attack, viruses or other technologically harmful material that may infect your computer equipment, computer programs, data or other proprietary material due to your use of QScience.com or to your downloading of any material posted on it, or on any QScience.com linked to it. You acknowledge that it is your responsibility to implement sufficient procedures and virus checks to protect your computer equipment, software, data or other proprietary material.

11. Impermissible acts
As a condition to your use of QScience.com, you agree not to use QScience.com for any illegal or unauthorized purpose, specifically including: Making available any information, materials or other content that is illegal, harmful, threatening, abusive, harassing, defamatory, obscene, pornographic, or offensive; or that infringes another's rights, including any intellectual property rights; Impersonating, or falsely claiming association with any person; or obtaining, collecting, storing or modifying any personal information about other users; Making available any unsolicited or unauthorized advertising, promotional materials; Modifying, adapting or hacking the QScience.com website or falsely implying that another website is associated with QScience.com; Violating any laws in your jurisdiction.

12. Disclaimer of warranties
Your use of QScience.com or any website to which it is linked is at your own risk. QScience.com and its content is provided for use on an "as is" and "as available" basis. HBKU Press makes no representations or warranties with respect to QScience.com or its contents, and therefore disclaims all warranties.  All warranties, expressed or implied, including without limitation the implied warranties or merchantability, satisfactory quality and fitness for purpose relating to QScience.com and/or its content and/or any website to which it is linked are hereby, to the fullest extent permitted by law, excluded. No representations or warranties are given as to the accuracy or completeness of the information provided on QScience.com, or any website to which it is linked. No advice or information, whether oral or written, obtained by you from HBKU Press shall create any warranty not expressly stated in the Terms of Use. Without limiting the generality of the foregoing, HBKU Press strongly recommends that you independently verify any medical treatment information upon which you choose to rely.

13. Indemnification
In no event shall HBKU Press or its employees, agents, suppliers, or contractors be liable for any damages of any nature, including, but not limited to, loss of income or profit, claim or expense of any kind arising out of or in connection with the use of QScience.com, its content or any website with which it is linked. This exclusion and limitation only applies to the extent permitted by applicable law and does not apply to liability for death or personal injury caused by the negligence of HBKU Press, its employees, agents, suppliers or contractors.

14. Arabic translations
The Arabic translations on this site are provided for browsing and information retrieval purposes only and should not be considered as a part of the official publication. The only official version of the article is that provided in English. No liability is accepted by Qscience.com or HBKU Press for the misuse of any translated version.

15. Advertisements
While certain parts of QScience.com may contain advertisements, HBKU Press is not responsible for any content of such advertisement material or any error or inaccuracy in any advertisement or sponsorship, which is the responsibility of the advertiser. HBKU Press partners with third-party advertising companies to serve ads and/or collect certain information when you visit QScience.com. These companies may use cookies or web beacons to collect non-personally identifiable information (but would never include your name, address, email address, or telephone number) during your visit to QScience.com. This is done in order to help show advertisements on other websites likely to be more interesting to you. To opt-out of this use of your anonymous information, you can visit http://www.networkadvertising.org/managing/opt_out.asp.

16. Violation of these Terms of Use
HBKU Press reserves the right to investigate and prosecute violations of any of these Terms of Use to the fullest extent of the applicable law. You acknowledge that HBKU Press has no obligation to pre-screen or monitor your access to or use of QScience.com or any information, materials or other content provided or made available through QScience.com, but has the right to do so. You hereby agree that HBKU Press has the right to remove or delete any entries, information, materials or other content that violates these Terms of Use or that is otherwise objectionable at its own discretion.

17. Trade marks
The names, images and logos ("Trade marks") identifying HBKU Press, Qatar Foundation, QScience.com or other third parties and their products and/or services are subject to copyright, design rights and trade mark laws.  Nothing contained in these terms shall be construed as offering any right to use any such Trade marks.

18. Changes in Terms of Use
HBKU Press maintains the right to change these terms and conditions without prior notice, by posting changes on this page of the QScience.com. If you use Qscience.com after HBKU Press publishes these changes to the Terms of Use, you are deemed to have accepted any such changes.

19. Governance
These terms shall be governed and construed in accordance with the Laws of the State of Qatar.

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