Every manuscript that is submitted to the journal undergoes the same process, which consists on the following points:
First the abstract will be submitted through the MTS to evaluate its compliance with the journal’s aims and scope.
If accepted, the manuscript is submitted online exclusively through the Manuscript Tracking System on the given date.
Upon receipt, manuscripts will be “blinded” by a member of the editorial board, who will erase the names of the authors, their affiliations and all the information that may lead to authors’ identification.
Two “blind” members of the editorial board will check the manuscript to ensure that it is suitable to go through the whole peer-review process.
If the editors find that the manuscript do not comply with the journal’s quality standards, or do not align with the journal’s aims and scope, the article will be rejected without further review by the peers, and the authors will be immediately notified.
If the editors consider that the manuscript has good quality, falls within the journal’s aims and scope and complies with a high level of novelty, then it will be sent to at least 3 peer-reviewers, upon the personal declaration that they do not have conflicts of interest.
The reviewers will send their reports to the Editorial Board with one of the following dictates:
Publish Unaltered
Consider after Minor Changes
Consider after Major Changes
Reject
Upon a reviewers’ commentaries-based consensus, the editorial board will give a final dictate, which may be one of the following:
Publish Unaltered: if the manuscript contains novel and quality data that is presented in good form.
Consider after Minor Changes: when proofreading and/or rephrasing is necessary in order to improve the manuscript’s readability and guidance to precise conclusions.
Consider after Major Changes: if a new experiment, measurement or a light experimental-design rearrangement is needed.
Reject: Manuscript is flawed or not sufficiently novel.
If the Reviewers’ and Editor’s recommendation is “Publish unaltered” the article will be published in the next journal’s number.
Upon rejection, the article will not be accepted again in the journal.
If the consensus is to consider after minor changes the authors will have 20 working-days to send the corrected manuscript.
If consideration after major changes is recommended, the authors will have 80 working-days to comply with the suggested changes.
After minor or major changes have been done to the manuscript, and the corrected versions have been received by the journal, the editors will check if the reviewer’s recommendations have been correctly met. In the negative case, the article will be rejected, but upon compliance the article will be published in the next journal’s number.
At all times the reviewing process will be double blinded to ensure a high quality, fair and unbiased reviewing process.
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