Publishing Process

1

Submission and acknowledgement   ·   immediately

The corresponding author submits through the website. The system issues an acknowledgement email, and the submission appears in the author’s dashboard, where its status can be followed at every later stage.

2

Editorial screening   ·   target: within three weeks

An editor checks fit with the journal’s scope, compliance with the Author Guidelines, anonymisation, and adherence to the policy on generative artificial intelligence, and screens the manuscript for textual similarity using Turnitin. Manuscripts that do not pass are returned with reasons or declined at this stage.

3

Double-anonymous peer review   ·   target: first decision within twelve weeks of submission

Manuscripts sent forward go to at least two independent reviewers with expertise in the subject. Neither authors nor reviewers learn each other’s identity. Reviewers advise; the handling editor decides.

4

Decision

The decision is one of: accept, minor revisions, major revisions, or decline. Where a manuscript addresses an important problem but falls short of publishable form, the editors say specifically what would need to change. Decisions may be appealed on the grounds set out in the Publication Ethics policy.

5

Revision and re-review   ·   author’s pace; revised versions may return to the original reviewers

Authors submit the revised manuscript with a point-by-point response to the reviews. Major revisions normally go back to review; minor revisions are usually checked by the editor.

6

Acceptance and identifying information

On acceptance, the authors’ names, affiliations, acknowledgements, funding and competing-interest statements — held separately during review — are restored to the article.

7

Copyediting and proof

The manuscript is copyedited and laid out. The corresponding author receives a proof and is asked to check it within a stated period; corrections at this stage are limited to errors, not rewriting.

8

Publication   ·   on readiness — articles are not held for a release date

The article is published open access under CC BY 4.0 in the current open issue (Issue 1: January–June; Issue 2: July–December), with authors retaining copyright. Content is preserved through the journal’s archiving arrangements, and identifiers are assigned as set out in the Archiving and Self-Archiving policy.