Editorial process

This document applies to papers submitted directly to the Journal. It also applies to papers that have been previously presented at a GPPS Forum, Conference, or Workshop with peer review.

All submissions first go through a plagiarism check and an in-house editorial check to ensure they are original and meet our requirements for style and language. Only after a manuscript has passed this initial check is it passed to the Editor-in-Chief.

Papers that have been provisionally accepted for publication by the Editor-in-Chief following presentation at a GPPS Forum, Conference, or Workshop will then be accepted for publication. In rare cases, minor modifications may be requested by the Editor-in-Chief before acceptance. Further peer review is not required.

Authors of papers that have been presented at a peer-reviewed GPPS Forum, Conference, or Workshop and which have not been provisionally accepted for publication must submit a revised manuscript, a marked-up copy of the manuscript showing the changes that have been in response to the reviewer’s comments and a detailed rebuttal of those comments. The Editor-in-Chief may then choose to accept the paper, request additional minor modifications, reject the paper, or request an Associate Editor to examine the case in more detail. In the latter case, the Associate Editor may make a recommendation to the Editor-in-Chief or request additional reviews before making a recommendation.

For papers submitted directly to the Journal, the Editor-in-Chief will assign an Associate Editor providing that the manuscript is appropriate for the Journal and is of a suitable standard. The Associate Editor is responsible for inviting reviewers. Upon receiving all the required reviews, the Associate Editor makes one of the following initial recommendations to the Editor-in-Chief: accept, request minor or major revisions, or reject. The Associate Editor will work with the authors in cases where revisions are requested. Revised manuscripts are evaluated by the Associate Editor, with or without the reviewers’ assistance, at his/her discretion. The manuscript may be accepted or rejected at this stage, or further revisions may be requested. Once the review process is complete, the Editor-in-Chief will make a final decision to accept or reject the paper.

Deadlines

We aim to offer cost-efficient and fast publication to authors. As such, we ask that reviewers submit their reports within four weeks of accepting a review. Reviewers should decline requests if they cannot commit to completing the review on time (they can always change their minds later if the manuscript is still available). In case of delay, the editorial staff must be informed as soon as possible.

Editorial criteria

GPPS welcomes all valid and robust scholarly articles. Our review process is designed to ensure that submissions are technically and ethically sound. We ask our reviewers and editors to use the following evaluation criteria:

Purpose of the review

The purpose of the review is to determine whether the paper is acceptable for publication, needs revision, or should be rejected. As a reviewer evaluates a paper’s originality, significance, relevance, narrative, and correctness, the following questions should be considered:

• What is the subject of the paper?
• Is the reviewer able to perform the review without a potential conflict of interest?
• Has the reviewer published in the same technical area or has he/she sufficient knowledge of this technical area for him/her to be considered an expert by other peers?

In terms of the narrative and correctness:

• What is the purpose of the paper?
• Is the presentation satisfactory?
• Is it well organised?
• Is the paper of an appropriate length?
• Is it clear?
• Is there an appropriate introduction?
• Is the selection of material appropriate?
• Is there validation of any theory or CFD?
• Is the experimental accuracy assessed?
• Is the method of approach valid?
• Is it technically correct?
• Are the figures and tables appropriate?
• Are the figures and tables clear?
• Are there too many figures or tables?
• Is there sufficient analysis and interpretation of each figure?
• Are the conclusions drawn from the results?
• Are the references appropriate?
• Is the use of English satisfactory?

In terms of the originality, significance and relevance:

• Are there any conclusions or is there just a summary?
• What are the main conclusions and recommendations?
• Is the contribution original?
• Does the work advance the “state of the art” sufficiently?
• Are the conclusions and recommendations tangible and useful to the community?
• Has more than a small amount, say, 20%, of the paper been published before in a similar format?
• Is the subject of the paper appropriate for the journal?
• Is it archival?

Above all else:

• is the paper interesting to the reader of the journal?

Content of the review

The provision of written comments is the key to the review, whether the manuscript is recommended for publication or not. A good review must provide:

• a summary of the important points of the paper in one to five sentences to indicate that the reviewer actually understands the paper,
• a statement of the significance, relevance and originality of the research,
• an evaluation of the methodology, accuracy and suitability of the work,
• an evaluation of the quality of the presentation,
• an overall recommendation for or against publication,
• detailed reasons for the recommendation, whether it is favourable or not,
• clear statements of both necessary and suggested changes required before publication.

The recommendations for publication or otherwise must be supported by specific and critical comments. For example,

• “This paper is recommended for journal publication because…” or
• “This paper is of current interest but falls short of archival value because…” or
• “This paper is not recommended for presentation or publication because…” or
• “This paper is recommended for journal publication provided the following revisions are made by the authors…”.

In other words, if a manuscript is being recommended for journal publication, the reviewer must clearly provide a summary of the reasons why this is so. Merely checking the box and saying that only minor revisions are required is not sufficient. If the reviewer was that impressed, it should be easy to provide a written statement explaining the reasons. If the paper is not recommended for the journal (see below), the reviewer must state why this is the case, and also go one step further to comment on what would make the research of permanent interest. In cases when the review is inadequate, the reviewer will be asked to revise their submission.

A bad review simply passes judgement on a paper without explaining the reasons why. A review does not need to contain a blow-by-blow account of every single typographical error if these and/or other problems are so numerous as to render the paper not publishable.

Language and presentation

Manuscripts must be written in English, clearly intelligible, and well presented. As far as possible, the structure of articles should follow accepted standards. The introduction must provide sufficient background. All relevant results should be included. Figures and tables must be properly labeled and of sufficient quality. References should be relevant and up to date.

What constitutes a journal paper?

A journal paper:

• is interesting,
• is original, making a unique, imaginative or innovative contribution to the field,
• contains a clear narrative from the introduction, through the work carried out to a clear expression of substantial conclusions and recommendations,
• is of sufficient significance and relevance to the community that it will be referred to by other workers in the field.

For a journal paper,all, of the above are required, whether the paper contains new work or is presenting previously published work in a new light.

What are the appropriate standards for a journal paper?

The standard of a journal paper is not absolute. In effect, it is established by the average of the papers that you find worth reading or published in the journal. Using this standard, you should be able to put the paper into one of the following categories:

1. Major results, very significant contribution (top 1%) - publish
2. Good, solid, interesting work; a definite contribution (next 10%) – publish
3. Minor, but positive, contribution to knowledge (next 10-20%) – publish with discretion
4. Elegant and technically correct but useless – do not publish
5. Neither elegant nor useful, but not actually wrong – do not publish
6. Wrong or misleading – do not publish
7. So badly written that technical evaluation is impossible – do not publish.

Ethics and best practice

Reviewers will ensure that manuscripts comply with accepted standards with regards to experimental ethics, research integrity, and data and material sharing. See our Policies section for further details.

Research integrity and publishing ethics

GPPS adheres to the COPE recommendations and upholds the highest standards in publication ethics and research integrity. We do not tolerate data or figure manipulation, plagiarism, redundant publication, inaccurate or incomplete declarations of interest or other irregularities. We will deal with allegations of misconduct in accordance with COPE’s guidelines, and issue corrections or retractions of articles as necessary. For further details see Wager E. & Kleinert S. (2011), Responsible research publication: international standards for authors, in: Mayer T. & Steneck N. (eds) Promoting Research Integrity in a Global Environment. Imperial College Press / World Scientific Publishing, Singapore (pp 309-16).

Data and materials deposition

GPPS requests that, where applicable, authors make the data, method or materials underlying their research available to readers free of charge in accordance with best practice in their discipline. Reviewers should check that authors have adhered to this policy and provided relevant accession or reference numbers. See our policies page for details.

Reviewer recommendations

Reviewers are asked to make one of the following recommendations:

• Acceptance: The manuscript can be published as it is with no need for any amendment or correction (other than typos).
• Minor revision: the manuscript is on the whole acceptable, but some small improvements or additions are desirable before publication.
• Major revision: some significant issues have been raised, but the authors should be able to address them within a reasonable timeframe. Reasons can include the need for more data, language improvement, considering alternative interpretations etc.
• Rejection: a manuscript must be rejected in particular if it is unsound (for example its rationale, experimental design, data or interpretation are flawed, vague or lack rigour); if the amount of revision required would be such that most of the manuscript would have to be rewritten; if it describes unethical research; if it is too difficult to understand or nonsensical.

All recommendations must be justified by clear reasons.

Reviewer conduct

The review process helps filter out unsuitable submissions, but it should also help authors improve their manuscript. In that spirit, we ask that reviewers provide clear, detailed and constructive comments as well as practical guidance to the authors. Opinions and recommendations should be explained and objectively grounded. Insensitive or offensive wording must be avoided. Reviewers should be impartial and rigorous. If reviewers cannot evaluate a manuscript with impartiality for whatever reason, we ask that they decline the review. For further details please see the Committee on Publication Ethics’ ethical guidelines for peer reviewers.

Conflict of interest

Reviewers should decline to review manuscripts if they have been involved with the study or with writing the manuscript, have collaborated with any of the authors in the last three years, are based in the same department as the authors, have a financial interest in the publication of the manuscript, have a close personal relationship with the authors, are a direct competitor, or if their impartiality is compromised in any other way. They may review papers if they have potential conflicts of interest in the field of research, but must disclose them in their report.

Confidentiality of manuscript

Manuscripts under review must be treated in strict confidence. Reviewers must not share manuscripts or information about submissions with anyone, nor use the manuscript content without express permission from the journal.

Single-blind review

We operate a single-blind review system: reviewers are anonymous to the authors at all times. Reviewers should ensure that no identifying information, such as names, institutions, etc., is present in their reviews (including the file metadata).

Reviewer selection

Reviewers are selected by editors based on their expertise.

Quality control of reviews and rating of reviewers

The quality of reviews is evaluated by the Editor-in-Chief or Associate Editor. Reviews that are poor, insufficient, or do not adhere to our guidelines may be withdrawn or sent back to the reviewers for improvement. If a review is withdrawn, the reviewer may be banned from reviewing for a period of time. Reviewers may also be banned temporarily from reviewing if they are late, do not submit their review, or do not evaluate revised manuscripts upon request.

Notifications and submitting reviews

Notifications and manuscript details are found in the reviewer’s center on our Editorial System peer review platform. We will also send important notifications by email. Notifications will usually contain a link to access the relevant page on our website. Invitations to review a manuscript contain links to register a response in our system automatically. Reviews must be submitted on our system. The review form contains mandatory and optional fields. In addition, reviewers can upload an annotated manuscript. Reviewers can track the status (including decisions) of any manuscript they have evaluated in their reviewer centre.

Help

Please contact the editorial office by email (see link in the reviewer centre) if you have any questions or concerns, or need help. If it relates to a specific manuscript, please be sure to quote its reference number.