Peer review

Policy Peer Review

All materials submitted to the editorial office of the journal "Vestnik of Brest State Technical University" are subject to double-blind peer review.

Reviewers must be experts on the subject of the submitted research, they must guarantee an objective assessment of articles according to the criteria set out in the Publication Ethics and clearly formulate their conclusions about the submitted materials, including an assessment of the possibility of their publication and recommendations for revision.

Reviewers are selected and invited to evaluate the article by the responsible editors or section editors assigned to the article. They send invitations to reviewers.

Reviewers working on the evaluation of the article are considered to have accepted all the provisions of the Publication Ethics of the journal and agree with their duties set forth in it.

The task of the reviewers is to objectively assess the quality of submitted articles:

  • the relevance of the research topic and the level of its scientific novelty and practical significance;
  • compliance of the structure and volume of the article with the established requirements;
  • correspondence of the title of the article to its content;
  • compliance of the abstract of the article with the established requirements and its content;
  • use of standard terminology;
  • compliance of measurement units with the International System of Units of Physical Quantities;
  • the quality and level of illustrations and tables, the presence of references in the text to all tables and figures given by the author;
  • general literacy and presentation style; confirmation of research results in conclusions;
  • compliance of the cited sources with the research topic, availability and correspondence of references to the cited works.

Based on the results of the review, the reviewer formulates a reasoned conclusion:

  • The article may be recommended for publication;
  • The article can be recommended for publication with minor edits (without the need for re-review);
  • The article can be recommended for publication subject to the revision of these comments (re-review is required);
  • The article does not correspond to the profile of the journal;
  • The scientific level of the article is low. The article cannot be published in the journal.

Thus, the reviewer makes clear recommendations for publication of materials, their revision, or rejection of the article with an appropriate level of confidentiality, following the generally accepted standards of COPE objectivity, ensuring non-disclosure of information and informing about conflicts of interest in a timely manner.

Section editors may conduct as many rounds of reviews as necessary to ensure that all recommendations made by the reviewers are met.

Responsibility of reviewers

  1. The reviewer evaluates his employment before agreeing to the examination of the manuscript and agrees to review only if there is sufficient time for quality work.
  2. The reviewer warns the editors about the presence of a conflict of interest (if any) before starting work with the article.
  3. Reviewers should identify significant published works that are relevant to the topic and not included in the bibliography of the manuscript. For any statement (observation, conclusion or argument) published earlier, the manuscript must have a corresponding bibliographic reference. The reviewer should also draw the editor's attention to the discovery of significant similarities or coincidences between the manuscript in question and any other published work that is within the scientific competence of the reviewer.
  4. The reviewer does not draw conclusions about the quality of the article based on subjective data: personal attitude to the author, his gender, age, religion.
  5. The reviewer does not transfer information about the article and the data it contains to third parties.
  6. The reviewer does not use the information obtained from the article for personal and commercial purposes.

In order to ensure that peer review of the journal "Vestnik of Brest State Technical University" is constructive and useful for authors, readers and other reviewers, we ask reviewers for the following:

  • read the article in its entirety (please read the full text of the article and review all related figures, tables and data);
  • be careful (the review report should cover the article, both in full and in certain moments, and should demonstrate your understanding of the article);
  • be specific (your comments should contain as much detail as possible, with links where appropriate, so that the authors can fully eliminate shortcomings and errors);
  • be constructive in your criticism (feel free to include any errors or criticisms you may have in your review, however please do so in a constructive and respectful manner);
  • avoid derogatory comments (review the way you want to be reviewed and make sure your comments focus on the scientific content of the paper in question, not on the authors themselves).

In addition to the above, reviewers should study the provisions of the Publication Ethics and strictly follow them.

Review guide

If you are selected as a reviewer, you will receive a link to the review invitation page. On this page, you can find the description of the article under review, the file for review, and the deadlines for submitting the review. On the same page, you are expected to record your consent to proceed with the review.

After your consent to review, you will have access to a page on the site with a form to send a file with a review or fill out an online review form. You can also follow the instructions for reviewers.

All peer review activities require authorization on the journal website.

We also ask reviewers to prepare a review reflecting their assessment of the article, including any constructive criticisms they may have and suggestions for improvement.

Please note that reviews must be written in good Russian or English.

The editors of the journal may contact you if they need additional clarifications or details.

During the peer review process, authors may submit a revised article in response to the reviewer's comments.

When this happens, a new version of the article is uploaded for evaluation, and the original reviewers are re-invited to review (in case they indicated that they want to see the article again when submitting the original review).

Reviewers are then expected to resubmit a review of the article, taking into account the changes.

Review rounds continue until the reviewers have no complaints about the submitted article.

How to become a reviewer in a journal

An invitation to become a reviewer in the journal can be received by any author who has previously published in it (can be selected to review articles on topics similar to his work). Any expert in the areas covered by the journal (if the expert has registered on the site and indicated in his profile areas of interest, as well as consent to the invitation as a reviewer), as well as unregistered on the site, but recognized as authoritative experts, whose contacts are available section editors.

In the second case, the editors of the journal may additionally request a resume from the expert to assess his competence on the subject of the article.

Basic principles that reviewers should adhere to:

  • agree to review only those manuscripts for which they have sufficient knowledge to evaluate and which they can review in a timely manner;
  • respect the confidentiality of the review and not disclose any details of the manuscript or review during or after the review to anyone except those authorized by the journal;
  • not use the information obtained during the review for your own benefit or the benefit of other persons or organizations, or to harm or discredit others;
  • declare all possible conflicts of interest (related, for example, to personal, financial, intellectual, professional, political or religious interests) and seek advice from the journal if they are unsure whether a situation constitutes a conflict of interest or not;
  • not allow the content of their review to be influenced by the origin of the manuscript, nationality, religious affiliation, political or other views of its authors, or commercial considerations;
  • write a review objectively and constructively, refraining from hostile or inflammatory statements, as well as from slanderous or derogatory comments;
  • understand that, as researchers, they themselves need conscientious reviews from their peers, and therefore perform peer review in good faith;
  • provide journals with accurate and truthful information about their personal and professional knowledge and experience;
  • Be aware that impersonating another person during peer review is a serious violation of proper behavior.

While preparing for the review:

  • promptly respond to the offer to write a review, especially if they are not going to write it;
  • if they do not know the subject well enough to write a review, state it directly, and if they can evaluate only some part of the manuscript, describe the boundaries of the area in which they have sufficient knowledge;
  • agree to review a manuscript only if they are confident that they will be able to complete the review within the proposed or jointly agreed timeframe, promptly notifying the journal if they need an extension of the deadline;
  • follow the journal's policy in situations that, in their opinion, may interfere with objective peer review. Unless otherwise specified in the rules, they must notify the journal if they work in the same organization as one of the authors (or will soon work in this organization or apply for employment in this organization); if they are or have been in the recent past (for example, within the last 3 years) teachers of one of the authors, their students, close collaborators or joint grant recipients, or they have a close personal relationship with any of the authors;
  • re-review any manuscript that they have previously reviewed for another journal, because during this time its text may have changed, and the criteria for publishing articles in journals may be different;
  • make sure that suggestions to alternative reviewers are made without prejudice, and are not the result of personal preferences or made in order for the manuscript to receive a certain assessment (positive or negative);
  • agree to peer review of the manuscript only in order to read it, without the intention of preparing a review;
  • refuse to prepare a review if they feel that they will not be able to make an unbiased and fair assessment;
  • refuse to prepare a review if they participated in any work related to the preparation of the manuscript, or in the studies described in it;
  • refuse to prepare a review if they are asked to review a manuscript that is very similar to the one they are reviewing for another journal or to the one they proposed for review;
  • refuse to prepare a review if they do not agree with the peer review rules adopted in the journal, which may either affect their review or devalue it for the reason that they will not be able to effectively fulfill the requirements of the journal.

During review:

  • notify the journal immediately and seek advice if they discover any conflict of interest that was not noticed when they agreed to take the article for review, or any other circumstances that prevent them from forming a fair and impartial assessment of the article;
  • refrain from studying the manuscript and related materials while awaiting instructions from the journal on matters that may lead to a request to terminate the peer review agreement;
  • carefully read the manuscript, supporting materials (eg instructions to the reviewer, required ethical guidelines and policies, files with attachments) and the instructions of the journal, referring to the journal with any questions and requesting the missing information necessary to write a quality review;
  • notify the journal as soon as possible if they find that they do not have sufficient knowledge to evaluate all aspects of the manuscript without waiting for the review submission date, as this will unduly delay the review process;
  • do not involve anyone in the review, including their assistants, without obtaining the consent of the journal; the names of all persons who helped the reviewers in writing reviews should be included in the text so that the fact of their participation is registered in the journal, and the journal can thank them;
  • not to publicize any details of the manuscript and reviews;
  • inform the journal if circumstances arise that prevent them from preparing a review in a timely manner, providing an accurate estimate of the time they will need if the journal does not appoint another reviewer to replace them;
  • in the case of a double-blind review, if they guess the name of the author(s), inform the journal if such knowledge could cause a conflict of interest;
  • immediately notify the journal if they discover errors in the work, are concerned about the ethics of the work, become aware of a significant similarity between the manuscript and another document, or suspect that unfair behavior occurred during the research or submission of the manuscript to the journal; at the same time, reviewers should keep their concerns secret and not investigate further the circumstances of the case, unless the journal itself turns to them for help;
  • not delay the peer review process by delaying the submission of your review or by requesting additional unnecessary information from the journal or the author;
  • make sure that the assessment contained in their review is based on the quality of the work and is not influenced (neither for better nor for worse) by any personal, financial or other considerations, as well as intellectual predilections;
  • do not apply directly to the authors without the prior permission of the journal. 

While preparing the review:

  • remember that the editor expects from them knowledge of the subject area, common sense, as well as an honest and fair assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of the work and manuscript;
  • if the review (at the request of the journal) affects only certain aspects of the work, indicate this at the very beginning of the review, and clearly indicate which aspects;
  • follow the journal's instructions regarding the specific feedback they are required to provide, and unless there is a good reason not to provide it, such feedback should be arranged;
  • write an objective and constructive review that can help authors improve their manuscript;
  • Avoid derogatory personal comments or baseless accusations;
  • Be specific in your criticisms and support your general conclusions, such as “this work has been done before”, with solid evidence and appropriate references, to help editors form correct assessments and decisions while maintaining an objective attitude towards the authors;
  • remember that this is the author's work, and do not try to rewrite it in accordance with your stylistic preferences, if it is generally of high quality and written clearly; although suggestions to improve the clarity of presentation are always welcome;
  • be sensitive to language when authors write in a language other than their native language and formulate their comments appropriately and with due respect;
  • clearly indicate which proposed additional studies may support the conclusions of the peer-reviewed manuscript and may enhance or expand the work;
  • do not write a review in such a way that there are grounds to assume that it was written by another person;
  • not portray other people in a negative light or in a biased way in your review;
  • not make unfair negative comments or unreasonable criticism of any of the works of competitors listed in the manuscript;
  • make sure that the comments and recommendations addressed to the editor are in agreement with the report addressed to the authors; the main part of the information should be included in the report sent to the authors;
  • confidential comments sent to the editor must not contain slander and false accusations against authors made in the belief that the authors will not see these comments;
  • do not invite authors to include references to the work of the reviewer (or his colleagues) in the publication only in order to increase the citation or visibility of their work; all proposals to authors must be based solely on their scientific or technological value;
  • determine if the journal's policy allows them to sign their reviews and, if so, decide if it is convenient for them to do so;
  • if the editor working with the manuscript decides to write a review on it himself, he must do it transparently, without pretending to be anonymous; but writing a review of a manuscript that another journal editor is working on can be treated like any other review. 

After reviewing:

  • continue to keep the details of the manuscript and its reviews confidential;
  • respond quickly if there are questions from the journal related to the manuscript and provide the necessary information;
  • contact the journal if, after submitting their review, they learn any important facts that could influence their original opinion and recommendations;
  • to read reviews of other reviewers, if they are provided by the journal, in order to improve their understanding of the topic or their conclusions in relation to the work;
  • if possible, fulfill the requests of journals to review the changes made to the manuscript or the new version of the manuscript.

The peer review process is a vital component of scientific publications and we greatly value the work our reviewers do for us and are grateful for the time and effort they put into reviewing articles, as peer review is an invaluable contribution to the scientific community.