Medicine and Materials is committed to maintaining high standards of publication ethics, scientific quality, transparency, and scholarly integrity. All submitted manuscripts undergo an editorial assessment and independent peer review process designed to evaluate their originality, methodological quality, ethical compliance, relevance, and suitability for the journal.
1. Originality and Pre-Publication Screening
Medicine and Materials considers only original manuscripts that have not been previously published and are not simultaneously under consideration by another journal.
All submissions are screened prior to peer review. The initial editorial assessment includes, where applicable, verification of:
- compliance with the journal’s Aims and Scope;
- completeness of the manuscript and required declarations;
- originality and textual similarity using plagiarism-detection software;
- authorship and Author Contributions statements;
- funding and Conflicts of Interest declarations;
- ethical approval and Ethics Committee/Institutional Review Board protocol number for research involving human participants or animals;
- informed consent and consent for publication, where applicable;
- clinical trial registration, where applicable;
- compliance with appropriate EQUATOR Network reporting guidelines, where applicable;
- the presence of an appropriate literature search methodology for review articles;
- Data Availability statements;
- disclosure of the use of generative AI or AI-assisted technologies, where applicable.
Manuscripts that do not meet the journal’s scientific, ethical, reporting, or scope requirements may be returned to the authors for correction or rejected without external peer review.
2. Peer Review Model
All manuscripts that successfully pass the initial editorial screening undergo single-blind peer review:
- Reviewers are aware of the identities of the authors.
- Authors are not informed of the identities of the reviewers.
Each manuscript is evaluated by at least two independent reviewers with relevant scientific expertise. Reviewers are selected on the basis of subject competence, independence, and absence of conflicts of interest.
The purpose of peer review is to assess the scientific validity, originality, methodological quality, ethical compliance, clarity, significance, and relevance of the manuscript.
3. Editorial Workflow
- Initial Editorial Screening – The Editorial Office checks the manuscript for scope, completeness, originality, ethical requirements, reporting standards, required declarations, and technical compliance.
- Editor Assignment – A handling editor with appropriate subject expertise is assigned to manage the manuscript.
- Reviewer Selection and Invitation – At least two independent reviewers with relevant expertise are invited to evaluate the manuscript.
- Peer Review – Reviewers assess the manuscript’s scientific quality, originality, methodology, ethical compliance, interpretation of results, relevance, and presentation.
- Editorial Decision – Based on the reviewers’ reports and the editor’s own assessment, one of the following decisions may be issued:
- Accept;
- Minor Revision;
- Major Revision;
- Reject.
- Revision – When revision is requested, authors must submit a revised manuscript together with a detailed point-by-point response to the reviewers’ and editor’s comments.
- Re-evaluation – Revised manuscripts may be returned to the original reviewers or evaluated directly by the handling editor, depending on the extent and nature of the revisions.
- Final Decision – The final editorial decision is made by the Editor-in-Chief or a delegated handling editor with appropriate subject expertise, taking into account the independent peer-review reports, the authors’ responses, and the journal’s editorial and ethical policies.
- Production and Publication – Accepted manuscripts undergo editorial and production checks and are published online as open access articles under the journal’s applicable Creative Commons license.
4. Reviewer Responsibilities and Ethical Guidelines
Reviewers are expected to conduct peer review in accordance with principles of confidentiality, objectivity, independence, and research integrity.
Reviewers must:
- accept assignments only when they have appropriate expertise and sufficient time to provide a thorough review;
- treat the manuscript and all associated files as confidential documents;
- not share, distribute, reproduce, or disclose manuscript content without authorization from the journal;
- not use unpublished information, data, methods, ideas, figures, or results obtained through peer review for personal, academic, commercial, or professional advantage;
- declare any financial, institutional, collaborative, competitive, professional, or personal conflict of interest that could affect, or reasonably be perceived to affect, their impartiality;
- decline the review when a significant conflict of interest exists;
- provide objective, constructive, evidence-based, and respectful comments;
- identify relevant published work that may have been overlooked by the authors, where appropriate;
- alert the editor to suspected plagiarism, duplicate publication, data fabrication, image manipulation, unethical research practices, or other concerns regarding research integrity;
- not attempt to identify or contact authors outside the formal editorial process;
- not misrepresent their identity, expertise, affiliation, or contribution to the review process.
5. Use of Artificial Intelligence by Reviewers and Editors
Manuscripts submitted to Medicine and Materials are confidential documents. Reviewers and editors must not upload manuscripts, figures, supplementary files, unpublished data, or other confidential material to publicly accessible generative AI platforms or other external systems where confidentiality, data protection, or intellectual property cannot be assured.
AI-assisted technologies may not replace the scientific judgment and responsibility of reviewers or editors. Any permitted use of such tools must comply with the journal’s confidentiality, ethics, and data-protection requirements. Reviewers and editors remain fully responsible for the content and integrity of their assessments and decisions.
6. Conflicts of Interest
Reviewers, editors, and Editorial Board members must declare any conflicts of interest that could influence, or reasonably appear to influence, the peer-review or editorial decision-making process.
Conflicts may include, but are not limited to:
- financial interests;
- recent or ongoing research collaboration;
- institutional relationships;
- personal or professional relationships;
- direct academic competition;
- other circumstances that could compromise impartiality.
Where a relevant conflict exists, the individual concerned must recuse themselves from the review and decision-making process.
7. Submissions from Editors and Editorial Board Members
Manuscripts submitted by the Editor-in-Chief, editors, Editorial Board members, or individuals closely associated with the journal are subject to the same editorial and peer-review standards as all other submissions.
Such manuscripts are handled by an independent editor who is not involved in the submitted work and has no relevant conflict of interest. The submitting editor or Editorial Board member has no access to reviewer selection, reviewer reports, or editorial decision-making beyond that available to any other author.
8. Special Issues and Guest-Edited Content
Special Issues, thematic collections, and guest-edited content are subject to the same scientific, ethical, and peer-review standards as regular journal submissions.
All manuscripts submitted to Special Issues undergo initial editorial screening and independent peer review by at least two qualified reviewers. Guest Editors must declare conflicts of interest and may not independently make editorial decisions on manuscripts in which they have a personal, professional, institutional, or financial interest.
Manuscripts submitted by Guest Editors are handled independently by the Editor-in-Chief or another editor without a conflict of interest. The Editor-in-Chief retains overall responsibility for editorial standards and the integrity of the peer-review process.
9. Editorial Independence
Editorial decisions are based on the scientific quality, originality, ethical compliance, methodological soundness, and relevance of the manuscript to the journal’s scope.
Commercial considerations, Article Publication Charges, institutional relationships, sponsorship, or the authors’ ability to pay publication fees do not influence peer review or editorial decisions.