Peer-review process

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Peer-review process
including a description of the type of review, reviewer selection criteria, deadlines, documentation forms, and decision-making

The procedure for reviewing manuscripts of the articles in "Biotechnologia Acta" is as follows.

The review procedure in the journal "Biotechnologia Acta" is designed as an independent external assessment that ensures academic integrity and quality of publications. The manuscript sent to the editorial board is submitted for review to three leading specialists in the relevant field, who are appointed by the editorial board. The selection of reviewers is based on their scientific competence, absence of conflict of interest and willingness to adhere to the principles of objectivity, confidentiality and attention to the correctness of bibliographic references. Reviewers are obliged to notify the editor-in-chief of the impossibility of completing the review within the established deadline or of the inconsistency of the topic with their specialization. Usually, the review period is up to one month, which allows to ensure the timeliness of the editorial process.

The review is documented through a reviewer questionnaire, which contains structured assessments of scientific novelty, appropriateness of methods, correctness of interpretations, and presentation of the material. Written comments are formed on the basis of this questionnaire, which are sent to the author along with a copy of the manuscript. The authors prepare a revised version of the article, agreed with the reviewers, and it is considered final; after that, any changes to the text, figures, or tables are unacceptable. If the article is rejected, the editorial board sends the author an official written notification stating the reasons. The final decision on acceptance or rejection is made by the editorial board, guided by the date of receipt of the latest version of the manuscript. All communications between the editorial board, authors, and reviewers are considered confidential and cannot be made public without the permission of the editors. Publications in the journal are made under the CC-BY license, which guarantees open access to materials through the journal website and the V. I. Vernadsky National Library of Ukraine. The CC-BY license allows the free distribution, copying, adaptation and modification of materials, provided that the authorship is indicated, but prohibits their use for commercial purposes. This means that articles in the journal Biotechnologia Acta can be freely read, cited and used in scientific and educational projects, but cannot be sold or used for profit.

Thus, the review procedure in "Biotechnologia Acta" combines clearly defined terms, a standardized form of documentation (reviewer questionnaire), strict confidentiality requirements and a transparent mechanism for making editorial decisions.

The process of reviewing manuscripts of articles in the journal "Biotechnologia Acta"

1. Reviewing manuscripts of scientific articles is carried out in order to maintain the high scientific level of the journal "Biotechnologia Acta" and select the most valuable and relevant scientific works.

2. The journal "Biotechnologia Acta" uses Single-Blind Peer Review:

• the reviewer knows the personal information of the author/authors;

• the author/authors do not know the personal data of the reviewer.

3. Scientific articles sent to the editorial office undergo initial control for the completeness and correctness of their design and compliance with the Rules for authors set out on the website.

5. The executive editor determines three or more external reviewers for the submitted article.

• Reviewers must be well-known experts in the topic of the submitted manuscript and have publications in the field of research.

6. After expert evaluation of a scientific article, the reviewer gives a written recommendation according to the review form developed and approved by the editorial board, and may:
• recommend the article for placement;
• recommend the article for publication after the author's revision, taking into account the comments and wishes expressed;
• not recommend the article for placement.

If the reviewer recommends the article for placement after revision, taking into account the comments or does not recommend the article for publication, the review must indicate the reason for such a decision.

7. When reviewing scientific articles, reviewers are obliged to:
• pay special attention to the relevance of the scientific problem raised in the article;
• characterize the theoretical and applied significance of the research performed;
• check the correctness of the presented mathematical calculations, graphs, figures;
• assess the extent to which the author's conclusions correlate with existing scientific concepts;
• pay attention to the authors' compliance with the rules of scientific ethics, the correctness of references to literary sources.

A necessary element of the review should be the reviewer's assessment of the author's personal contribution to solving the problem under consideration.

In reviews, it is advisable to note the correspondence of style, logic and the presence of scientific novelty, as well as draw conclusions about the reliability and validity of the conclusions of the author(s) in this article.

8. Scientific articles may be sent for revision with the following reasons:
• insufficient expert qualification on the issues considered in the scientific article;
• insufficiently high level of initial expert assessment;
• sharp contradiction of the provisions expressed in the scientific article.

9. The completed review is sent to the editorial office by e-mail.

10. The editorial office sends the authors copies of the reviews (without indicating the reviewer's name) or a motivated refusal of the editorial office to publish this particular manuscript.