Reviewer Guide - sci-lum.com

Use professional and respectful language, even when pointing out significant problems. If you suggest rejection, kindly explain your rationale clearly and constructively.

1. Model of Peer Review

Sci-Lum operates a double-blind peer review system. This means that:

• Reviewers do not know the identity of the authors, and
• Authors do not know the identity of the reviewers.

We ask all reviewers to preserve the confidentiality of the process and refrain from seeking to identify authors or revealing their own identity within the review comments or documents.

2. Reviewer Responsibilities

As a reviewer, you are entrusted with evaluating submitted work in a manner that is:

• Objective – focused solely on scientific merit and methodological soundness
• Constructive – aimed at helping the authors improve the quality of their work
• Ethical – respectful of confidentiality, fairness, and professional standards

Your primary tasks are to:

• Assess the originality, validity, and significance of the manuscript’s content
• Evaluate the clarity of writing and structure of the article
• Identify methodological strengths and weaknesses
• Highlight any potential ethical concerns (e.g., lack of informed consent, questionable data integrity, excessive similarity to prior work)
• Recommend whether the manuscript should be: Accepted, Revised (Minor or Major), or Rejected
• Provide detailed, structured comments that are useful to both authors and editors

3. How to Structure Your Review

Please provide a short summary of the manuscript in your own words (2-3 sentences), followed by clearly separated sections such as:

• Strengths
• Major Issues (e.g., fundamental flaws in study design, ethical problems, unsupported claims)
• Minor Issues (e.g., formatting, clarity of language, typographical errors)
• Recommendation (choose one: Accept / Minor Revisions / Major Revisions / Reject)

Use professional and respectful language, even when pointing out significant problems. If you suggest rejection, kindly explain your rationale clearly and constructively.

4. Ethical Expectations

As a reviewer, you are expected to:

• Maintain strict confidentiality during and after the review process
• Recuse yourself if you detect a conflict of interest (e.g., personal, professional, financial, institutional)
• Avoid using or sharing any ideas, data, or methods from the manuscript before its formal publication
• Notify the editorial office if you suspect plagiarism, duplicate submission, or ethical misconduct

We also encourage reviewers to provide mentorship through their reviews, particularly when evaluating submissions by early-career researchers or from regions with less access to editorial resources.

5. Timeliness

Reviewers are kindly asked to submit their reviews within 7 days of accepting the invitation. If you anticipate a delay, please contact the editorial office as soon as possible. If you are unable to complete the review, we appreciate your recommendation of an alternative qualified reviewer.

6. Recognition

We acknowledge the important contribution of peer reviewers. With your consent, we may issue formal reviewer certificates, and we are exploring integration with services such as Publons or ORCID peer review tracking to allow optional recognition of your contribution.

7. Final Notes

By agreeing to review for Sci-Lum, you are supporting a journal that values ethical science, open access, and equity in publishing. We consider our reviewers not only evaluators but partners in shaping the future of biomedical communication. If you have any questions about your role or wish to discuss concerns during the review process, please contact the editorial team directly at info@sci-lum.com. Thank you for contributing your time, insight, and professionalism to Sci-Lum.