Submissions

IMPORTANT
- During the submission, it is mandatory to upload the information of all the co-authors, with affiliations and email addresses. Submissions without all the information about all the co-authors will be rejected at the desk.

- Max 2 non-original figures per paper can be used. During the submission, it is mandatory to attach the written permission of the Publisher to re-publish the figures. Without the written permission, the manuscript will be rejected at the desk.

- Any ethical misconduct during the submission process will imply an immediate rejection of the manuscript.

Manuscript preparation
- Download the Paper template (LINK)
- Prepare your paper using the Paper template file, strictly following all the indications.
- The paper must be prepared in English
- Read the Publishing Agreement (LINK)
For any problem during the submission, please send an email to gruppofrattura@gmail.com describing the details of the problem.

Manuscript submission
- Go to “Make a Submission” (LINK)
- Read the “Authors Guidelines”(LINK)
- Read the “Submission Preparation Checklist” (LINK)
- Read the “Copyright Notice” (LINK)
- Read the “Privacy Statement” (LINK)
- Select “Make a new submission” (LINK)
- Select a Section. It is possible to choose among ten different thematic sections. If you are invited for a Special Issue, choose the SI of your interest.

- Select one or more Categories (this will help the paper visibility).

- Select all the flags you find in "Submission requirements"

- It is possible to suggest one or more reviewers (names, surnames, affiliations and email addresses are mandatory; different nationalities are warmly suggested).

- Select all the flags in "Open Access Statement" section.

Press "Save and continue". A new window "Upload Submission File" will open

- Upload the manuscript as a word (docx) file selecting the correspondent “Article Component” and, after that, uploading the file.

- Upload the republishing permission for the already published figures (max 2), if any.

Press "Save and continue"

- Fill the Metadata boxes (Title, Abstract are mandatory). In “List of Contributors”, please, check all your metadata (your ORCID included) and, please, add all the co-authors with their metadata (Affiliations, ORCIDs and emails included). If all the co-authors metadata (ORCIDs and emails included) will not be uploaded, the paper will be automatically rejected (we take care of the papers authorship!)
- Fill the Additional Refinements. The most important are the Keywords. Please upload them one after the other (and not as a single “copy and paste”; it is sufficient to press “Enter” after each keyword)
- In the Additional Refinement section you find also the “Subject” field. You can fill this field using the Main Topics List of the journal (this will facilitate the reviewing process)
-Press "Save and continue" and, after, press “Finish Submission”.

After that, you should receive a confirmation email. If you don't see the "[FIS] Submission Acknowledgement" email after a few seconds, please, check in the SPAM folder.

Thematic Sections
1) Analytical, computational and physical Models
2) Damage mechanics
3) Environmentally assisted fracture
4) Failure Analysis and Forensic Engineering
5) Fatigue and Fracture of metallic alloys
6) Fatigue and Fracture of non metallic materials
7) Integrity of materials and structures

After the manuscript submission: reviewing process
The editorial board performs the plagiarism/autoplagiarism check
If the plagiarism/autoplagiarism check is passed, the reviewing process starts. Two (or more) reviewers are invited. The reviewing process time depends on the paper quality, from a few days, up to some weeks. Sometimes more than one reviewing round is necessary.
The paper can be:
- Rejected
- Proposed for a major review (after being resubmitted a new reviewing round is necessary)
- Proposed for a minor review (after being resubmitted a new reviewing round is NOT necessary)
- Accepted

After the paper acceptance
After the paper is accepted, the paper is processed in the Copyediting stage:
- If the paper is correctly paginated, the authors receive the proofs, with the request to upload the Visual Abstract and the Publishing Agreement (if still missing);
- If the paper is not correctly paginated, the authors are requested to modify their paper and to correctly paginate it, with the request to upload the Visual Abstract and the Publishing Agreement (if still missing);
Only correctly paginated papers are prepared as proofs and submitted to the authors for their confirmation.
Only after the proofs confirmation and the upload of the Visual Abstract, the paper is processed in the Production stage.

Production stage
In the Production stage, both the pages numbers and the DOIs are assigned and the paper is pre-published in the “Online First” Section.

Visual Abstract
Visual Abstracts (VAs) are mandatory. A tutorial to prepare the VAs is available here (LINK).

VAs are short (2 minutes max) presentations and they enhance the papers visibility, allowing the readers to quickly understand the topic of the paper, focusing on the results and the conclusions.
VAs are:
- embedded in the papers,
- linked in the paper webpage,
- available on a dedicated YouTube channel (LINK).

Visual Abstracts must be prepared using the following TEMPLATE.

The Visual Abstracts guidelines are available here: LINK

Manuscript limits
- No pages limit
- No Mb limit (if the file exceeds 100 Mb, please, contact gruppofrattura@gmail.com in advance)
- No Figures number limit
- No Tables number limit
- No video and/or audio files number limit. Audio/video files can be directly uploaded during the submission procedure (if the file exceeds 100 Mb, please, contact gruppofrattura@gmail.com in advance). 

References
Text: Indicate references by number(s) in square brackets in line with the text. The actual authors can be referred to, but the reference number(s) must always be given.
Example: “..... as demonstrated [1, 2]. Mettam and Adams [9] obtained ....”

References must be organized according to the Harvard format. DOI at the end of the ref. is warmly encouraged.
A Mendeley Style for Frattura ed Integrità Strutturale is available here:
https://csl.mendeley.com/styles/504042211/Fracture-and-Stuctural-Integrity

IMPORTANT: The authors must respect the following limits in the number of references:
- 25 references max for a research paper (with max 5 self-references);
- 50 references max for a review paper (with max 8 self-references);
- no limits for an invited review (with no limits for self-references). 

In case of submissions that do not respect these limits, the authors will be requested to revise them before inviting the reviewers.

The installation of this style is very simple:
1) open Mendeley desktop
2) Select"View/Citation style"
3) "Get more Styles"
4) In "Download Style" copy and paste https://csl.mendeley.com/styles/504042211/Fracture-and-Stuctural-Integrity

Examples:
Reference to a journal publication:
[1] Van der Geer, J. (2014). The art of writing a scientific article, J. Sci. Commun., 163(2), pp. 51–59. DOI: https://doi.org/12.3456/j.scicom.2013.11.003.
Reference to a book:
[2] Strunk, W. Jr. and White, E.B. (2000). The Elements of Style, New York, Longman. DOI: https://doi.org/12.3456/j.scicom.2013.11.003.
Reference to a chapter in an edited book:
[3] Mettam, G.R. ed., (2017). How to prepare an electronic version of your article, In: Introduction to the Electronic Age, New York, E-Publishing Inc., pp. 281–304. DOI: https://doi.org/12.3456/j.scicom.2013.11.003.
Reference to a conference paper:
[4] Doe, J., Fish, R. and Red, W. (2018). How to prepare an electronic version of your article. Conference on Papers preparation, Rome, Italy, 18-23 February.
Reference to a website:
[5] Tester, J. (2015). How to publish an article. Available at: http://www.testwebsite.eu/site/file.pdf.

IMPORTANT: Refs without a correct format will imply a delay in the paper publication (up to the upload of the paper with the correct refs).

Audio/video files
It is possible to publish audio and/or video files embedded in the manuscript (Tutorial). It is possible to upload the video files during the manuscript uploading procedure. If a video file exceeds 100 Mb, please contact gruppofrattura@gmail.com in advance.

Audioslides
Authors are allowed to publish audioslides. More details about the Audioslides production are given in the Tutorial.

Open Access Statement
Fracture and Structural Integrity, F&SI, is an open-access journal, which means that all content is freely available without charge to the user or his/her institution. Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles in this journal without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author. This is in accordance with the BOAI definition of open access. F&SI operates under the Creative Commons Licence Attribution 4.0 International (CC-BY 4.0). This allows to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format, to remix, transform and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, but giving appropriate credit, providing a link to the license, and indicating if changes were made.

Open Science Badges Policy
Fracture and Structural Integrity promotes transparency and reproducibility in structural integrity research. Authors are encouraged to apply for the Open Materials and/or Open Data Badges to certify that the components of their research are publicly accessible. Click HERE for more details.

Transparency in AI Reporting (TITAN 2025 Guidelines)
In accordance with the journal’s commitment to research integrity and transparency, authors are required to explicitly declare the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools in the research process or manuscript development, following the TITAN 2025 (Transparency In The reporting of Artificial Intelligence) guidelines. It is mandatory to provide a detailed disclosure covering the purpose and scope of AI use, the specific tools and configurations employed (including model version and date of use), and the data safeguards applied. Furthermore, authors must describe the human oversight and verification process conducted to ensure the accuracy and technical reliability of the AI-generated output, as authors retain full accountability for the integrity of the final work.

Here is the checklist to be filled out, signed, and uploaded during submission (LINK).

For more information, please refer to the official TITAN guideline (DOI: 10.70389/PJS.100082).

IGF/F&SI Newsletter
By submitting the paper, all the co-authors agree to be added to the IGF/F&SI Newsletter mailing list. The newsletter provides updates on IGF/F&SI activities and is sent out no more than six times per year. It is always possible to unsubscribe the Newsletter by clicking the dedicated link.