Editors Column
by Marco Liserre
Good Practices for Good Articles
T
he online submission and review
system has been up and running
(http://mc.manuscriptcentral.
com/iem-ieee) for six months at the time
I am writing this column, and it is time
to provide some data. About 40 papers
have been submitted, and the accep-
tance ratio is below 50%. The main prob-
lem is that the papers are seldom pre-
pared following the guidelines posted at
http://ieee-ies.org/magazine/auth_sub-
mission.shtml, and frequently they are
more suited for an IEEE transactions
rather than for an IEEE magazine. The
papers that are not prepared according
to the guidelines may be sent back to the
authors with a request for resubmission
if they do not comply with the general
requirements concerning paper format,
presence of author name in the paper, or
number of figures and their quality. Also,
they can be rejected directly by me or by
the other members of the editorial board
if they are out of IEEE Industrial Electron-
ics Magazines scope or if they are not
suited for the magazine because their
scope is too narrow.
Fortunately, we were still able to se-
lect a good number of excellent papers
covering many of the topics of interest
to the IEEE Industrial Electronics Soci-
ety (IES). In this issue, you will find a
nice overview of multilevel converters,
a discussion on integration of power
quality measurements in a distribu-
tion automation system, and an article
on the application of Java technology
in industrial automation. Moreover,
there is also an interesting engineer-
ing application on the ophthalmology
branch of medicine.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MIE.2008.924750
2 IEEE INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE n JUNE 2008
I have to admit that submissions the reviewers selected by the associ-
for the Past and Present column ate editor in charge of the paper); high
are few, even if the articles on pas- attention to possible plagiarism; and
sivity-based control and fractional avoidance of possible conflict of inter-
calculus were very interesting. I am est. This last point is as important as
sure that in the following months the others, and soon the policy adopt-
we will find authors ed by the IES for its pub-
interested in contribut- lications will be published
ing to the discussion of on the Web site for all IES
As you can
theoretical issues with journals. In brief, papers
potential impact on in- see, we are written by members of the
dustrial electronics. committed to editorial board are man-
The solicitation of ma- guaranteeing the aged by other associate
terial is one of the most best reputation editors, and all names in-
recurrent topics I have for our volved are hidden. Papers
touched upon in this written by the editor-in-
publication.
column, and I hope that chief are managed by the
my call for contributions vice president for Publi-
will reach a vast audience. In fact, the cations of the IES, who maintains the
goal of this magazine is to attract con- review process completely blinded to
tributions from every researcher and the editor-in-chief of the journal.
engineer willing to communicate his As you can see, we are committed
results and offer a tutorial service to to guaranteeing the best reputation for
the scientific community interested our publication, using a serious and
in industrial electronics. All potential transparent peer-review process based
contributors who may be not be aware on well-qualified reviewers and we
of our practices in selecting papers for strongly persecute any case of plagia-
publication should know that the work rism. (Please have a look at the list of
of the editorial board emphasizes the reviewers of the past year published in
following: blind peer review (papers the Winter issue of 2007.) What else can
are circulated without author names you request from a journal to deserve
in order to prevent bias on the part of your contribution?
New Products
Future issues of IEEE Industrial Electronics Magazine will include a New Products
department. New product announcements can be sent to Associate Editor Hiroshi
Fujimoto (hfuji@ynu.ac.jp) for possible publication.