The AE main support to the Journal is the appropriate tracing of the Reviewers inside the top level scientists in the research field of the submitted paper.
Once the reviewer(s) complete their work, the AE read the paper, the revision(s) and make a short comment giving their opinion about the destiny of the submission.
The AE will take the decision of: a) accepting; b) send again the paper to the authors for a (major or minor) revision. The Editor will take in serious account the opinion of the AE, giving the AE opinion the highest score.
Once that the revision by the authors is ready, the AE can choose to start a second revision process, repeating the procedure, reject or accept the paper.
In case of a second revision, the AE will handle the paper in the same way as the first revision round.
The entire revision process will be done through the on-line system. In case of need, the AE can communicate via e-mail with the Editorial Office and/or directly with the Editor in Chief.
Comments and replies are entirely managed by one of the AEs. The procedure is the following:
1) the submitted comment is assigned to one of the AEs (possibly the same who was assigned to the paper under comment) by the Editor in Chief
2) The assigned editor read the comment and verify if the comment is well sounded, scientifically correct and no offensive or aggressive. The AE decides if the comment is appropriate or not.
3) If it is, the assigned AE sends the comment to the authors of the paper under comment, asking if they want, or not, prepare a reply in 4 weeks.
4) When ready, the AE verify the reply using the same principles used for the comment. If the AE opinion is positive, both comment and reply are sent to the Editor in Chief who accept the paper.
5) If the authors do not want prepare any reply, the comment is published alone.
6) The AE can ask rapid and small changes to both the comment author and to the reply author.
