Reflecting on a Year of Transformation for Fracture and Structural Integrity

It's hard to believe that another year has already come and gone. It feels like just yesterday we were celebrating the start of 2024, and now here we are, on the cusp of a brand new year. As we reflect on the past 12 months, we can't help but feel a sense of pride in all that we've accomplished here at Fracture and Structural Integrity. In 2024, we received 446 submissions and published 85 papers, resulting in an 84% rejection rate (73% at desk). The average time to rejection was just one day, and the time from submission to acceptance decreased significantly from 69 days in January 2024 to 48 days in October 2024. We published four issues featuring authors from a diverse range of countries, up to 19 countries in the April issue. 

It's been a year of significant change and growth for our journal, and we're excited to share some of the highlights with you.

New name, new look

One of the biggest changes we made this year was to our name. Formerly known as "Frattura ed Integrità Strutturale", we decided to rebrand ourselves as "Fracture and Structural Integrity." This new name in English will improve the journal's visibility, especially in web search engines.

New publishing schedule

Furthermore, 2024 saw the implementation of a new publishing schedule, enabling immediate paper publication upon acceptance of proofs and the uploading of Visual Abstracts.

Embracing the future of publishing with our AI policy

Another major change we made this year was introducing a new AI policy. This policy outlines authors, reviewers, and editors' acceptable use of generative AI tools. AI has the potential to revolutionize the publishing process, and we're committed to embracing these new technologies responsibly and ethically.

Launching our new podcast platform

We're also excited to announce the launch of our new podcast platform. This platform will feature interviews and podcasts on various fracture and structural integrity topics. We believe this is a great way to engage with our readers and share our knowledge with a broader audience.

Looking ahead to 2025

We're incredibly proud of all we've accomplished this year and excited to see what the future holds for Fracture and Structural Integrity. We're committed to continuing to publish high-quality research in the field of fracture and structural integrity, and we look forward to serving our community for many years to come.

We'd like to take this opportunity to thank our authors, reviewers, editors, and readers for their continued support. We couldn't do it without you!

In the meantime, we wish you all a very happy and successful New Year!

OK, now we have an Impact Factor... a revolution is necessary!

 

In June 2023, FIS obtained an IF! 

This great result was possible only thanks to the Section Editors time, to the Editorial boards members help, to the reviewers efforts and, last but not least, to the authors who considered FIS as a good platform to publish their papers! … A value of 1.4 is not exceptional, but, considering that the journal is completely based on the volunteers’ time and that any APC are requested, this value is not terrible! 

In the last years, the number of submissions to FIS dramatically increased. Considering 81 submissions in the July-November 2020 period (the pandemic crisis year), we had 166, 282, 252 submissions in the same periods of the years 2021, 2022, and 2023 respectively. Although we have a high rejection rate (higher than 90%), this huge number of submissions forced us to modify the structure of the journal. 

Some weeks ago, we renewed the list of Thematic Sections, trying to offer to the authors a more complete and “equilibrated” choice:

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

This implied a renewal both of the Section Editors team and of the Editorial Board.  

In addition, we are working on the papers structure. Starting from the next section (January 2024), the authors will be asked to prepare their visual abstract according to a template. This visual abstract will be directly available in the pdf and in the browsable version of the paper, while the written version of the abstract will be always available on the website page of each paper. The first VAs prepared according to the new template are already available on the YouTube channel dedicated to Visual Abstracts.

This is, maybe, the most important “revolution” of our journal of the last years. 

If you have any suggestions to further improve the journal, please, do not hesitate to post your suggestions in the comments or, privately, using the dedicated form.

Do you enjoy social media?

Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, Twitter, Telegram … both Gruppo Italiano Frattura (IGF) and Frattura ed Integrità Strutturale (FIS) are active on all these social media. They are mainly used to spread news and info about the IGF activities (the organization of events, for example) and to inform our community about the papers publication on the IGF journal. 

Analyzing the IGF social media, here you find some more details:

• Facebook (IGF): it is used to spread the info about the events organized by IGF, the publication of issues on Frattura ed Integrità Strutturale or on Procedia Structural Integrity, or, even, the organization of events that could be of interest for the IGF community. Sometimes, the IGF Facebook page is used to stream live the events organized by IGF. This page is also used to collect the pictures of the events organized by IGF,
• Facebook (FIS): it is dedicated to spread the info about the publication of papers on FIS, the publication of issues or, even, the activation of new services. 
• YouTube (IGF): this channel is active since 2011 and it is used to publish the presentations that were held during the IGF events (since IGF19, Milan 2007). More than 1300 videos are available, with more than 650 subscribers. The IGF YouTube channel is also used to stream live the events organized by IGF.
• YouTube (FIS): this channel is active since 2018 and it is used to publish Visual abstracts. Since July 2018, all the papers published in FIS are connected to Visual Abstracts, trying to offer a quick view of the paper content. 
• LinkedIn & Twitter: the activity on these platforms is similar to the Facebook (IGF) page.
• Telegram: It is mainly used to publish news about the IGF activities and FIS publications.

Do you have any suggestions to improve our social media activity?

We are now thinking about the possibility to activate a podcast platform ... do you think it will be useful for our community? 

In case of a positive answer, do you think that this platform will have to be focused on the IGF journal (publishing "audio abstracts", for example) or will have to publish interviews or podcasts on topics of interest for our community? 

Please, share your thoughts about it. Any suggestions will be welcome!