About the Journal

DIVK, or the Society for Structural Integrity and Life, is a Serbian scientific society. We are a voluntary non-governmental and non-profitable society, established for an indefinite period of time, aimed at achieving goals in the field of assuring safety and integrity of structures, from the design phase up to the end of the structural lifecycle.
The Society is based on the creation, development, tradition and tasks of the ‘Society for Structural Integrity and Life’, and maintains a continuous, unique, true and legally valid ownership of all its achievements, content of work, movable and immovable property.
The goals of the Society: to master the modern theoretical, experimental and numerical methods for assessing the integrity; to apply this knowledge in order to accomplish the safety and reliability of structures in service and to extend their design life; to secure the prevention of failures and outages, especially at risks for the environment; to improve the education and publishing level in this field.
DIVK is publishing a printed and electronic peer reviewed professional and scientific journal ‘Structural Integrity and Life’. The journal serves professionals in the analysis, design, testing, health monitoring, integrity assessment, case studies and engineering sciences of engineering structures. The journal aims to provide a recognizable forum for the research in the field of structural engineering and life of systems and components. Papers published include original papers, review papers, technical reports, book reviews, commentaries, and news. Topics cover fundamental aspects in theoretical and applied mechanics, testing and experiments, design and reparation, materials sciences, etc. Special thematic issues are occasionally published and are devoted to important regional events that cover topics as integrity and life, risk, safety and health of engineering structures.
The Editorial Board is responsible, among other, for deciding which of the research papers/articles submitted should be published and preventing publication malpractice. Unethical behaviour is unacceptable and the Society for Structural Integrity and Life does not tolerate plagiarism in any form.

1. Editors' Responsibilities
Publication Decisions: Editors are accountable for everything published in the journal and strive to meet the needs of readers and authors. Editor’s decisions to accept or reject a paper for publication should be based on the editorial board’s reviews and paper’s importance.
Review of Manuscripts: The editor ensures that each manuscript is initially evaluated by the editor, who may make use of appropriate means, to examine the originality of the contents of the manuscript and ensure the quality of the material they publish, recognizing that journal and sections within the journal will have different aims and standards.
Fair Review: Editors should strive to ensure that peer review at the journal is fair, unbiased and timely. The editor ensures that each manuscript received is evaluated on its intellectual content without regard to authors’ sex, gender, race, religion, citizenship, etc.
Confidentiality: The editor and any editorial staff must not disclose any information about a submitted manuscript to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, potential reviewers, other editorial advisers, and the publisher, as appropriate. The editor must ensure that information regarding manuscripts submitted by authors is kept confidential.
Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest: Editors should require reviewers to disclose any potential competing interests before agreeing to review a submission.

2. Authors’ Responsibilities
Reporting Standards: Authors should precisely present their original research, as well as objectively discuss its significance. Manuscripts are to be edited in accordance to the submission guidelines of the journal.
Originality: Authors must certify that their work is entirely unique and original.
Redundancy: Authors should not concurrently submit papers describing essentially the same research. Submitting the same paper to more than one journal constitutes unethical publishing behaviour and is unacceptable.
Acknowledgement of Sources: Author(s) should acknowledge all sources of data used in the research and cite publications that have influenced their research.
Authorship of the Paper: Authorship should be limited only to those who have made a significant contribution to conceiving, designing, executing and/or interpreting the submitted study. All those who have significantly contributed to the study should be listed as co-authors. The corresponding author should also ensure that all the authors and co-authors have seen and approved the final submitted version of the manuscript and their inclusion as co-authors.
Data Access and Retention: Authors should retain raw data related to their submitted paper, and must provide it for editorial review, upon request of the editor.
Fundamental errors in published works: When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in his/her submitted manuscript, the author must immediately notify the editor.

3. Reviewers’ Responsibilities
Confidentiality: Manuscript reviewers, the editor and the editorial staff must not disclose any information regarding submitted manuscripts. All submitted manuscripts are to be treated as privileged information. Editors should provide guidance to reviewers on everything that is expected of them including the need to handle submitted material in confidence.
Acknowledgement of Sources: Reviewers must ensure that authors have acknowledged all sources of data used in the research. Any statement that an observation, derivation, or argument had been previously reported should be accompanied by the relevant citation. A reviewer should also call to the editor's attention any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other published paper of which they have personal knowledge.
Standards of Objectivity: Review of submitted manuscripts will be conducted objectively. Reviewers shall express their views clearly, with supporting arguments. Personal criticism of the author is inappropriate.
Promptness: If a reviewer believes it is not possible for him/her to review the research reported in a manuscript within the designated guidelines, or within stipulated time, he/she should notify the editor, so that the accurate and timely review can be ensured.
Conflict of Interest: All reviewers should have no conflict of interest with respect to the research, the authors and/or the funding bodies.

4. Change or Modification of Published Paper
Withdrawal: Published papers will be withdrawn if the author(s) noticed significant errors. Before accepting the withdrawal request, the editorial board and Editor-in-chief should talk with author(s) sufficiently. If the paper is agreed to be withdrawn, the following should follow:
• The paper in the journal database should be removed.
• The link in online publication site should be removed.
• Next phrase or similar phrase to announce the reason should be shown below the paper title in online publication paper list: (The paper is withdrawn because of technical errors).
Replacement: Papers published can be replaced if the author(s) send an updated paper. Before accepting the replacement request, the editorial board and Editor-in-chief should talk with author(s) sufficiently, and at least two reviewers should check the changes. If the paper is replaced, the following should follow:
• The paper in journal database should be replaced.
• Link in online publication site should be replaced.
• Next phrase or similar phrase to announce the reason should be shown below the paper title in the online publication paper list: (This paper is replaced because author(s) sent an updated version. Contact the editor if you want to check the old version).
• Old version should be kept separately, and if someone wants to check the old version, the editor can send the PDF to him/her.
• Note that the replacement is acceptable only one time, and only for technical advances.
Removal: Published papers will be removed if reviewers, readers, librarians, publishers or other subjects noticed significant errors or plagiarism. Before removing a paper, the editorial board and Editor-in-chief should talk with authors sufficiently, and should provide enough time to have authors’ explanation. If the paper is removed, then it follows that,
• The paper in the journal database should be removed.
• The link in the online publication site should be removed.
• Next phrase or similar phrase to announce the reason should be shown below the paper title in the online publication paper list: (This paper is removed because of plagiarism).

5. Penalties
Double Submission: If double submission is found or noticed from other sources, the editorial board should check the status. If double submission is confirmed as intentional, then the following actions must be imposed:
• Review process will be terminated.
• The reason should be sent to reviewers, editorial board and authors.
• All authors’ names will be marked as black list, and these authors cannot submit any papers to the DIVK journal for three years.
Double Publication: If double publication is found or noticed from other sources, the editorial board should check the status. If double publication is confirmed as intentional, then the following actions will be carried out:
• This should be reported to editorial board and author(s).
• This should be sent to the publisher who published same (or very similar) paper.
• Paper will be removed according to the ‘Removal’ part in section 4.
• All authors’ name will be marked as black list, and these authors cannot submit any paper to the DIVK journal for three years.
Plagiarism: If plagiarism (including self-plagiarism) is found or noticed from other sources, the editorial board should check the status. If plagiarism (including self-plagiarism) is confirmed as intentional, then the following actions will be carried out:
• This should be reported to the editorial board and authors,
• This should be sent to the publisher who published the same or similar paper,
• Paper will be removed according to the ‘Removal’ part in section 4,
• All authors’ names will be marked as black list, and this author(s) cannot submit any paper to the DIVK journal for five years.