Brazilian Journal of Radiation Sciences - BJRS
ISSN 2319-0612
One way to impact radiation protection safety culture is by establishing adequate and proper communication processes among all the actors involved in radiation applications, in various fields such as industry, environmental conservation, analytical sciences, agriculture, medical diagnosis and therapy, and other areas.
In this context, the BJRS as an open access journal, supported by the Brazilian Radiation Protection Society - SBPR, an IRPA associate society, aims to disseminate scientific articles on the major disciplines on radiation sciences, including:
Assessment of Terrestrial Radionuclides and Radiological Risk within Indigenous Construction Materials: A Case Study from the Liwale District, Tanzania
Read more about New articles published: V. 14 n. 2 (2026)Last update: 2025-01-01
Brazilian Journal of Radiation Science (BJRS), ISSN 2319-0612, is a Platinum Open Access journal sponsored, since 2013, by the Brazilian Radiation Protection Society – (Sociedade Brasileira de Proteção Radiológica - SBPR), a scientific society affiliated to the Brazilian Association of Scientific Editors (ABEC). It publishes rigorously peer-reviewed scholarly research.
Platinum (Diamond) Open Access: this term refers to open access journals that don't charge any author fees (APC - Article Processing Charges). They are usually financed by a university or research organization. https://www.unesco.org/es/diamond-open-access
The editor in chief, advised by the BJRS Editorial Board, possesses delegated responsibility for overall policy matters concerning the Journal.
One way to consolidate a radiation protection safety culture is to establish adequate and appropriate communication processes among all the actors involved in radiation applications in various fields such as industry, medicine, environmental conservation, analytical sciences and agriculture.
In this context, the BJRS, as a journal published by the Brazilian Radiation Protection Society, a society affiliated to the INTERNATIONAL RADIATION PROTECTION ASSOCIATION - IRPA, aims to disseminate scientific articles on the major disciplines on radiation sciences.
Covering the Biological, Health, Engineering, Exact and Earth areas and even Law (Nuclear Law), the following topics covered by the journal editorial line stand out:
The focus is: first, to serve researchers through the immediate publication of important advances in all fields of radiation sciences, as well as to promote a forum for discussion and dissemination of science-related issues.
Second, ensure that the results of scientific work are quickly disseminated to the general public, in order to express their importance for knowledge, culture and everyday life, in the direction of what the movement in favor of Open Science advocates.
Any work that meets the aforementioned scope and that has not been published or accepted for publication elsewhere will be considered for publication in the Brazilian Journal of Radiation Sciences.
Community of potential readers, especially in Portuguese-speaking countries:
Contribute to the dissemination of a culture of radiological safety and protection, establishing adequate and appropriate communication processes between all actors involved in radiation applications, through the dissemination of scientific articles in the main disciplines of radiation sciences.
BJRS is committed to scholarship that is respectful of diversity and inclusion. Diversity in our journal includes considering and publishing scholarship from scholars with different institutional affiliations, different nationalities, and at different stages of their professional careers; In particular, we encourage submissions from those that are underrepresented within academia, due to race, ethnicity, gender identity, disability, or other protected characteristics, thereby ensuring the promotion of diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility (DEIA principles). We encourage authors to engage with and cite sources historically excluded from academia and engage with the work of scholars based in the countries about which they are writing. We are committed to eliminating the influence of bias in our editorial and review processes and continually work toward identifying and implementing best practices for scientific publishing.
Starting on 2023, BJRS operates under a continuous publication model, by publishing manuscripts submitted to the journal and manuscripts previously deposited in the EmeRI preprint repository. Papers are posted online as soon as the production process is completed.
BJRS publishes 4 regular issues per year, under continuous publication.
BJRS supports the concept of open science, which seeks to open up the entire research and publication process even further, including open data, open protocols, open code and transparent peer review. However, the opening of the data is conditioned to the authorization of the authors and reviewers involved in a submission.
For authors: check out the Open Science Compliance Form.
BJRS is a Diamond 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, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author. This is in accordance with the BOAI definition of open access. Diamond OA (or Platinum OA) is a publishing model where the entire publishing process is funded by non-profit organizations, research institutions, or government agencies; there are no charging fees to authors or readers.
The BJRS articles are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, CC By, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party materials in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Authors have a series of rights, called copyright, that protect their work. If people want to use copyrighted work, they often have to ask for permission from the creator. The author grants us permission of first publication. Since January 2025, BJRS no longer demand that the authors transfer – or “assign” – their copyright to the journal. The authors now, from 2025 onwards, retain unrestricted copyright and all publishing rights by publishing under license adopted by the journal, to inform readers how published content can be used. It enables us to effectively manage, publish and make author work available to the academic community and beyond. Before 2025 copyright was assigned to the publisher/journal. Our current policy is to return copyright even to authors who published in previous editions, without prejudice to the Creative Commons license already used.
As a Diamond Open Access (DOA) journal, BJRS applies the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY) license to articles we publish. Creative Commons works within copyright law. It allows creators to grant permission to everyone in the world to use their work. If you submit your paper for publication by BJRS, you agree to have the CC BY license applied to your work.
BJRS requires that you, as the author, agree that anyone can reuse your article content in whole or part for any purpose, for free, even for commercial purposes. These permitted uses include but are not limited to self-archiving by authors of submitted, accepted and published versions of their papers in institutional repositories. Anyone may copy, redistribute, reuse, or modify the content as long as the author and original source are properly cited. This facilitates freedom in reuse and also ensures that BJRS content can be mined without barriers for the needs of research.
If your manuscript contains content such as photos, images, clipart, tables, audio files, videos, proprietary protocols, code, etc., that you or your co-authors do not own or did not create, we will require you to provide us with proof that either:
a. the material is in the public domain or available under an open access license compatible with CC BY 4.0, or
b. the owner of that content has given you written permission to use and publish the content under an open access CC BY 4.0 license.
BJRS does not charges for submission and offers immediate free access to its content.
BJRS uses the LOCKSS and the CLOCKSS systems to create a file system distributed among participating libraries and allows them to create permanent archives of the journal for preservation and restoration (PKP PN).
BJRS allows authors to deposit publisher’s version (post-print) of their article in an institutional repository.
Your privacy is important to BJRS. This privacy statement provides information about the personal information that BJRS collects, and the ways in which we use that personal information.
BJRS may collect and use personal information that is necessary for the processing and publication of manuscripts submitted to us. This information may include names, affiliation and contact details; including postal address, emails, phone numbers and fax numbers.
Any personal information received by BJRS will only be used to: process and publish your manuscript; administer this website; personalize the website for you; enable your access to and use of the website services; send to you communication about your manuscript; send to you statements and invoices; send you marketing communications.
Where BJRS discloses your personal information to its agents or sub-contractors for these purposes, the agent or sub-contractor in question will be obligated to use that personal information in accordance with the terms of this privacy statement.
In addition to the disclosures reasonably necessary for the purposes identified elsewhere above, BJRS may disclose your personal information to the extent that it is required to do so by law, in connection with any legal proceedings or prospective legal proceedings, and in order to establish, exercise or defend its legal rights.
BJRS will take reasonable technical and organisational precautions to prevent the loss, misuse or alteration of your personal information.
In addition, personal information that you submit for publication on the website will be published on the internet and may be available around the world. You agree to such cross-border transfers of personal information.
BJRS may update this privacy policy by posting a new version on this website. You should check this page occasionally to ensure you are familiar with any changes. This website contains links to other websites.
BJRS is not responsible for the privacy policies or practices of any third party.
If you have any questions about this privacy policy or BJRS' treatment of your personal information, please send an email to bjrs@bjrs.org.br.
e-ISSN: 2319-0612.
The revenue sources are income from scientific events promoted by SBPR, as a scientific society that finances the scientific journal, and resources from any support projects approved in public calls promoted by official bodies supporting Science and Technology.
BJRS does not charges for submission and offers immediate free access to its content.
BJRS is under ownership of Sociedade Brasileira de Proteção Radiológica (SBPR), Crossref Member, and assign/activate DOI numbers to every paper published on journal.
Check out SBPR Participation Report on Crossref.
The BJRS team constantly seeks to incorporate the practices recommended by Crossref for better distribution of its metadata.
A preprint is a paper that is made available publicly via a community preprint server prior to (or simultaneous with) submission to a journal. Preprint servers, i.e., servers that allow for the posting of papers prior to submission for publication, are becoming more common across a range of disciplines.
BJRS believes journals should allow for the submission of manuscripts which have already been made available on such a server. Allowing submission does not, of course, guarantee that an article will be sent out for review; it simply reflects a belief that availability on a preprint server should not be a disqualifier for submission.
BJRS will consider for review articles previously available as preprints. Authors are requested to update any pre-publication versions with a link to the final published article. Authors may also post the final published version of the article immediately after publication.
Authors who have published a work on the EmeRI preprint server must complete the Open Science Compliance Form and submit it through step 2 of the submission form.
BRJS adopts EmeRI preprint repository for manuscript preprint submissions.
Authors should not assign copyright during the preprint process; authors should retain copyright in their work when posting to a preprint server.
Preferably, authors should only grant “no re-use” licenses to their preprints. However, BJRS will consider for publication submissions that have previously been assigned CC-BY (-NC/-NC-ND) as preprints.
BJRS encourages researchers and academics who reference preprints (like other peer reviewed and non-peer reviewed sources) to continue to cite these sources accurately.
Researchers can search preprint servers that are easily found using scholarly search engines or that are recognized and well-established.
If a preprint is assigned a DOI, BJRS will assign a new DOI to the accepted article and can optionally link to the preprint. Note that the preprint publisher must link to the published article, per CrossRef: “[Posted content] consists of preprints, eprints, working papers, reports, dissertations, and many other types of content that has been posted but not formally published… Once a journal article (or book, conference paper, etc.) has been published from the posted content and a DOI has been assigned, the posted content publisher will update their metadata to associate the posted content with the DOI of the accepted manuscript (AM) or version of record (VOR).”
More details are available here.
The Brazilian Journal of Radiation Sciences (BJRS) and its Publisher, Brazilian Radiation Protection Society (SBPR) - are responsible for the conduct of their editors, for safeguarding the research record, and for ensuring the reliability of everything we publish.
Publication ethics is a crucial aspect of scientific publishing. The Brazilian Journal of Radiation Sciences has its own policies and procedures to ensure the integrity and credibility of the research we publish. But we try to follow the guidance of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), to whom we have already applied to join.
In July 2022, a COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics) working group agreed on ten new topics to replace the previous "Core Practices". These topics focused on crucial aspects of ethical publication.
Authors should take collective responsibility for submitted and published work and should accurately reflect individuals’ contributions.
BJRS recommends that authorship be based on four criteria: substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work, drafting or revising the work, final approval of the version to be published, and agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work.
There is also the specification system CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy) which is maintained by NISO - https://credit.niso.org/. CRediT defines 14 different authorship roles or functions, described as follows:
Regardless of contribution and registration system, all authors are equally responsible for the article.
BJRS requires that authors disclose any conflicts of interest that could influence their research.
Editors must declare any conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships with manuscript authors and their institutions and abstain from editorial responsibility for such manuscripts.
Declaration of any conflicts of interest with authors or their institutions is mandatory, and reviewers should abstain from reviewing such manuscripts.
Editors should guard the integrity of the published record by issuing corrections and retractions when needed and pursuing suspected or alleged research and publication misconduct.
Established protocols for dealing with allegations of research, publication, and review misconduct are in place, applicable both before and after publication.
Researchers should present their results clearly, honestly, and without fabrication, falsification or inappropriate data manipulation.
BJRS recommends that researchers share their data and make it available to others so that they can reproduce the results.
Peer review is defined as obtaining advice on manuscripts from reviewers/experts in the manuscript’s subject area.
Editors are accountable and should take responsibility for everything they publish and should make fair and unbiased decisions independent of commercial consideration and ensure a fair and appropriate peer review process.
Manuscripts under consideration should be reviewed by at least two expert reviewers, ensuring appropriate assessments, including statistical evaluation if necessary. Chief Editors are responsible for the final decision based on reviewer feedback and associate editor evaluation.
Manuscripts should be evaluated solely based on their content and relevance to the journal's scope, without considering the authors' origin and characteristics, such as gender, race, sexual orientation, religion, political stance, and institutional affiliation.
Researchers should adhere to publication requirements that submitted work is original, is not plagiarised, and has not been published elsewhere (duplicate publication). Editors and journal staff often use plagiarism detection software to scan articles. It compares submitted work against large databases of content. It can identify duplicate or improperly cited passages.
Self-plagiarism is when you republish or re-submit parts of your own papers or reports without properly citing your original work.
BJRS prioritize the well-being and safety of participants, emphasizing informed consent, minimizing radiation exposure, and respecting patient autonomy. Specific guidelines address radiation limits, participant eligibility, and researcher competence.
Editors should adopt editorial policies that encourage maximum transparency and complete, honest reporting.
Editorial independence must be ensured, so decisions on manuscript publication are not influenced by SBPR policies or any external entity outside the journal.
Journals should routinely evaluate their policies to ensure they do not create exclusionary environments and actively encourage broad engagement with their content.
Editors of BJRS must adhere to best editorial practices, prevent any form of scientific misconduct, and promote ethics in publication.
Editorial decisions should be based solely on scholarly merit, free from bias related to authors' nationality, ethnicity, political beliefs, race, or religion.
Confidentiality must be maintained for all information about submitted manuscripts, prohibiting disclosure to individuals not involved in the editorial process, and the use of unpublished manuscript information without explicit written authorization from the authors.
Editors and publishers are responsible for ensuring the integrity of the scholarly literature in BJRS and should ensure they outline its policies and procedures for handling such issues when they arise.
These issues include plagiarism, citation manipulation, and data falsification/fabrication, among others.
In the event that a journal’s editors or publisher are made aware of any allegation of research misconduct relating to a submitted or published article in their journal, the editor or publisher should follow COPE’s guidance (or equivalent) (https://cope.onl/guidance) in dealing with allegations 1. Editors’ Responsibilities
Ethical aspects of manuscripts, especially those involving human and animal research, must be verified to ensure compliance with research ethics requirements.
Editors must appropriately respond to any ethical concerns raised regarding a submitted or published manuscript. All suspicions of misconduct should be investigated following COPE guidelines, and, if necessary, the best form of literature correction – erratum, expression of concern, or retraction – should be adopted for published articles.
Publishers and editors are responsible for promoting accessibility, diversity, equity, and inclusivity in every aspect of the publication process.
The Journal also:
In addition, it is expected of authors, reviewers and editors that they follow the best-practice guidelines on ethical behaviour.
Editors evaluate submitted manuscripts exclusively on the basis of their academic merit (importance, originality, study’s validity, clarity) and its relevance to the journal’s scope, without regard to the authors’ race, gender, sexual orientation, ethnic origin, citizenship, religious belief, political philosophy or institutional affiliation. Decisions to edit and publish are not determined by the policies of governments or any other agencies outside of the journal itself. The Editor-in-Chief has full authority over the entire editorial content of the journal and the timing of publication of that content.
Editors and editorial staff will 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.
Editors and editorial board members will not use unpublished information disclosed in a submitted manuscript for their own research purposes without the authors’ explicit written consent. Privileged information or ideas obtained by editors as a result of handling the manuscript will be kept confidential and not used for their personal advantage. Editors will recuse themselves from considering manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships/connections with any of the authors, companies or institutions connected to the papers; instead, they will ask another member of the editorial board to handle the manuscript.
The editors ensure that all submitted manuscripts being considered for publication undergo peer-review by at least two reviewers who are expert in the field. The Editor-in-Chief is responsible for deciding which of the manuscripts submitted to the journal will be published, based on the validation of the work in question, its importance to researchers and readers, the reviewers’ comments, and such legal requirements as are currently in force regarding libel, copyright infringement and plagiarism. The Editor-in-Chief may confer with other editors or reviewers in making this decision.
Editors (in conjunction with the publisher and/or society) will take responsive measures when ethical concerns are raised with regard to a submitted manuscript or published paper. Every reported act of unethical publishing behaviour will be looked into, even if it is discovered years after publication. AP-SMART editors follow the COPE Flowcharts when dealing with cases of suspected misconduct. If, on investigation, the ethical concern is well-founded, a correction, retraction, expression of concern or other note as may be relevant, will be published in the journal.
Peer review assists editors in making editorial decisions and, through editorial communications with authors, may assist authors in improving their manuscripts. Peer review is an essential component of formal scholarly communication and lies at the heart of scientific endeavour. AP-SMART shares the view of many that all scholars who wish to contribute to the scientific process have an obligation to do a fair share of reviewing.
Any invited referee who feels unqualified to review the research reported in a manuscript or knows that its prompt review will be impossible should immediately notify the editors and decline the invitation to review so that alternative reviewers can be contacted.
Any manuscripts received for review are confidential documents and must be treated as such; they must not be shown to or discussed with others except if authorized by the Editor-in-Chief (who would only do so under exceptional and specific circumstances). This applies also to invited reviewers who decline the review invitation.
Reviews should be conducted objectively and observations formulated clearly with supporting arguments so that authors can use them for improving the manuscript. Personal criticism of the authors is inappropriate.
Reviewers should identify relevant published work that has not been cited by the authors. Any statement that is an observation, derivation or argument that has been reported in previous publications should be accompanied by the relevant citation. A reviewer should also notify the editors of any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other manuscript (published or unpublished) of which they have personal knowledge.
Any invited referee who has conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, companies or institutions connected to the manuscript and the work described therein should immediately notify the editors to declare their conflicts of interest and decline the invitation to review so that alternative reviewers can be contacted.
Unpublished material disclosed in a submitted manuscript must not be used in a reviewer’s own research without the express written consent of the authors. Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for the reviewer’s personal advantage. This applies also to invited reviewers who decline the review invitation.
Authors of original research should present an accurate account of the work performed and the results, followed by an objective discussion of the significance of the work. The manuscript should contain sufficient detail and references to permit others to replicate the work. Review articles should be accurate, objective and comprehensive, while editorial 'opinion' or perspective pieces should be clearly identified as such. Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute unethical behaviour and are unacceptable.
Authors may be asked to provide the raw data of their study together with the manuscript for editorial review and should be prepared to make the data publicly available if practicable. In any event, authors should ensure accessibility of such data to other competent professionals for at least 10 years after publication (preferably via an institutional or subject-based data repository or other data centre), provided that the confidentiality of the participants can be protected and legal rights concerning proprietary data do not preclude their release.
Authors should ensure that they have written and submit only entirely original works, and if they have used the work and/or words of others, that this has been appropriately cited. Publications that have been influential in determining the nature of the work reported in the manuscript should also be cited. Plagiarism takes many forms, from "passing off" another's paper as the author's own, to copying or paraphrasing substantial parts of another's paper (without attribution), to claiming results from research conducted by others. Plagiarism in all its forms constitutes unethical publishing behaviour and is unacceptable.
Papers describing essentially the same research should not be published in more than one journal or primary publication. Hence, authors should not submit for consideration a manuscript that has already been published in another journal. Submission of a manuscript concurrently to more than one journal is unethical publishing behaviour and unacceptable.
The publication of some kinds of articles (such as clinical guidelines, translations) in more than one journal is sometimes justifiable, provided that certain conditions are met. The authors and editors of the journals concerned must agree to the secondary publication, which must reflect the same data and interpretation of the primary document. The primary reference must be cited in the secondary publication.
Authors are fully responsible for the content of their manuscripts submitted for publication. This implies that they must ensure the accuracy, originality and ethical compliance of their work, as well as obtaining the necessary permissions for the use of copyrighted materials.
Only persons who meet these authorship criteria should be listed as authors in the manuscript as they must be able to take public responsibility for the content: (i) made significant contributions to the conception, design, execution, data acquisition, or analysis/interpretation of the study; and (ii) drafted the manuscript or revised it critically for important intellectual content; and (iii) have seen and approved the final version of the paper and agreed to its submission for publication. All persons who made substantial contributions to the work reported in the manuscript (such as technical help, writing and editing assistance, general support) but who do not meet the criteria for authorship must not be listed as an author, but should be acknowledged in the "Acknowledgements" section after their written permission to be named as been obtained. The corresponding author should ensure that all appropriate coauthors (according to the above definition) and no inappropriate coauthors are included in the author list and verify that all coauthors have seen and approved the final version of the manuscript and agreed to its submission for publication.
Authors should—at the earliest stage possible (generally by submitting a disclosure form at the time of submission and including a statement in the manuscript)—disclose any conflicts of interest that might be construed to influence the results or their interpretation in the manuscript. Examples of potential conflicts of interest that should be disclosed include financial ones such as honoraria, educational grants or other funding, participation in speakers’ bureaus, membership, employment, consultancies, stock ownership, or other equity interest, and paid expert testimony or patent-licensing arrangements, as well as non-financial ones such as personal or professional relationships, affiliations, knowledge or beliefs in the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript. All sources of financial support for the work should be disclosed (including the grant number or other reference number if any).
Authors should ensure that they have properly acknowledged the work of others, and should also cite publications that have been influential in determining the nature of the reported work. Information obtained privately (from conversation, correspondence or discussion with third parties) must not be used or reported without explicit, written permission from the source. Authors should not use information obtained in the course of providing confidential services, such as refereeing manuscripts or grant applications, unless they have obtained the explicit written permission of the author(s) of the work involved in these services.
If the work involves chemicals, procedures or equipment that have any unusual hazards inherent in their use, the authors must clearly identify these in the manuscript. If the work involves the use of animals or human participants, the authors should ensure that all procedures were performed in compliance with relevant laws and institutional guidelines and that the appropriate institutional committee(s) has approved them; the manuscript should contain a statement to this effect. Authors should also include a statement in the manuscript that informed consent was obtained for experimentation with human participants. The privacy rights of human participants must always be observed.
Authors are obliged to participate in the peer review process and cooperate fully by responding promptly to editors’ requests for raw data, clarifications, and proof of ethics approval, patient consents and copyright permissions. In the case of a first decision of "revisions necessary", authors should respond to the reviewers’ comments systematically, point by point, and in a timely manner, revising and re-submitting their manuscript to the journal by the deadline given.
When authors discover significant errors or inaccuracies in their own published work, it is their obligation to promptly notify the journal’s editors or publisher and cooperate with them to either correct the paper in the form of an erratum or to retract the paper. If the editors or publisher learns from a third party that a published work contains a significant error or inaccuracy, then it is the authors’ obligation to promptly correct or retract the paper or provide evidence to the journal editors of the correctness of the paper.
In cases of alleged or proven scientific misconduct, fraudulent publication or plagiarism, the publisher, in close collaboration with the editors, will take all appropriate measures to clarify the situation and to amend the article in question. This includes the prompt publication of an erratum, clarification or, in the most severe case, the retraction of the affected work. The publisher, together with the editors, shall take reasonable steps to identify and prevent the publication of papers where research misconduct has occurred, and under no circumstances encourage such misconduct or knowingly allow such misconduct to take place.
The publisher is committed to the permanent availability and preservation of scholarly research and ensures accessibility by partnering with organizations and maintaining our own digital archive.
Crossmark is an initiative to provide a standard way for readers to locate the current version of a piece of content. By applying the Crossmark button, Brazilian Journal of Radiation Science is committing to maintaining the content it publishes, and to alerting readers to changes if and when they occur.
Clicking on the Crossmark button will tell you the current status of a document, and may also give you additional publication record information about the document.
Brazilian Journal of Radiation Science is committed to uphold the integrity of the literature and publishes Errata, Expressions of Concerns or Retraction Notices dependent on the situation and in accordance with the COPE Retraction Guidelines. In all cases, these notices are linked to the original article.
More information on Brazilian Journal of Radiation Science’s guidelines can be found here. Information on COPE Retraction Guidelines can be found here: Retraction Guidelines.
Scientific integrity as well as the peer-review process is the heart of scholarly publishing. As a part of our commitment to protect the integrity of scholarly publications, we take the necessary steps in all aspects of publishing ethics. Plagiarism takes many forms, from intentionally passing off someone else’s work as your own to unintentional paraphrasing someone else’s work without proper attribution. Does not matter in which form or to what extent, plagiarism always constitutes unethical behavior and is unacceptable in academic publishing.
Plagiarized articles are not allowed in BJRS. Even though plagiarism is a serious issue but it’s very easy to avoid by giving proper acknowledgment to the work of others. Before submitting the manuscript to BJRS, the authors should ensure that they have written original works. In the case where authors have used someone else’s or own previously published work/words, that should be properly attributed through appropriate citation. The author shall remember to not use information obtained privately without explicit, written permission from the source; for instance, the knowledge gained through peer-reviewing of other’s work or through third party discussion.
BJRS is using iThenticate plagiarism software provided by CrossRef Similarity Check for the initial plagiarism detection but still if later on any article is found to be plagiarized then appropriate action will be taken as per our ethical policy and that article might get retracted. Overall similarity index of the manuscript should not be more than 15% for research articles and 20% for review articles with a limitation of less than 3% similarity from any individual source.
Similarity Check is a multi-publisher initiative to screen published and submitted content for originality. BJRS uses the iThenticate software to detect instances of overlapping and similar text in submitted manuscripts which compare content against its database of periodicals, the Internet, as well as other wide-range databases of articles. BJRS is committed to actively combating plagiarism and publishing original research.
The policies and guidelines provided here are in place to protect the quality and integrity of forms of scholarly practice and research, as well as the reputations of the publications produced by BJRS.
Conflict of interest - COI has been defined as a set of conditions in which professional judgment concerning a primary interest (such as validity of research) can be influenced by a secondary interest (such as financial gain).
If a guest editor, associate editor, or reviewer believes that his/her relationship to an author, if known, or the subject matter of an article, may constitute a conflict of interest for any reason, this must be disclosed to the journal editor.
COI exists when a participant in the publication process (author, peer reviewer, or editor) has a competing interest that could unduly influence (or be reasonably seen to do so) his or her responsibilities in the publication process. Among those responsibilities are academic honesty, unbiased conduct and reporting of research, and integrity of decisions or judgments. The publication process includes the submission of manuscripts, peer review, editorial decisions, and communication between authors, reviewers and editors.
Many kinds of competing interests are possible. Journals often have policies for managing financial COI, mostly based on the untested assumption that financial ties have an especially powerful influence over publication decisions and may not be apparent unless they are made explicit. However, other competing interests can be just as damaging, and just as hidden to most participants, and so must also be managed. The following are examples of competing interests; they do not include all possibilities and they may coexist.
Conflicts of Interest are ubiquitous and cannot be completely eliminated from the editorial and/or authoring process. However, they can be managed constructively so that they exert as little intrusion as possible on the journal, its content and its credibility. All statements about COI by the author are requested in writing - in the notes to editor field - as a condition for analyzing a manuscript, so that authors will have a high probability of reporting possible conflicts of interest related to the manuscript, if there is.
Any conflict of interest will be handled based on flowcharts used by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). Charts can be downloaded and accessed from the link (http://publicationethics.org/resources/flowcharts).
If any or all types of Conflict of Interest (mentioned above) are detected (a priori, during the peer review process or after publication) in any text evaluated or approved, the manuscript will be suspended until the conflict of interest is resolved.
Articles must be writen in English with a maximum of 20 pages and submitted preferrabley in MS Word format or any other compatible text editor. We recommend using the template supplied here when preparing the article.
All elements formatting (article title, abstract, authors, affiliation, paragraphs, titles, long citation, references, etc) are described on MS Word Template. Author can use pre-formatted styles from MS Word Quick gallery.
Papers will be presented according to the following sequential organization:
The citations should follow the ABNT norms. See examples.
Any acknowledgments must have a header and be placed in their own section.
If any of the authors have any competing interests, then these must be declared. Information about competing interests can be found here. If there are no COI to declare, then the following statement must appear in this section:
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
If there are competing interests to declare, complete the following statement:
The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests: [LIST HERE].
Authors are required to declare what support they received to carry out their research. Declaring funding sources acknowledges funders' contributions, fulfills funding requirements, and promotes greater transparency in the research process. Please inform the funding agency and the funding award number.
The References at the end of the text must also comply with ABNT norms. We strongly recommend that authors cite and discuss a fair representation of relevant work by members of under-represented groups. Note that we do not place a limit on the number of references in research articles, so you are free to include whatever references and citations you think are relevant. All and only the works of authors cited in the text should appear in the References, which are typed in simple spacing between lines, separated by a simple space, and organized in alphabetical order by the surname of the first author. Whenever there are any, the authors should inform URLs and DOIs of the references used.
If a manuscripts submitted to BJRS has been previously deposited in the EmeRI preprint repository, authors must inform its link on “Comments fo the Editor” (1st step of submission form).
Preprint manuscript submissions must fill the Open Science Compliance Form.
As part of the submission process, authors are required to check off their submission's compliance with all of the following items, and submissions may be returned to authors that do not adhere to these guidelines.
The author(s) must register (Login/Password) on the BJRS’s website and correctly complete their profiles. After performing these steps, they should go to "New Submission" button, on OJS Dashboard, and start the submission process, in which they will perform the five basic steps:
After completing the four steps described above, the author(s) must wait for the Editor's email. These are the following steps:
Peer review is an essential part of the publication process and it ensures that BJRS maintains the highest quality standards for its published papers. All manuscripts submitted to our journals are strictly and thoroughly peer-reviewed by experts.
Immediately after submission, the journal’s Managing Editor will perform a technical pre-check of the manuscript. A suitable academic editor will be notified of the submission and invited to perform an editorial pre-check and recommend reviewers. Academic editors can decide to continue with the peer review process, reject a manuscript, or request revisions before peer-review. In the case of continuing the peer review process, the Editorial Office will organize the peer review, which is performed by independent experts, and collect at least two review reports per manuscript. We ask authors for sufficient revisions (with a second round of peer review, when necessary) before a final decision is made.
The final decision is made by an academic editor (usually the Editor-in-Chief/Editorial Board Member of a journal or the Guest Editor of a Special Issue). Accepted manuscripts are then copy-edited and English-edited internally.
The role of the reviewer is vital and bears a great responsibility in ensuring the integrity of the scholarly record. Every reviewer is expected to perform manuscript evaluation in a timely, transparent, and ethical manner, following the COPE guidelines for peer reviewers.
Reviewers should meet the following criteria:
BJRS strives for a rigorous peer review to ensure a thorough evaluation of each manuscript—this is a fundamental task for our reviewers. Reviewers who accept to review a manuscript are expected to:
Manuscripts submitted to BJRS are reviewed by at least two experts, who can be volunteer reviewers, members of the Editorial Board or reviewers suggested by the academic editor during the preliminary check. Reviewers are asked to evaluate the quality of the manuscript and to provide a recommendation to the external editor on whether a manuscript should be accepted, requires revisions, or should be rejected.
We ask invited reviewers to:
At this stage, you receive a review request by email which contains links to the journal website and to the submission. The request is displayed in your Dashboard, with due dates to accept or decline the request and due dates to submit your review if you were to accept it.
We ask reviewers to declare any potential conflicts of interest and email the journal Editorial Office if they are unsure if something constitutes a potential conflict of interest. Possible conflicts of interest include (but are not limited to):
Reviewers should disclose any conflicts of interest that may be perceived as bias for or against the paper or authors.
Please kindly note that if reviewers are asked to assess a manuscript they previously reviewed for another journal, this is not considered to be a conflict of interest. In this case, reviewers should feel free to let the Editorial Office know if the manuscript has been improved or not compared to the previous version.
Reviewers are also recommended to read the relevant descriptions in the Ethical Guidelines For Peer Reviewers by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).
BJRS operate double-blind or open peer review.
Until the article is published, reviewers should keep the content of the manuscript, including the Abstract, confidential. Reviewers should also be careful not to reveal their identity to the authors, either in their comments or in metadata for reports submitted in Microsoft Word or PDF format. Reviewers must inform the Editorial Office if they would like a colleague to complete the review on their behalf.
BJRS offer the possibility for authors to publish review reports together with their paper (Open Review) and for reviewers to sign their open review reports once “Open Review” is requested by the authors. However, this will only be done at publication with the reviewer’s permission. In all other cases, review reports are considered confidential and will only be disclosed with the explicit permission of the reviewer.
If you accept, you must treat the materials you receive as confidential documents. This means you can’t share them with anyone without prior authorization from the editor. Since peer review is confidential, you also must not share information about the review with anyone without permission from the editors and authors.
We have listed some general instructions regarding the review report for your consideration below.
To begin with, please consider the following guidelines:
When you sit down to write the review, make sure you familiarize yourself with the journal guidelines which is available at the BJRS Policies page.
First read the article. You might consider spot checking major issues by choosing which section to read first. Below we offer some tips about handling specific parts of the paper.
Your review will help the editor decide whether or not to publish the article. It will also aid the author and allow them to improve their manuscript. Giving your overall opinion and general observations of the article is essential. Your comments should be courteous and constructive and should not include any remarks or personal details including your name. Providing insight into any deficiencies is important. You should explain and support your judgement so that both editors and authors are able to fully understand the reasoning behind your comments. You should indicate whether your comments are your own opinion or are reflected by the data and evidence.
If the manuscript you are reviewing is reporting an experiment, check the methods section first. The following cases are considered major flaws and should be flagged:
For analytical papers examine the sampling report, which is mandated in time-dependent studies. For qualitative research make sure that a systematic data analysis is presented and sufficient descriptive elements with relevant quotes from interviews are listed in addition to the author’s narrative.
Once you are satisfied that the methodology is sufficiently robust, examine any data in the form of figures, tables, or images. Authors may add research data, including data visualizations, to their submission to enable readers to interact and engage more closely with their research after publication. Critical issues in research data, which are considered to be major flaws can be related to insufficient data points, statistically non-significant variations and unclear data tables.
Experiments including patient or animal data should properly be documented. Most journals require ethical approval by the author’s host organization. Please check journal-specific guidelines for such cases (available from the journal’s homepage).
If you don’t spot any major flaws, consider the article from your own perspective. When you sit down to write the review, again make sure you familiarize yourself with journal guidelines.
The editor ultimately decides whether to accept or reject the article. The editor will weigh all views and may call for another opinion or ask the author for a revised paper before making a decision. The submission system provides reviewers with a notification of the final decision.
Do not forget that, even after finalizing your review, you must treat the article and any linked files or data as confidential documents. This means you must not share them or information about the review with anyone without prior authorization from the editor.
Finally, we take the opportunity to thank you sincerely on behalf of the journal, editors and author(s) for the time you have taken to give your valuable input to the article.
General questions to help guide your review:
Respond to the invitation as soon as you can (even if it is to decline) – a delay in your decision slows down the review process and means more waiting for the author. If you do decline the invitation, it would be helpful if you could provide suggestions for alternative reviewers.
The content of your review report will be rated by an Academic Editor from a scientific point of view as well as general usefulness to the improvement of the manuscript.
For further guidance on writing a critical review, please refer to the following documents:
Reviewers must login on the BJRS’s website to proceed with the review. Review process will present four basic steps:
Bear in mind that there will be the opportunity to direct separate comments to both the editor and author. Once you are ready to submit your report, follow the instructions in the email or contact the editor directly in case of any difficulties.
Brazilian Journal of Radiation Sciences - ISSN 2319-0612
Maintained by 
Brazilian Radiation Protection Society (Sociedade Brasileira de Proteção Radiológica - SBPR https://ror.org/01brr522), a scientific society affiliated to the Brazilian Association of Scientific Editors (ABEC). and to the Brazilian Society for the Advancement of Science (Sociedade Brasileira para o Progresso da Ciência − SBPC), a organization that focuses on defending scientific and technological advancement, as well as educational and cultural development in Brazil.
SBPR is an independent non-profit association, also affiliated to the International Radiation Protection Association, the global voice of the radiation protection professionals, and to the FRALC, the Latin American and Caribbean Federation of Radiation Protection Societies.
All journal content is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
