Announcements

Academic editors play a crucial role in leading our journals and ensuring that each article undergoes a robust and timely peer-review. With the launch of Topics this year and addition of Topic Editors to our family of academic editors, we decided it would be a good time to restructure our academic boards, thus providing more clarity and support for each role. MDPI is pleased to announce the launch of a new position—Topical Advisory Panel Member, that will replace the previous position of Topics Board Member. The Topical Advisory Panel will be comprised of early career researchers eager to gain experience in editorial work.

The main responsibility of the new members of the Topical Advisory Panel is to regularly provide support to Guest Editors, Topic Editors, and Section Board Members. The responsibilities of the Topical Advisory Panel are available here: https://www.mdpi.com/editors.

Each year, the members’ performances are evaluated, and outstanding members are promoted to the Editorial Board by the Editor-in-Chief.

To qualify as a Topical Advisory Panel Member, applicants must:

• Have expertise and experience in the field related to the journal;
• Have received a Ph.D. in the last 10 years, approximately;
• Have at least 6-8 published papers in the last 5 years as first author or corresponding author;
• Currently hold an independent research position in academia or a government institute.

If you are interested in this role, please contact the editorial office by email.

We look forward to hearing from you soon.

Founded in 1996, MDPI was one of the first fully Open Access publisher. Over 25 years MDPI has grown to become the largest Open Access publisher globally, publishing over 160,000 articles across more than 350 journals in 2020. At the core, MDPI was founded in response to a pressing need of fast publication and inclusion. The scholar was set at the centre of the publication process for the first time. Acting as a service provider, rather than a product provider, MDPI exists to help scientists achive their objective to disseminate research results. At MDPI, we believe scientists deserve a better service from the publishing world.

The International Open Access Week (Open Access Week), founded by the SPARC (the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition) Alliance and student partners in 2008, has been successfully running for 13 years. As an advocate and pioneer of open access publishing, MDPI actively responds to the call of International Open Access Week. This year’s theme of “It Matters How We Open Knowledge: Building Structural Equity” highlights the Recommendation’s call for equitable participation from all authors and readers.

For the last 25 years, MDPI has been committed to disseminating open research. Here is a video showing MDPI’s Commitment to Equity, Inclusion and Diversity for More than 25 Years.

International Open Access Week is an important opportunity to catalyze new conversations, create connections across and between communities that can facilitate this co-design, and advance progress in the building of more equitable foundations for opening knowledge—discussions and actions that need to be continued, year in and year out. MDPI has always aimed to provide professional and efficient publishing services to scholars around the world.

Our mission is to make scientific research accessible to everyone; this year, we interview and hold discussions with open science ambassadors on how to build an equal and inclusive environment for open science. Academic editors help us collaborate with more institutions to advocate for open access ideas.

Read our anniversary blog post: "Sharing 'Collective Human Knowledge': The Benefits of Open Access Publication"

Besides this, our scientific community is a key driver of our success and MDPI’s remarkable growth. Despite the pandemic, we have prepared online conferences and workshops to gather scholars from different communities.

The Basel Sustainable Publishing online forum provides an equal opportunity for stakeholders and researchers from multi-cultural environments to exchange ideas and eliminate barriers to participation.

Conference date: 25 October 2021, online
Conference website: https://bspf2021.sciforum.net/
Main topics: MDPI discusses the current dilemma of open access science from various perspectives such as governments, libraries, and publishers, and related measures on how to change the status quo of discrimination from a global perspective.

We aim to support equality, inclusion, diversity, and accessibility in scholarly communications. We collaborate with universities and key laboratories and have scholarly communications with researchers, teachers, and students on open access workshops.

• 25 October 2021
  Energies journal and Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences

• 28 October 2021
  Machines journal and State Key Laboratory of Traction Power, Southwest Jiaotong University

• 29 October 2021
  Processes journal and Beijing Institute of Technology

• 29 October 2021
  Coatings journal and Wuhan University of Technology

MDPI is committed to providing open access and high-quality publishing services for scholars and promoting rapid dissemination of academic achievements. We hope to promote the practices and policies of open access publishing and diversify the dissemination of academic achievements.

Rigorous peer-review is the cornerstone of high-quality academic publishing. Over 369,916 scholars served as reviewers for MDPI journals in 2020. We are extremely appreciative of all those who made a contribution to the editorial process in this capacity. At the beginning of every year, journal editorial offices publish a list of all reviewers’ names to express our gratitude. In addition, this year, the MDPI Top Reviewer Award was announced, to recognize the very best reviewers for their expertise and dedication, and their high-quality, and timely review reports. We are pleased to announce the following winners of the 2020 MDPI Top Reviewer Award:

• Adriana Burlea-Schiopoiu;
• Alban Kuriqi;
• Álvaro González-Vila;
• Alessandro Alaimo;
• Alexey Beskopylny;
• Alexander Yu Churyumov;
• Alberto Fernández-Isabel;
• Andrea Mastinu;
• Antonios N. Papadopoulos;
• Anton Rassõlkin;
• Antonio Humberto Hamad Minervino;
• Arkadiusz Matwijczuk;
• Artur Słomka;
• Baojie He;
• Bartłomiej Potaniec;
• Bojan Đurin;
• Camilo Arturo Rodriguez Diaz;
• Carmelo Maria Musarella;
• Chiachung Chen;
• Chiman Kwan;
• Cristian Busu;
• Danil Pimenov;
• Dan-Cristian Dabija;
• Delfín Ortega-Sánchez;
• Demetrio Antonio Zema;
• Denis Butusov;
• Elena Lucchi;
• Gaurab Dutta;
• Livia Anastasiu;
• M. R. Safaei.

For more information about how to become a reviewer of MDPI journals, please see: www.mdpi.com/reviewers.

UN's 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are the blueprint to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all. In 2020 the SDG Publishers Compact was launched, aimed to inspire publishers and accelerate progress to achieve the 17 goals by 2030. Members of the programme are committed to support the publication of materials that will promote and inspire actions towards SDGs.

MDPI is an eager advocate of SDGs and has already been supporting the programme by creating Special Issues and publishing a series of books on SDGs prior to joining the Compact in 2021. MDPI's Sustainability Foundation initiated the World Sustainability Awards in 2016. We fully support UN's goals to promote sustainable actions that make the world a better place for all and, as part of its commitment, we will focus our actions on SDG10: Reduced Inequalities whilst promoting all 17 SDGs. For more details, please visit the programme’s website: https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/sdg-publishers-compact/.

Joining this initiative was a unanimous decision. MDPI has in its core values the dissemination of science for all, breaking the wall between research access and under-represented members of the scientific community and the general population. To support this initiative further and continue to support under-represented scientists, MDPI will take a series of actions that will be announced once ready.

The first action MDPI takes is to nominate Dr. Liliane Auwerter as the coordinator of the programme. Dr. Auwerter studied Environmental Process Technology (UTFPR, Brazil), obtained her MSc degree in Water and Environmental Engineering (University of Surrey, UK) and in 2020 completed her PhD in self-healing low-friction materials for water transport (Imperial College London, UK), always focusing on diverse scientific projects that would potentially bring sustainability to industrial processes. As a student in Brazil, she engaged in volunteering activities focused on environmental education and took part in the Millennial Development Goals meetings held at the university.

For more information, please contact:
Dr. Liliane Auwerter
Scientific Officer
liliane.auwerter@mdpi.com

We are pleased to announce that Prof. Dr. Ignatios Antoniadis has been appointed Editor-in-Chief of Astronomy (ISSN 2674-0346).

	Name:	Ignatios Antoniadis
	Academic title:	Prof. Dr.
	Affiliation:	Laboratoire de Physique Théorique et Hautes Énergies - LPTHE, Sorbonne Université, CNRS, 4 Place Jussieu, 75005 Paris, France
	Homepage:	http://string.lpthe.jussieu.fr/members.pl?key=840
	Research fields:	quantum field theory; particle physics phenomenology; quantum gravity; cosmology; string theory
Education
1983	Doctorat d’Etat, école Polytechnique, Paris, France (EP)
1980	Ph.D., école Normale Supérieure, Paris, France
1978	DEA de Physique Théorique, Paris, France
1977	B.Sc. Mathematics, National Kapodistrian University of Athens
Employment record—Academic positions:
2021	International Franqui Chair, KU Leuven-ULB-VUB, Belgium (6 months)
2014–2020	Senior Scientist, Institute for Theoretical Physics, AEC, Bern University
2015–now	Directeur de Recherche class 1 of CNRS, France
2009–2015	In charge of the joint Master EP-ETHZ on High Energy Physics
2000–2014	Senior Staff Member of CERN, Geneva, Switzerland
1997–2009	Professeur chargé des cours of the école Polytechnique, France (part time)
1996–1997	Scientific Associate, CERN, Geneva, Switzerland
1992–2015	Directeur de Recherche class 2 of CNRS, France
1986–1988	Fellow of CERN, Geneva, Switzerland
1986–1992	Chargé de Recherche of CNRS, France
1983–1986	Research Associate of SLAC Stanford, California, USA
1982–1986	Attaché de Recherche of CNRS, école Polytechnique, France
Employment record—Administrative positions:
2020	Evaluator of EU Marie-Curie programs
2019	Evaluation committee HCERES of IHES, Bures-sur-Yvette, France
2015	Evaluation committee of NORDITA, Stockholm
2014–now	Scientific Council of the ICTP-ECAR institute, Izmir, Turkey
2013–2018	Scientific Advisory Committee of APPEC (Astroparticle physics European consortium)
2013–2016	Board of Trustees of National Technical University of Athens
2013	President of the evaluation committee AERES of UPMC (University Paris 6)
2013	President of the search committee for the director of INPP institute of Demokritos
2011–2014	Head of the CERN Theory Unit and deputy of the Physics Department
2011–2013	Evaluation committee of the ARISTEIA grants of Excellence, Greece
2010–2013	Organizer of the CERN Colloquium
2007–2009	Senior jury of the Institut Universitaire de France
2005–now	Evaluation committees for the selection and promotion of professors, Greece
2003–now	Expert of grant evaluations for NSF (US), ANR (France), STFC (UK), JSPS (Japan), Italy, etc
1999–now	Member of Physics panels for EU actions (networks and ERC grants)
Academic Awards
2008	European Research Council (ERC) Advanced Award of the EU.
2002	Prix Special of the Société Française de Physique
2000	Médaille d’Argent of the CNRS, France
1995	“Honoris Causa” of the University of Ioannina, Greece
1995	Particle Physics Award of the Bodosaki Foundation

The following is a short Q&A with Prof. Dr. Ignatios Antoniadis:

1. What appealed to you about the journal that made you want to take the role as its Editor-in-Chief?

I have known already other journals of MDPI (as part of the editorial board of Universe and Symmetry) and was attracted by the idea of setting up a new one. 

2. What is your vision for the journal?

The main goals should be the scientific excellence from the members of the editorial board, the quality of publications and the referee procedure, so that it receives an excellent reputation within the scientific community of its research field. 

3. What does the future of this field of research look like?

Astronomy from cosmology to astrophysics is a fascinating research field with recent breakthrough achievements and bright future in observations and in theories. 

4. What do you think of the development of Open Access in the publishing field?

The concept is good and consistent with the principles of science, but I am skeptical of the way it is implemented. The cost of libraries in scientific institutions and universities is replaced by the participation to open access groups of journals, while many more are outside and apply a dual policy: imposing fees to authors or publishing without open access. This is not a healthy situation and it is becoming worse with the multiplication of journals.

This serves to announce to our valued authors based in Japan that value-added tax, or consumption tax will now be imposed on article processing fees and other service fees for all papers submitted, or resubmitted (assigned new paper IDs), effective from 15 August 2021. The change is in accordance with the Japanese "Act for Partial Revision of the Income Tax Act and Other Acts" (Act No. 9 of 2015), which includes a revision of consumption taxation on cross-border supplies of services such as digital content distribution.

For additional information from the National Tax Agency please see here ("Cross-border supplies of electronic services").

Contact: Setsuko Nishihara, MDPI Tokyo