About the Journal

Updated in July/2025

Brief Background

The journal “Polímeros: Ciência e Tecnologia”, referred in short as Polímeros, is a technical-scientific publication of the Brazilian Polymer Association (ABPol), established in 1988 with the aim of promoting and disseminating knowledge in the field of polymers. It was officially launched as a scientific journal in 1991, with a bimonthly frequency and an initial print run of 3,000 copies. The first issue was distributed at the 1st Brazilian Polymer Congress (1CBPol, Dec/1991), an event that would become a significant milestone in the consolidation of the technical-scientific community in the polymer field in Brazil.
Polímeros has evolved significantly over the years, keeping pace with transformations in the scientific and editorial environment. In 2015, it became a 100% online publication, ceasing its print version and adopting the XML format. From 2018 onwards, it has published exclusively in English, strengthening its internationalisation. It currently maintains a quarterly frequency, with continuous publication of articles, and is part of the SciELO Brazil Collection, ensuring effective dissemination of its scientific content. In 2024, after 34 years of activity, Polímeros achieved an impact factor (IF) of 1.4, establishing itself as one of the leading scientific journals in the field of polymers in Brazil and with growing international recognition. It has consistently received financial support from CAPES/CNPq annually through their Editorial Support Calls.

Mission

The mission of Polímeros is to disseminate scientific knowledge in the academic and technological world in the field of polymers, promoting the integration between academic research and industrial applications. The journal aims to publicise relevant advances of the scientific, technological, and corporative communities worldwide, contributing to the development and visibility of polymer science.

Open Science Compliance

Our editorial policy follows the research communication in the open science modus operandi, according to the single-blind peer review model, where authors do not have access to the identities of the reviewers, but the reviewers do know the names of the authors.

Ethics in Publication

Polímeros supports the principles of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and adopts best editorial practices to ensure scientific integrity and the quality of the content published.

The Editorial Board is responsible for assessing ethical conduct, including, but not limited to: authorship and contributions, conflicts of interest, plagiarism, duplicate publication, and data manipulation.

Research involving humans, animals, or sensitive materials must always indicate, where applicable, compliance with recognised ethical standards. The Editorial Board reserves the right to request proof or clarification whenever necessary.

Cases of scientific misconduct may result in corrections, retractions, manuscript rejection, or other appropriate editorial measures.

Focus and Scope

Polímeros is a technical-scientific journal, published by the Brazilian Polymer Association (ABPol), which is open access, peer-reviewed, and publishing original articles, review articles, and short communications in the field of polymer science and technology.
The journal covers a wide range of topics related to the synthesis, characterization, processing, properties, recycling, and applications of polymeric materials. Contributions that advance the academic, industrial, and technological development of the polymer sector are welcomed.
The scope includes, but is not limited to:

Polymer chemistry and physics
Polymer processing and engineering
Nanocomposites and functional polymers
Biopolymers and biodegradable materials
Polymer blends, mixtures, and composites
Polymer recycling and sustainability
Applications in packaging, automotive, biomedical, and electronics sectors
Market trends and innovation in polymers

The journal encourages contributions from researchers both from Brazil and abroad, valuing interdisciplinary approaches that integrate fundamental research with practical applications.

Digital Preservation

This journal follows the standards defined in the programme of the SciELO Program Digital Preservation Policy.

Indexing Sources

Bibliographic Journal Information

Journal title: Polímeros
Abbreviated title: Polímeros
Published by: Brazilian Polymer Association – ABPol
Frequency: Quarterly
Publication model: Continuous Publication
Year of establishment: 1991
ISSN: 0104-1428 (Printed)
EISSN: 1678-5169 (Electronic)

Websites and Social Media

EDITORIAL POLICY

Preprints¹

Polímeros accepts the submission of manuscripts that have been previously made available as preprints, provided they include the following statement in the body of the text:

"Part of this article was published as a preprint at <link>."

Preprints deposited in the following servers are accepted: SciELO Preprints, arXiv, bioRxiv, and medRxiv. The acceptance of preprints hosted on other servers is subject to evaluation by the journal’s editors.

_{¹ A preprint is defined as a manuscript ready for submission to a journal and deposited on trusted preprint servers prior to or concurrently with journal submission. This practice, along with continuous publication, serves as a mechanism to accelerate research communication. Preprints share with journals the originality of article publication, and their use is at the authors’ discretion. The choice of which preprint server to use should be made from among those recognised and accepted by the journal.}

Peer Review Process

All manuscripts submitted to Polímeros must strictly follow the journal’s guidelines, available on its website. Submissions that do not comply with the guidelines will be returned to the authors for correction/adjustment. This verification is carried out by the Editorial Assistant of Polímeros, who will assist the corresponding author in preparing the manuscript in the required format. Up to this stage, no technical evaluation is performed, only formatting is reviewed.

At the time of submission, authors must indicate three potential reviewers, providing full name, email address, and institutional affiliation. Suggested reviewers must not have any current professional connection with the authors, belong to the same institution, or have co-authored publications with the authors in the last two years.

Initially, manuscripts are evaluated by the Editorial Board (Editor-in-Chief and Associate Editor, responsible for overseeing the review process). Then, 2–3 Ad Hoc reviewers, specialists in the manuscript’s technical area, are invited to comment on the article. The journal adopts a single-blind peer review model, in which the authors do not have access to the identity of the reviewers.

Based on the reviewers’ comments, the Editorial Board makes one of the following decisions: 1) Accept the manuscript directly (without revisions), 2) Request minor changes/adjustments to the text, 3) Request major changes/additions/removals to the text, or 4) Reject the manuscript.

In the first case, the manuscript is accepted and immediately sent for final formatting and publication. In the last case, the manuscript is rejected and returned to the authors. There is no appeal for this decision. In cases 2 and 3, a new version of the manuscript is requested, called Revised Version R1, in which the authors must address all items required by the Editorial Board and those listed by the Ad Hoc reviewers. Authors must prepare a “Response to Reviewers” letter, replying individually and in detail to each comment received. It must be clear, indicating the page and paragraph where the changes were made. To facilitate verification, all changes in the manuscript must be highlighted in yellow. If authors disagree with any comment/suggestion, they must provide a scientifically supported justification for not accepting it.

Based on the Response to Reviewers letter and the revised manuscript, the Editorial Board assesses whether the corrections have been made and decides on the manuscript’s suitability for publication. This decision is based on its technical quality and relevance to the advancement of the Polymer field, as evaluated by the Ad Hoc reviewers. If necessary, the full file is sent to the Ad Hoc reviewers for reanalysis and acceptance (or not). A second or more revised versions (R2, R3, etc.) may be requested by the Editorial Board until a final decision (acceptance or rejection) is reached.

The name of the Editor-in-Chief or Associate Editor responsible for the evaluation is included at the end of the published article.

Open Data²

Polímeros adopts an Open Data policy, encouraging the sharing of data, codes, methods, and other materials used or generated in scientific research. We suggest the use of the multidisciplinary research data repository linked to SciELO articles. It allows access to data types such as: Open / Restricted / Embargoed

https://data.scielo.org/

At the time of manuscript submission, authors choose how the data used in the research will be made available in the section called “Data Availability”. They must state whether the data are available, where they are stored, and how they can be accessed. This section, published on the first page of the final article, includes the following options:

All data supporting the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon request.
All data supporting the findings of this study are available at [repository name] – [URL or DOI].
All data supporting the findings of this study are included in this article and its supplementary materials.

_{² Guidelines for research data citation (Portuguese only).

List of repositories for research data deposit (Portuguese only)}

Fees

Polímeros charges a fixed fee per approved article for publication, called the Article Publication Charge (APC). The fee is R$ 800.00 (eight hundred Brazilian reais) for corresponding authors based in Brazil or US$ 230.00 (two hundred and thirty American dollars) for corresponding authors based outside Brazil, regardless of the article’s length. Upon submitting the manuscript, the corresponding author must confirm awareness and acceptance of this fee should the article be accepted for publication.

Payment methods:

Foreign authors must make payments exclusively by credit card via PayPal.
Brazilian authors and ABPol members must pay in reais and may use Pix, bank transfer, deposit, or boleto; credit card payments must be made via PagSeguro.

Exemptions and discounts:

Review articles: Their publication is free; no charge is applied.
10% discount to active ABPol members who are corresponding authors of approved articles.
Articles partially presented at recent scientific congresses, having prior publication agreement signed with ABPol, please check if is there any discount available.
There is no charge for manuscript submission or evaluation.

Ethics and Misconduct, Correction and Retraction Policy³

Polímeros values the integrity of scientific output and adopts good editorial practices in addressing potential ethical misconduct, following international guidelines such as those of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and national guidelines such as the Guide to Good Practices for Strengthening Ethics in Scientific Publishing.

Cases of misconduct involving plagiarism, data manipulation, improper authorship, redundant publication, or other behaviours that compromise scientific credibility will be reviewed by the Editorial Committee, which will request clarifications and/or supporting evidence from the authors.

The journal adopts the following policies for managing published content:

Corrections: If relevant errors are identified after publication, a properly marked correction will be issued, linked to the original article, and published transparently.
Retractions: When serious errors or misconduct are identified that invalidate the results or compromise the integrity of the article, the journal will publish a retraction, in accordance with the Guide for the registration, labelling, and publication of Retractions.
Addenda: Relevant supplementary information that does not affect the article’s validity may be published as an addendum, following the Guide for the registration, labelling, and publication of Addenda.

All editorial notices (corrections, retractions, and addenda) will be clearly identified with date, authorship, and direct linkage to the original article, in order to ensure transparency and traceability of the scientific record.

_{³Guidelines on Best Practices for Strengthening Ethics in Scientific Publication

Guide to recording, marking and publishing Correction (Portuguese only)

Guide for registering, marking and publishing a retraction (Portuguese only)

Guide for registering, tagging and publishing Addendum (Portuguese only)}

Policy on Conflict of Interest⁴

Polímeros adopts transparency guidelines to ensure that any potential or actual conflict of interest is properly disclosed during the editorial process. During submission, all authors must respond to the following mandatory question:

Do you have any conflicts of interest?

If the answer is yes, the author(s) must detail the type of conflict in the appropriate field on the platform and attach a signed document declaring the identified conflict.

Omission of relevant information may result in the rejection of the manuscript or, if already published, its retraction.

Editors and reviewers must also decline to participate in processes in which they have any involvement that may compromise their impartiality.

For further guidance, it is recommended to read the ICMJE guidelines:
Disclosure of Financial and Non-Financial Relationships and Activities, and Conflicts of Interest: https://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/roles-and-responsibilities/author-responsibilities--conflicts-of-interest.html

_{⁴Conflicts of interest may be of a personal, commercial, political, academic, or financial nature. Conflicts of interest can arise when authors, reviewers, or editors have interests that may influence the preparation or evaluation of manuscripts. Upon submitting the manuscript, authors are responsible for recognising and disclosing any financial or other types of conflict that may have influenced the work. If there is, even potentially, a conflict of interest, the author(s) must disclose it in a signed document and upload it to the submission platform.}

Adoption of similarity software

Polímeros adopts similarity checking measures with the aim of preventing duplicate submissions, plagiarism, and other forms of improper content overlap.

During submission, manuscripts are automatically compared with existing records in the editorial platform’s database to identify significant similarities in titles and authorship. This preliminary screening helps flag potential duplications for analysis by the Editorial Committee.

When a high degree of similarity is identified, the manuscript may be suspended pending clarification or rejected, as appropriate. The objective is to ensure the originality, integrity, and ethical standards of the journal’s publications.

Adoption of software using Artificial Intelligence resources

Polímeros follows the recommendations of the SciELO Network and adopts a cautious and responsible approach regarding the use of tools with artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities, including generative models such as chatbots (e.g., ChatGPT), advanced automatic translators, writing assistants, or text analysis tools.

Authors

The use of AI tools by authors is permitted exclusively as technical support for formatting and adapting the manuscript to the journal’s standards. The use of such tools for content generation, such as abstracts or initial structuring of the text, is not permitted. Any significant use of these tools must be declared in the manuscript’s cover letter, specifying the tool used, its purpose, and the stage at which it was employed. AI tools must not be listed as authors.

Editorial team

The editorial team may use tools with AI capabilities only for simple tasks, such as assisting with manuscript formatting and checking for duplicate references. All editorial decisions remain under human responsibility, and Polímeros does not use AI for automated decision-making in editorial processes.

Reference

For further information, see:
Guide to the Use of Artificial Intelligence Tools and Resources in Research Communication on SciELO em https://wp.scielo.org/wp-content/uploads/Guide-to-the-Use-of-AI-tools-and-resources-20230914.pdf

Gender and Sex Issues

The editorial team of Polímeros, as well as the authors who publish in the journal, must always observe the guidelines on Sex and Gender Equity in Research (SAGER). The SAGER guidelines comprise a set of recommendations that guide the reporting of sex and gender information in study design, data analysis, results, and interpretation of findings. In addition, Polímeros follows a gender equity policy in the composition of its editorial board.

Ethics Committee

Authors must attach a statement of approval from the ethics committee of the institution responsible for approving the research.

Copyright, Intellectual Property and Terms of Use

The journal is published exclusively in digital format and offers free and open access to all of its content.

Website responsibility:

The copyright terms applied to the content published by Polímeros are clearly stated and are distinct from the terms applicable to the journal’s website.

Author responsibility:

Authors of articles published by Polímeros retain the copyright of their work, licensing it under the Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 4.0 licence. This licence allows the content to be copied, distributed, transmitted, adapted, and used for commercial purposes, provided that appropriate credit is given to the authors and the original source, as specified, without implying endorsement by the authors or the journal.

The copyright terms do not conflict with the journal’s open access policy, and statements such as “all rights reserved” are not permitted. Polímeros encourages authors to self-archive their accepted manuscripts by posting them on personal blogs, institutional repositories, academic networks, and social media, as long as full citation of the final published version on the journal’s website is included.