About the Journal

Focus and scope

Letras ConCiencia TecnoLógica publishes original articles in the field of engineering and technology, in correspondence with the typologies of scientific research, review and reflection according to the classification criteria for scientific journals established by the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation.

The journal belongs to the broad area of knowledge of Engineering and Technology, according to the classification of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

It is aimed at the academic community, researchers, the productive sector and in general the public interested in contributing to knowledge through the dissemination of results of innovation projects, technological development and research in the following areas: electronics, environment, industrial, robotics, informatics, computing, telecommunications, mechatronics, among other disciplines of engineering and technology.

The objective is to disseminate, generate academic discussions regarding the advances in the different areas through the publication of articles of national and international contribution.

Since 2006, the journal has been edited, published and financed by the Escuela Tecnológica Instituto Técnico Central, in Bogotá D.C. It is open access, implying that both authors and readers do not generate any payment for publishing and having access to the contents of the journal.

The call for manuscripts is permanent, the applications received must be original and unpublished and not have been submitted to other journals. Contributions are received in Spanish and English.

Each year the journal publishes a maximum of 20% of the accepted articles from ETITC authors.

Publication sections of the journal:

• Pedagogy and Didactics, Art, Humanism and Technosciences.
• Energy: Affordable, Efficient and Sustainable
• Environment and Sustainable Bioeconomy
• Equity, Social Development and Postdevelopment
• Materials, Design and Engineering Processes
• Industries, Business and Entrepreneurship
• Converging Technologies NBIC
• Availability: electronic versioN

Availability: electronic version.

Frequency of publication: semiannual, manuscripts are received on a permanent basis and are published on January 1 and July 1 of each year.

Peer review process:

Prior to the assignment of peer reviewers, the editorial committee makes a pre-selection of manuscripts in terms of relevance of the content with the subject matter of the journal and quality in terms of presentation in correspondence with the journal's guidelines and guidelines for authors. The manuscript is analyzed through the Turnitin tool, software implemented for plagiarism detection.
If the latter are met, the manuscript is assigned to reviewers.

The review is performed in a double-blind mode, in which the anonymity of both authors and reviewers is maintained. Peers are assigned specialists in the disciplinary areas of the journal, most of them external to ETITC and from a different institution from the authors, preferably with a master's degree or higher academic level than the authors and with publications in specialized journals in the last three years. The time taken by the reviewers for evaluation is approximately 2 weeks after accepting to review the work.

If the latter are met, the manuscript is assigned to reviewers.

The review is performed in a double-blind mode, in which the anonymity of both authors and reviewers is maintained. Peers are assigned specialists in the disciplinary areas of the journal, most of them external to ETITC and from institutions different from the authors', preferably with a master's degree or higher academic level than the authors and with publications in specialized journals in the last three years.

The time taken by reviewers for evaluation is approximately 2 weeks after agreeing to review the paper.

Refereeing process:

The concept issued by the peers is sent to the authors indicating whether the manuscript is:

• Publishable: the manuscript is approved in its current form.
• Publishable with minor modifications: approved subject to minor modifications by the authors, modifications of form are required such as writing, grammar, spelling or to expand or detail the topic and the author must resubmit the manuscript to the editor of the journal within 15 days after the communication of the concept.
• Publishable with major modifications: approved subject to major modifications by the authors, the authors receive the suggestions and comments made by the reviewers requiring significant changes in the manuscript and deepening of the topic and may even lead to a new field study and data collection. Authors should return the modified manuscript to the journal editor within one month from the communication of the concept, attaching a letter justifying the adjustments included. The editorial committee verifies the changes in the new manuscript and, if pertinent, sends it to the initial peer reviewer for a new concept. According to this second review, together with the editorial committee, the final decision to publish the manuscript is made.
• Not publishable: not approved and the manuscript is rejected, sending the evaluators' concepts to the authors, thanking them for submitting the manuscript to the journal and inviting them to improve the manuscript so that it can be submitted to another journal, and the manuscript is withdrawn.

In the case of a positive and a negative concept in the same evaluation round, the manuscript is assigned to a third peer reviewer for an editorial decision.

Guidelines for review

Manuscripts assigned for review are evaluated by at least two anonymous and expert academic peers.

The reviewer reads the submitted manuscript and performs the qualitative assessment and their respective suggestions or arguments for improvement, acceptance or non-publication, as appropriate.

Aspects to be taken into account for the review:

• Compliance with the guidelines for authors: titles, abstracts and keywords in Spanish and English.

See guidelines for authors.

• Scope of the work: clarity, relevance, topicality of the subject and new contributions to knowledge in the field of engineering and technology.
• Scientific quality: rationale, methods used or methodology, data analysis, argumentation, common thread, coherence.
• Style and format: presentation, organization, grammar, writing, quality and convenience of figures and tables, length of the paper.
• Typology of the work.

Review format that defines the evaluation criteria for a manuscript submitted to Letras ConCiencia TecnoLógica.

See review format.

Principles of the reviewers:

• Impartiality: respect for the values and intellectual freedom of the authors.
• Honesty: transparency and objectivity in the review of manuscripts.
• Confidentiality: maintain the privacy of the manuscript contents and the authors' information.
• Manuscript evaluation: evaluate the manuscript according to the scientific and quality guidelines of the journal, declared discipline in the area of engineering and technology, in compliance with originality.
• Conflict of interest: if there is any kind of academic, labor or personal relationship with the author, declare the situation and retract the manuscript for review.

Open Access Policy

Letras ConCiencia TecnoLógica provides free and open access to its content, offering immediate free access to research under the principle that making research freely available to the public contributes to the global exchange of knowledge.

This principle defends the elimination of barriers that prevent access to the fruit of research considered as a universal good to which everyone has a right and opens the gap so that any user can read, download, copy, distribute, print, search or use. The restriction on reproduction, distribution and copyright is to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly recognized and cited.

The Escuela Tecnológica Instituto Técnico Central assumes all costs for the publication of the articles.

Publication License

Under the Creative Commons license, rights are granted to users under certain conditions using the license:

Atribución-NoComercial-CompartirIgual 4.0 Internacional (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0)

Attribution - Non-Commercial - Share Alike: allows users to distribute, remix, retouch, and build upon the original work in a non-commercial manner, provided that the author is acknowledged and their new creations or derivative works are licensed or circulated under the same conditions of this license.

The user is free to:

• Attribution - You must give proper credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes have been made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in such a way as to suggest that you or your use is endorsed by the licensor.
• NonCommercial - You may not use the material for commercial purposes.
• ShareAlike - If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you must distribute your contribution under the same license as the original.
• No Additional Restrictions - You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from making any use permitted by the license.

Ethics and good practices in publishing

The Editorial Committee of the journal Letras ConCiencia TecnoLógica, establishes the following principles of ethics in scientific and academic quality in publications and adheres to the principles promulgated by  Committee on Publications Ethics-COPE.

It also adheres to the ethical and legal standards of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (APA) 7th edition.

The journal strives to generate mechanisms to avoid fraud and plagiarism through compliance with ethical publication practices, especially concerning authorship, transparency in the publication process and identification of conflicts of interest, among others.

Responsibilities of the authors

• To state by means of the completion and signature of each author in the letter of originality and assignment of publication rights, that the manuscript submitted to the journal is not being submitted or accepted in another publication and that the contents reproduced from other sources are acknowledged and cited.
• In research involving animal experimentation, ensure that the practices are in accordance with the ethical standards that regulate these activities.
• Declare any conflict of interest that may influence any stage of the editorial process on the manuscript.
• Respect the timing of the editorial process, do not force or influence the editorial team on the communication of the results.

Responsibilities of the Editorial Committee

• To act in an objective, respectful and fair manner, regardless of the sexual orientation, religion, political tendency or ethnicity of the authors.
• To consider submissions to the journal according to editorial guidelines, excluding any personal influence or conflict of interest.
• Follow the appropriate procedures framed in the Escuela Tecnológica Instituto Técnico Central to resolve complaints, ethical discrepancies and conflicts of interest regarding the publication.

Responsibilities of reviewers

• Contribute impartially, timely and of scientific quality to the review process.
• Maintain confidentiality of the information provided for the review.
• Inform the journal about plagiarism or conflict of interest.

Responsibility of the publishing institution

When unethical behavior is identified, it should be reported to the journal, addressing the editor or the editorial committee.

It is made in writing and is supported by tangible, reliable and sufficient evidence to initiate an investigation process, the editorial committee of the journal will follow the regular channels according to the due process of the Legal Office of the Escuela Tecnológica Instituto Técnico Central and a response will be issued.

The following actions are considered serious infractions or misconduct on the part of the authors:

• Plagiarizing articles.
• Using texts in the article without citation or improper use of sources.
• Duplicating the publication literally or partially. Duplicate publication of original research is considered unethical.
• Changes in authorship in an article that has been accepted.

Digital preservation policies

Through digital preservation methods, ensures the intellectual content of electronic records, for long periods of time, maintaining their integrity, authenticity, unalterability, originality, reliability and accessibility.