Objectives and Scope

As a flagship conference focusing on mechatronics and intelligent systems, the IEEE/ASME International Conference on Advanced Intelligent Mechatronics (AIM) brings together an international community of experts to discuss the state-of-the-art, new research results, perspectives of future developments, and innovative applications relevant to mechatronics, robotics, automation, industrial electronics, and related areas. The AIM is co-sponsored by IEEE Robotics and Automation Society (RAS), IEEE Industrial Electronics Society (IES), and ASME Dynamic Systems and Control Division (DSCD). IEEE/ASME Transactions on Mechatronics (TMech) is a bimonthly periodical that is also jointly sponsored by RAS, IES, and DSCD. The aim of the journal is to establish a high-quality archival journal which presents the state of the art, recent advances, and practical applications of mechatronics. The goal of the TMech paper submission with AIM presentation option (i.e., TMech/AIM concurrent submission) is to integrate timely peer-reviewed journal articles with the AIM venue to bring broader impacts on mechatronics research.

Description of the Submission and Decision Process

The TMech/AIM concurrent submission is a new opportunity for authors to rapidly publish a high-impact TMech journal paper and present the paper at the annual flagship AIM conferences. Figure 1 illustrates the paper submission and decision process.

To begin the process, authors should submit manuscripts to TMech ScholarOne submission site and submit basic paper information (e.g., authors, affiliation, abstract, and TMech submission number, etc.) to AIM 2020 PaperPlaza submission site. Manuscripts submitted to TMech/AIM concurrent submission will undergo a regular TMech paper review process by the TMech Editorial Board. The details about the TMech and submission information can be found at the journal’s website http://www.ieee-asme-mechatronics.org/. The review results, including all comments by referees and Technical Editors, are passed along to the AIM Conference Program Committee (PC). The AIM PC will then decide whether to include these papers in the program of AIM 2020. As shown in Fig. 1, depending on the outcome from the first-round review, several cases are possible in the evaluation process:

    If the first-round review decision on a TMech/AIM concurrent submission is “Accept” or “Minor revision” (and ultimately “Accept”), at least one author or co-author of the paper is required to pay the Full Conference registration fee before final acceptance of the paper by TMech. Then, authors must submit the final package of the paper to TMech for journal publication and must present the paper at AIM 2020. In the AIM’s PaperPlaza submission site, authors are required to submit the final submitted version of the accepted paper (before IEEE proof) for inclusion in the USB drive to be distributed to AIM attendees. The AIM Conference proceedings will contain the title and abstract of the paper, with a link to the eventual TMech publication.
    If the first-round review decision on a TMech submission is “Major revision”, authors of the paper can revise the manuscript and resubmit it to TMech by addressing review comments. The revised submission will be re-evaluated by the Editorial Board and reviewers before a final decision is made on the paper. The final decision could be “Accept” or “Reject” depending on the second-round review feedback. Accepted manuscripts will then follow the process described above in Case 1, and for rejected papers, the authors can take the steps described in Case 3 below.
    If the first- or second-round review decision on a TMech submission is “Reject”, authors of the paper can revise the manuscript and submit it to the 2020 AIM Conference through special submission track on PaperPlaza website. In particular, the submission should meet the page limitation of the AIM Conference. The Program Committee of the AIM Conference will evaluate and decide whether to accept the paper into the final program of the Conference using the review feedback of TMech submission. If accepted by the Conference, the paper will be treated as a regular contribution to the AIM Conference (i.e., the paper will be cited as an IEEE conference paper in IEEE Xplore.)

The accepted TMech/AIM concurrent submissions will be eligible for both the TMech Best Paper Award for the published year and the AIM Best Conference Paper or Best Student Paper Awards (if other requirements are satisfied). The accepted TMech/AIM concurrent submissions will also be included in a regular TMech issue under rapid production in October 2020. To be considered as candidates for these opportunities, the accepted TMech/AIM concurrent submission papers must be presented by authors at AIM 2020. If a TMech/AIM concurrent submission paper is accepted to TMech but none of the authors attends and presents at the AIM Conference without advanced notification to the conference organizers with valid proof (i.e., “No-show” paper), the paper will no longer be eligible for best conference or student paper awards nor be published in the targeted TMech issue on time. Instead, these “No-show” TMech papers will be placed into the IEEE Xplore production queue with entry time as the AIM Conference date waiting for publishing in a future TMech issue.

In conclusion, if you are interested in rapidly publishing your work in a high-impact journal while disseminating it at a premier conference, you should consider the TMech/AIM concurrent submission option. The deadline for TMech/AIM concurrent submission is January 8, 2020, and the submission is through https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/tmech-ieee and https://ras.papercept.net/conferences/scripts/start.pl.