Agent Skills
› brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills
› acta-materialia
acta-materialia
GitHub用于评估稿件是否符合Acta Materialia期刊定位，侧重结构材料/物理冶金及加工-组织-性能机制。提供框架重构建议、区分Acta与Scripta/功能材料投稿策略，并明确表征严谨性与拒稿启发式规则。
Trigger Scenarios
作者询问金属、陶瓷或结构材料稿件的适配性
需将研究从单纯测量重构为机制故事
在Acta Materialia与其他期刊间做选择
需要了解表征标准与拒稿风险
Install
npx skills add brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills --skill acta-materialia -g -y
SKILL.md
Frontmatter
{
"name": "acta-materialia",
"description": "Use when targeting Acta Materialia or deciding whether a structural-materials \/ physical-metallurgy manuscript fits this venue. Encodes the journal's fit, the processing–structure–property–performance mechanism bar, characterization rigor, house style, the Acta-vs-Scripta and Acta-vs-functional-materials routing, official-submission re-check, and desk-reject heuristics."
}
Acta Materialia (acta-materialia)
Journal positioning
Acta Materialia is a leading archival journal of materials science and engineering with a structural-materials and physical-metallurgy center of gravity: the quantitative relationships among processing, microstructure, properties, and performance in metals, alloys, ceramics, and structural composites. The journal rewards papers that establish a mechanism — why a microstructure forms and how it governs a property — over papers that merely report that a new processing route changed a number. Purely incremental "new alloy, slightly better property" studies without mechanistic insight are a weak fit. This skill is a fit / venue-selection / re-framing tool. It does not replace the journal's current official author guidelines. Before submitting, re-check the live Acta Materialia Guide for Authors.
When to trigger
- The author names Acta Materialia for a metallurgy, ceramics, or structural-materials manuscript and wants a fit/framing check.
- A materials paper must be re-framed from "we made and measured X" into a processing–structure–property mechanism story.
- The author is deciding between Acta Materialia, a rapid-communication outlet
(Scripta Materialia), and the functional-materials family (
advanced-materials,nature-materials). - The author needs Acta's characterization-rigor bar and desk-reject heuristics.
Scope & topic fit
- Physical metallurgy and alloy design: phase transformations, precipitation, recrystallization, texture, and the resulting mechanical behavior.
- Deformation and failure mechanisms: plasticity, creep, fatigue, fracture — when tied to microstructural evidence and, ideally, modeling.
- Microstructure evolution under processing (casting, thermomechanical processing, additive manufacturing, irradiation) with quantitative structure–property links.
- Ceramics and structural composites where the advance is mechanistic, not just a property table.
- Computational materials science (phase-field, CALPHAD, crystal plasticity, atomistics) when validated against or predictive of experiment.
Method & evidence bar
- The central claim is a mechanism connecting processing, microstructure, and property — supported by quantitative, statistically meaningful characterization, not representative micrographs alone.
- Characterization must be appropriate and rigorous: electron microscopy (SEM/TEM/EBSD), diffraction (XRD/neutron), and quantitative stereology with reported sampling; mechanical data with proper statistics and testing conditions.
- Modeling, when present, must be validated against experimental data or make tested predictions; a simulation with no experimental anchor is usually insufficient at this venue.
- Property improvements must be explained mechanistically and compared to the right baseline material/process, not to a strawman.
- Reproducibility: report composition, processing parameters, and testing protocol in enough detail to reproduce the microstructure and the measurement.
Structure & house style
- Standard research-article structure (introduction, materials/methods, results, discussion); Acta Materialia publishes full-length archival articles — route short, urgent results elsewhere and re-check current article types on the live guide.
- The introduction motivates the materials-science gap (mechanism, not application novelty); the discussion is where the processing–structure–property argument is made explicit.
- Figures are load-bearing: micrographs with scale bars and quantitative analysis, property plots with error bars, and schematics of the proposed mechanism.
- Supplementary material carries extended characterization and full processing details; main-text figures must support the central mechanism on their own.
Official-submission checklist
- Before giving submission-ready advice, read
../../resources/source-basis.mdand../../resources/official-source-map.md; start from the Elsevier anchors, then cite the current Acta Materialia Guide for Authors page you checked. - Search the live site for "Acta Materialia guide for authors" and follow the current Elsevier/Editorial Manager version.
- Re-check article types, length/figure expectations, and the data-availability and raw-data (e.g., microscopy/diffraction data) policy.
- Confirm graphical-abstract and highlights requirements if applicable.
- Re-check competing-interests, funding, author-contribution (CRediT), and AI-use disclosure requirements.
- If the live official instructions conflict with this skill, the official instructions win.
Pre-submission self-check
- The contribution is a processing–structure–property mechanism, not just a new material with a better number.
- Characterization is quantitative and statistically representative (sampling reported), not single cherry-picked images.
- Property claims are benchmarked against the correct baseline and explained mechanistically.
- Any model is validated against experiment or makes a tested prediction.
- Processing, composition, and testing protocols are reported in reproducible detail.
- The article type and length fit Acta's archival (not rapid-communication) format.
Common desk-reject triggers
- "New alloy / new process, slightly better property" with no mechanistic explanation.
- Characterization by representative micrographs only, with no quantification or sampling.
- Simulation-only studies with no experimental validation or testable prediction.
- Application-driven device papers where the materials-science mechanism is incidental.
- Better framed as a rapid communication (single incremental result) or as a functional-materials/device advance.
Re-routing decision
- Short, urgent single result → Scripta Materialia (rapid communications).
- Conceptual functional-materials or device advance →
advanced-materials/nature-materials. - Additive-manufacturing process focus over metallurgy →
additive-manufacturing. - Polymer/structural composite emphasis →
composites-part-b-engineering. - Plasticity theory/constitutive modeling as the core →
international-journal-of-plasticity/journal-of-the-mechanics-and-physics-of-solids.
Output format
[Fit] High / Medium / Low (one-line reason)
[Target] Acta Materialia
[Topic tags] <2–3 closest materials subtopics>
[Mechanism] <the processing–structure–property claim in one line>
[Method/evidence] <does characterization + modeling clear Acta's mechanism + rigor bar?>
[Top risk] <the single most likely reason for rejection>
[Official items to re-check] <article type / data policy / graphical abstract / disclosures>
[Re-route suggestion] <if not a fit, a better-matched venue>
Version History
- 1839142 Current 2026-07-05 12:54
