MDPI Reviewer Club 2025 | Environmental & Earth Sciences Session 1
MDPI Reviewer Club 2025 | Environmental & Earth Sciences Session 1
Part of the MDPI Reviewer Club series
peer review, Peer Review in Environmental and Earth Sciences, Peer Review Best Practices
Welcome from the Chair
Welcome to the MDPI Reviewer Club 2025 | Environmental and Earth Sciences Session 1.
At MDPI, we recognize that peer review is the foundation of scientific progress. The integrity, transparency, and quality of our journals depend on the careful evaluations provided by our reviewers. In 2024, more than 215,000 reviewers contributed over 1.2 million reports to MDPI journals. This achievement reflects the strength of our community, and it is through the expertise and dedication of reviewers like you that scholarly communication continues to advance worldwide.
The MDPI Reviewer Club series was created to acknowledge this important role and to provide a space for sharing experiences, exchanging best practices, and building connections within our reviewer community.
If you are not yet part of this community, we warmly invite you to apply to join us as a reviewer here. For further details about reviewing with MDPI, please also visit our Guidelines for Reviewers, where you will find information on reviewer responsibilities, ethics, and the peer review process.
We also encourage you to subscribe to the Reviewer Club series to o receive the latest updates and notifications about upcoming sessions, by visiting this link. Each edition will spotlight a different discipline, creating opportunities to learn across fields and continue strengthening the role of peer review together.
Date: 04 September 2025
Time: 9:00 am CEST | 3:00 pm CST Asia | 5:00 pm AEST
Webinar ID: 832 7869 9405
Webinar Secretariat: journal.webinar@mdpi.com
Event Chair
Mr. Daniel Varga is a Journal Relations Specialist at MDPI, where he focuses on maintaining and strengthening collaborations with researchers and scholars. He previously served as a Section Managing Editor and Assistant Editor at MDPI, gaining extensive experience in academic publishing and peer review coordination. His background is in Environmental Science and Environmental Engineering from Eötvös Loránd University and MATE University, and also brings industry experience in quality control and pharmaceuticals. Beyond publishing, Dániel is passionate about data engineering and has worked on projects involving ETL pipelines, Apache Airflow, PostgreSQL, and Python.
Keynote Speakers
State Scientific Research Institute Nature Research Centre / Laboratory of Mammalian Ecology
Is reviewer a gatekeeper: who rejects, who accepts, and on what grounds?
Linas Balčiauskas: PhD in zoology/biology,1988, Dr Hab in biology, 2008. Current employment: leading researcher and the Head of the Laboratory of Mammalian Ecology in Nature Research Centre, Lithuania. Teaching as professor in Vilnius University. Research experience: hoofed, semi-aquatic, carnivore and small mammal ecology, threatened and invasive species, spatial distribution, habitat analysis, population management and computer modeling, biodiversity and ecological diversity, road ecology, human dimensions of mammals. Publication record: over 300 peer-reviewed publications, including 115 research papers in SCI/SCIE journals. Presentation record: over 200 presentations at national and international conferences. Reviewing record: from 2000, reviewed about 150 papers. Reviewing for MDPI: 106 finished reviews, 98 reviews decline. Editorial record: 2000–2025, Editor in Chief, Assistant editor, Managing Editor, member of Editorial board, member of Topical Advisor Panel, Guest Editor of 8 Special Issues.
Vytautas Magnus University, Faculty of Forest Sciences and Ecology,,
Department of Forest Sciences, Bioeconomy Research Institute
How to make a good review?
Edgaras Linkevičius, a Doctor of Forestry Sciences from Dresden University of Technology, has authored and co-authored numerous scientific articles and conference papers focused on forest management, climate change adaptation, and sustainability. His research includes: • Impact of Competition on Tree Growth: A study on how competition for space affects the growth of pine trees. • Thinning Regimes: Research on how different thinning regimes influence the growth dynamics of Scots pine and Norway spruce stands in Lithuania. • Climate Change & Tree Adaptability: Investigations into how climate change affects the growth of tree species like common juniper, beech, and Scots pine in Lithuanian forests. • Sustainability & Biomass Production: Assessments of the sustainability of wood- and concrete-based building materials, as well as modeling biomass production in plantations. • Forest Policy: A publication linking forest policy issues with decision support tools in Europe.
natural regeneration of beech, sustainability of value chains
From Scale to Originality
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Vahdettin Demir is a faculty member at KTO Karatay University, Department of Civil Engineering. He completed dual bachelor's degrees in Civil and Geomatics Engineering at Gümüşhane University and received his MSc and PhD from Ondokuz Mayıs University. His research focuses on hydraulic modeling, drought and flood analysis, AI-based forecasting, and GIS-supported decision support systems. Dr. Demir has authored over 70 peer-reviewed journal articles, which have received more than 1500 citations. He actively serves as a reviewer and editorial board member for various SCI/SCI-E indexed journals. He has participated in multiple national and international projects, including Horizon Europe and TÜBİTAK-funded programs, in roles such as coordinator and senior researcher. His interdisciplinary work addresses climate resilience, digital twin technologies, and nature-based solutions.
Registration
This is a FREE webinar. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information on how to join the webinar. Registrations with academic institutional email addresses will be prioritized.
Certificates of attendance will be delivered to those who attend the live webinar.
Can’t attend? Register anyway and we’ll let you know when the recording is available to watch.
Programme
|
Speaker |
Presentation Title |
Time in CEST |
Time in CST Asia |
|
Mr. Daniel Varga |
Introduction |
9:00–9:10 am | 3:00–3:10 pm |
|
Dr. Linas Balčiauskas |
Is reviewer a gatekeeper: who rejects, who accepts, and on what grounds? |
9:10–9:30 am |
3:10–3:30 pm |
| Dr. Edgaras Linkevičius |
How to make a good review? |
9:30–9:50 am |
3:30–3:50 pm |
|
Dr. Vahdettin Demir |
From Scale to Originality |
9:50–10:10 am |
3:50–4:10 pm |
|
Q&A |
10:10–10:30 am |
4:10–4:30 pm |
|
|
Mr. Daniel Varga |
Closing of Webinar |
10:30–10:40 am |
4:30–4:40 pm |
Sponsors and Partners
Organizers
