Joy + stYle + Life + reseArch + Innovation = JYLAI

I received an e-mail from an associate editor of IEEE Transactions on Circuits and System II on July 06.

The following statements are part of the letter.

=== Start of the letter on July 06 ===

Dear Jyu-Yuan Lai,

I am cordially inviting you to evaluate a manuscript submitted to TCAS-II for
publication. Your review is due by August 04, 2010.

A copy of the paper is included in this email as an attachment.
The title, authors, and abstract are also given at the end of this message.

You have never accessed the system, so you must complete the registration form at:

// Here is information about how to create an account and set personal preferences on the editorial system.

In the meantime, I would like to draw your attention to the following points:

// Here are three points for reviewer's attention.

Wishing you many thanks,

XXX (name of the associate editor),
Associate Editor,
IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems II

// Here is the review submission form

// Here is the control number, title, authors, and abstract of the paper.

=== End of the letter on July 06 ===

This is the first time that I was asked for paper reviewing directly by an associate editor.

I felt very strange for two points.

First, I thought that students are only asked for reviewing by their advisors.

Second, I am curious about why the associate editor chose me.

However, I was in Shanghai till July 08 and in Taipei till July 12.

In addition, I need to revise my application for NSC funding as well as my junior labmates' theses.

Besides, I was asked by my teacher to apply for the 青年論文獎 of 中國電機工程學會

(after I prepared all the documents, I found that they only want master's thesis....0rz).

For these reasons, I just left the review task aside since its deadline is on August 04.

Then, I received another letter from the transaction to notify me the final decision on the paper,

which is rejected, on July 22.

When I got this mail, I felt that I messed up this opportunity. 

And I am confused that wasn't the deadline on August 04?

After I discussed this situation with my advisor and some of my friends.

I wrote a letter to the associate editor to show my apology and my interesting for future review

which is as follows:

=== Start of my apology ===

Dear Prof. XXX,

Thank you very much for your invitation!
However, I received the final decision on the paper titled "Designing
Power Analysis Resistant AES Coprocessor using Look-UP-Table
Based Differential Logic" today.
I am very sorry that I did not submit my comment in soon
because I am busy applying for my postdoctoral program.
I hope that I can receive your invitation again.
Thanks a lot again and please accept my apology.

Sincerely,
Jyu-Yuan Lai

=== End of my apology ===

Finally, the associate editor sent me a mail which is as follows:

=== Start of the associate editor's letter ===

Jyu-Yuan,

I made the recommendation as we have received enough reviews.
Thanks for your willing to help future review for IEEE.

Best regards,

Zhongfeng

=== End of the associate editor's letter ===

These are all of the events of my first experience to be a reviewer.

I hope that I can have chances to be a reviewer in the future which will be a notable record for my career.