Editors of scientific journals meet increasing challenges to find peer reviewers. Rewarding reviewers has been proposed as a solution to incentives peer review, and journals have already started to offer different kinds of rewards, particularly non-monetary ones. However, research so far has mainly explored the efficacy of monetary rewards, while research on non-monetary rewards is barely absent. The goal of this article is to fill this gap by exploring whether and under what conditions a rather common non-monetary reward employed by journals, i.e., to recognize reviewers work by publishing their names on a yearly issue, is effective in increasing the willingness of scientists to become peer reviewers. We test the efficacy of three different reward settings identified in the literature: (1) engagement contingent, (2) task-completion contingent, and (3) performance contingent, through a natural experiment involving 1865 scientists in faculties of business and economics of Romanian universities. We explore whether reward efficacy varies across scientists depending on their gender, academic rank, research productivity, and type of institution to which they are affiliated. The results show that the performance contingency strongly reduces the number of respondents willing to become reviewers (− 60 % compared to a no-reward setting), particularly males and research productive scientists. Scientists affiliated with private universities are strongly discouraged by the reward. In sum, the results suggest that non-monetary rewards are not necessarily effective, as in some cases they may actually discourage the most intrinsically motivated and competent reviewers. Peer review is the central practice to select contributions to be published in scientific venues, and one of the processes generating publication traces that are at the heart of bibliometric studies  engagement, (2) task-completion, and (3) performance related. We develop hypotheses on whether the willingness to become a reviewer and the responsiveness to rewards varies along scientists’ gender, academic rank, public-private status of the university to which the scholars are affiliated, and test the hypotheses through a natural experiment involving 1,865 scientists from faculties of business and economics of Romanian universities.Thus far, research on the efficacy of In section “The willingness to perform certain behaviours is related to the characteristics of the action, of the reward setting, and individual idiosyncratic motivations. Hence, in the following paragraphs, we review the debate on the effects of incentives on peer review, the literature on motivations to review and reward contingencies and develop hypotheses on their impact on the willingness to become a reviewer for different subgroups of scientists.Scientists’ most prominent motivations to peer review are enjoyment (intrinsic motivation) and service to the academic community , whereas extrinsic motivationsDespite empirical evidence suggesting that extrinsic motivations are weakly important in peer review, rewards are often proposed as an instrument to attract new reviewers Warne . The kinIt is subject to debate, however, whether reviewers should be rewarded  suggests that the impact of external rewards varies as a function of how they influence the individual’s perceived competence and autonomy. For example, verbal rewards may enhance perceived competence, but if they carry a feeling of external control, they will undermine the sense of autonomy and therefore intrinsic motivation  recognized.The effectiveness of rewards for different subgroups of scholars has rarely been discussed and explored —are expected to decline more often than academics strongly oriented to research- i.e. associate professors—which would have higher gains both in terms of learning and for career purposes. Full professors are also likely to be weakly motivated, namely because they are expected to be already experienced researchers (Tite and Schroter Academic ranks more focused on research (i.e. associate professors) are more likely to accept becoming reviewers than academic ranks relatively more focused on teaching (i.e. assistant professors and teaching assistant) and managerial tasks (i.e. full professors).Responsiveness to rewards depends on the relative importance of different type of motivations. For example, if intrinsic motivations are more important than extrinsic motivations, then the reward will have little or even a negative effect. However, it is difficult to argue that intrinsic motivations matter more or less for a given rank. In terms of extrinsic motivations, since peer review has no decisive impact on career advancement, the impact is likely negligible. Hence, no hypothesis can be clearly derived in this regard.the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand does”, namely it will not be of public dominion. Thus, in the secrecy of the peer review process, there might not be significant differences between scientists of public and private institutions in their willingness to review. On the contrary, disclosing the identity of reviewers by publishing their names is likely to be more welcome in public institutions—signalling the service to the academic community—than in private institutions, as it also signals that the scientist is diverting resources from the organizational goals. Therefore we craft the hypothesis that:In higher education, a notable difference is usually observed between public and private universities, which differ as to their values, norms, and institutional goals  and hence likely to enjoy reviewing as well; on the other hand, highly productive scientists will be also more skilled and therefore gain less in terms of learning through peer review. Therefore, no straightforward expectations emerge regarding the willingness to review in a no-reward setting. On the contrary, because of the stronger intrinsic motivations that arguably characterize high productive scientists, we expect them to be less responsive to rewards, especially in the case of performance-related ones, as they might enhance pressure and diminish the enjoyment of the task.Under a performance-contingent reward setting, scientists with higher productivity will be less likely to accept to become reviewers.Studia Universitatis Babeş-Bolyai Oeconomica, a scientific journal in Business and Economics, aiming to expand its pool of reviewers. Starting from the findings of peer review surveys on the most preferred incentives . In case of acceptance, and to measure the extent to which they were willing to put an effort in peer review for the journal, they were also asked how many articles they were available to review each year and the amount of time—i.e. how many months - they foreseen to provide a review report.No-reward: no reward was offered for accepting the invitation to become reviewersEngagement: reward for accepting to become part of the pool of reviewersCompletion: reward for completing at least a review reportPerformance: reward for quality and quantity of reviewsFour experimental settings—groups were tested:Studia Universitatis Babeş-Bolyai Oeconomica is the official publication of the Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Babeş-Bolyai University, which is one of the largest, oldest and highest ranked universities in Romania. The journal is included in the official list of journals, indexed in international databases , hence having a medium-to-high status in this context. The journal is published in English and adopts a double-blind peer review model, with three issues per year, five papers per issue, with an average rejection rate of 40%. The choice of the journal was driven by conceptual and empirical considerations. A key condition for the experiment is that the non-monetary reward should be sufficiently important to make a difference in the response rate. The selected journal holds a medium-high prestige in the Romanian economists’ community, which makes it an appropriate case. Moreover, the journal was aiming to expand its pool of reviewers and find the most effective ways in doing that, and one of the authors is a member of the editorial board, hence providing the opportunity to run the experiment under optimal conditions of control.The journal The pool of potential referees contacted for the experiment included scientists in business and economics from Romanian universities. The email addresses and the academic ranks were extracted from the official web page of the institution. From the total 99 Romanian universities across all fields, scientists from 35 universities—40 faculties—offering programs in economics and business were included in the study. In total, there were collected the contact details for 1946 scholars. Names were eliminated when double listed due to the affiliation to more institutions (9) or due to inconsistencies related to the way the names were listed on the websites (14). Since the previous experience with the journal could influence the decision to review, the scientists who had published or submitted a manuscript in the past 5 years, as well as scientists that had already been part of the reviewers’ pool (58) were not included in the study. The final pool of potential reviewers included 1865 scientists, of which: 87.2% from public universities, 57.3% females, and 25.4% full professors, 33.1% associate professors, 30.5% assistant professors, and 10.8% teaching assistants. We assigned individuals to the four experimental settings in order to obtain similar proportions of respondents by faculty, type of university, academic rank, and gender.Romania is part of the European Union since 2007. The higher education system includes 99 universities (56 public and 43 private universities) that employ over 26,949 scientists and enrols 535,200 bachelor and master students  or not (0). The sample includes scholars who opened the email and accepted within the first day after receiving the email.A categorical variable considers whether the potential reviewer was contacted employing a no-reward, engagement, completion or performance setting.A dummy variable takes into consideration the affiliation with a public or private university.A dummy variable for the gender of the respondent. The number of female scientists in Romanian universities increased in recent decades, and currently represent 49.4% of the academic body, although only 30.2% of the full professors.A categorical variable considers the scientist’s academic rank, namely: teaching assistant, assistant professor, associate professor, and full professor. In the Romanian context, the duties of teaching assistant and assistant professors mostly focus on teaching, associate professors are on average more oriented to research, whereas full professors spend much time on managerial tasks.For scientists opening the email, we collected three scores of scientific productivity from ISI Web of Science: (1) the number of articles, (2) the number of proceeding articles and (3) the Hirsch index of citations Hirsch . The thrThe empirical analysis combines descriptive and inferential statistics.First, we describe the scientists’ propensity to accept to review along the main predicting variables, as well as the ‘promised’ effort in terms of time to review and the number of manuscripts.Next, we run regression models to test the factors predicting the chance of opening the email and the willingness to become reviewer. Since the dependent variables are binary—i.e., open (1) or not open (0) the email, accept (1) or not accept (1) to become a reviewer—we employ logistic regressions.Logistic regressions require four major conditions to be satisfied Garson .First, the observations to be independent of each other. Therefore, we considered for the analysis only those scientists responding the same day they received the email, in order to avoid that scientists replied only after learning of the invitation from other colleagues.Second, multicollinearity is an issue in (logistic) regressions when two or more predicting variables are strongly associated. A cross tabulation of the frequency of the main predicting variables highlights that scientists are very similarly distributed along the different cross-categories, which suggest that multicollinearity should not be an issue (see Table 5 in the appendix). Small differences are also observed in the research productivity by gender , and university type , although some notable differences are observed in the research productivity e.g. between full professors and teaching assistant (Table 6 in the appendix). Therefore, we computed the Variance Inflation Factors (VIF) as a standard test for multicollinearity . The VIF values are all very low (below 1.15), which excludes multicollinearity among the predicting variables.Third, logistic regression typically requires large samples. A common rule of thumb is a minimum of ten cases with the least frequent outcome for each independent variable in your model. This study explores five independent variables and the expected probability of the least frequent outcome is 0.3 which means (10*5/0.30) = 300, whereas the samples include 1,865 and 735 units.Finally, logistic regression assumes linearity of independent variables and log odds- specifically for independent continuous variables. Most of the independent variables are categorical. We run the Box-Tidwell test by including in the model the interaction between the research productivity and its logs, and it is not significant, meaning that the assumption is not violated Garson .In sum, all the four conditions are satisfied.The sample for the second analysis of acceptance is not randomly selected as it is represented by scientists that in the first place opened the email. A Heckman correction would then be appropriate Heckman : a two-sWe run multilevel models to take into considerations that scientists (level 1) are nested into different faculties (level 2), as neglecting a multilevel structure may lead to biased coefficients Robinson . Since fmin being the one with the smaller AIC, then the exponential of (AICminAICj)/2 indicates the probability of modelj in respect to modelmin to minimize the loss of information.As a diagnostic for model comparison we employ the Deviance Information Criterion (DIC), which penalizes for a model complexity—similarly to the Akaike Information Criterion (AIC) and it is a measure particularly valuable for testing improved goodness of fit in logit models . Specificity measures the share of actual negatives that are correctly identified as such, and it is given by the ration between values predicted as negative which are truly negative divided by the total number of negative (refusing to become reviewer).In order to assess the goodness of fit of the regression model, we computed the predicted probability of accepting to review from the regression model with the main interactions. Next, we considered different thresholds of probability for determining whether the scientist accept  or not  to review. Third, we computed for each probability threshold two standard measures of fit for logistic regressions: sensitivity and specificity. The sample includes 1865 scholars who received the email invitation to become a reviewer. 735 scientists (39.4%) opened the email the same day, and among them, 306 (41.6%) accepted to become reviewer the same day.Table A closer examination of the acceptance rates by combining experimental settings and control variables provides additional insights Table . Femalesp value 0.105 for time for review and p value 0.471 for the number of manuscripts), suggesting that the impact of the reward is negligible in these regards.Table Table In the first model, the dependent variable is whether the email was opened or not. The main control variables are included. The results show that associate professors are significantly more likely to open the email, which indicates a higher interest in becoming reviewers. Gender and institutional affiliation are not significant predictors.Four models explore the predictors of accepting to become a reviewer.p value 0.056).The second model only includes the experimental setting variable and shows that under the performance-reward setting scientists are less likely to accept  and strongly less likely (− 60.4%)The fourth model also explores the interactions between the experimental settings and the predicting variables. There are no significant differences between the no-reward setting and the engagement and completion reward settings. On the other hand, respondents are significantly  (Hypothesis The fifth model explores the interactions between experimental settings and research productivity, showing no significant effects in the no-reward, engagement and completion settings, and a marginally significant and negative effect in the performance setting (Figure This paper explores the efficacy of a non-monetary reward–i.e., acknowledgment of the reviewers’ name in the journal and issuance of a reviewer certificate—and three reward settings in attracting peer reviewers. While studies on motivations have extensively discussed the negative effects of monetary rewards for intrinsically motivated activities (Heyman and Ariely The impact of the reward varies considerably across categories of scientists. Female scholars are more responsive than males in a performance setting, arguably because a reward that signals superior capability and effort is particularly attractive for categories of people who have traditionally been a minority and hold lower status positions. Scientists affiliated to private universities are strongly less responsive than public universities scientists in all the reward settings because publishing their names would reveal that they are spending their time in prosocial activities, which are at odds with the key goal of private organizations to maximize profit. Under a performance setting, highly productive scientists also appear to be less responsive.These findings suggest that rewards—particularly in a performance contingency—may unleash an adverse selection process, by attracting extrinsically motivated reviewers and discouraging scientifically productive, intrinsic and prosocial motivated ones. Given that intrinsic motivation increases curiosity and cognitive flexibility, which are pivotal for complex tasks that require deep information processing (e.g. Gagné and Deci The results bear value by providing editors with empirical evidence on the efficacy of non-monetary rewards, and the interactions with scientists’ characteristics. Similar rewards have been adopted without their efficacy in boosting peer review and possible unintended effects being carefully assessed.This article aimed to fill a gap in our understanding of whether rewards can be beneficial for peer review, and particularly non-monetary rewards. We explored whether and under what conditions recognizing reviewers’ work by publishing their names increases the willingness of scientists to become peer reviewers. We tested the efficacy of three different reward settings through a natural experiment involving 1865 scientists in faculties of business and economics of Romanian universities. The results show that this reward is not effective and that under the performance contingency the number of respondents willing to become reviewers even decrease strongly, particularly for research productive scientists. In turn, the effects of non-monetary rewards should not be assumed to be positive, as they may end up discouraging precisely the most intrinsically motivated and competent reviewers.This study was limited to one form of non-monetary reward, the specific setting of Business and Economics researchers in Romania, and on the effects on the willingness to become a reviewer. Future studies should explore the efficacy of other forms of non-monetary rewards, such as giving feedbacks to reviewers, keeping them updated on the outcome of the review, becoming part of the editorial team, as well as the effects of rewards on the number, timely and quality of review reports. Future research should also bear in mind that peer review surveys identified differences between disciplinary fields with regard to the declared preferred rewards (Sense About Science


The study of head and neck cancers in the clinic and in the laboratory has been radically transformed in recent years. The emergence of a subset of patients with Human Papillomavirus (HPV)-initiated oropharynx cancer, now representing the majority of new head and neck cancers at some sites in the United States, was followed by the recognition that these HPV-associated cancers represented a different disease . HPV-iniThe advent of next-generation sequencing and publication of The Cancer Genome Atlas genomic profile in head and neck cancer have led to an initial classification of head and neck cancers into 4 intrinsic subtypes, with mutations in tumor suppressor genes the most common molecular abnormalities . OngoingCancers of the Head & Neck.The rapidity with which the field is moving, and the richness of these data sets, creates the need for a new journal dedicated to this field, one with diverse expertise across the Editorial Board, the ability to rapidly review submissions, and open access. We intend to publish original articles, reviews, case reports, and position papers across all disciplines that impact the direction of research and clinical care in head and neck cancer. Studies of standard and novel treatment approaches, including radiation, surgery, cytotoxic and targeted systemic therapy, vaccines and immunotherapy; translational science characterizing the biology of head and neck cancer subtypes, validation of prognostic and predictive biomarkers, and identification of novel therapeutics targets; virology of HPV and – for Epstein-Barr Virus (EBV)-associated nasopharynx cancer – EBV in the context of the head and neck; prevention strategies for those at risk for head and neck cancer; database analyses; and strategies to assess and improve functional outcome and quality of life, will be the core material published in An Editorial Board has been assembled consisting of 21 distinguished members from Europe, Asia and North America. Their expertise spans medical oncology, radiation oncology, head and neck surgery, head and neck pathology, virology, signaling, genomics, biomarkers, immuno-oncology, and survivorship.Cancers of the Head & Neck operates a single-blind peer-review system aiming to provide authors with a first decision within 6 weeks and once accepted, to publish manuscripts online within 2 weeks. All articles in Cancers of the Head & Neck are freely and universally accessible online upon publication, so authors’ work is available to readers everywhere irrespective of the wealth of their institution. This ensures that authors’ work is disseminated to the widest possible audience and fosters the most active academic exchange [The journal is published by BioMed Central (BMC)—an important leader in open access publishing, which currently publishes over 290 peer-reviewed open access journals. The strength of the BMC editorial offices will support our efforts to publish the highest quality papers after efficient and fair scientific peer review. exchange .


The advance of Open Access publishing has given rise to a parallel and nefarious process called predatory publishing. Predatory publishing is defined as publishing that “upholds few if any of the best practices, yet demands payment for publishing, even from those most unable to pay.”1https://escholarship.org/uc/item/64f3v9fj), there are at least 25 to 30 journals related to emergency medicine that engage in predatory practices.1As we discussed in our 2016 article .Recently, we became aware that The cornerstone of Open Access publishing is that the copyright remains with the authors and is not assigned to the journal. Therefore, any other journal needs the author’s permission to use all or part of the material.Arvin Publishers claimed the paper as their own and assigned it to their electronic website as if it had not been previously published. They did not ask for or receive authorization to do this from the paper’s authors.In this case, WestJEM views this as a serious breach of publication ethics, and sent a letter demanding retraction to Arvin Publishers.Although we received no written response, the plagiarized article was taken down from their website two days after the demand to retract the article was sent. Of note, all five of the articles included in this predatory publisher’s first edition of their emergency medicine journal were stolen from other journals as well.Predatory publishers use this tactic to appear legitimate with previously published but stolen material masquerading as their own. This can dupe authors into submitting papers for consideration and early publication, only to receive a bill for several thousand dollars after acceptance. These predatory publishers do not provide legitimate editorial services or peer review, and are not indexed in PubMed or any internationally known bibliographic databases, such that other researchers and readers can find the material to learn from and cite.WestJEM notified the authors of the other papers so that they could demand retraction as well.WestJEM was removed, we then discovered that the entire current edition of stolen papers has now been taken offline.Shortly after we discovered that the plagiarized paper from The message of this experience is that authors should beware of predatory publishers in general and assure that journals to which they are submitting their work charge reasonable and transparent article processing fees after acceptance. Furthermore, researchers should assure that papers published in a journal are indexed widely so their work receives the attention it deserves.


Although peer reviewers play a key role in the manuscript review process, their roles and tasks are poorly defined. Clarity around this issue is important as it may influence the quality of peer reviewer reports. This scoping review explored the roles and tasks of peer reviewers of biomedical journals.Comprehensive literature searches were conducted in Cochrane Library, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature, Educational Resources Information Center, EMBASE, MEDLINE, PsycINFO, Scopus and Web of Science from inception up to May 2017. There were no date and language restrictions. We also searched for grey literature. Studies with statements mentioning roles, tasks and competencies pertaining to the role of peer reviewers in biomedical journals were eligible for inclusion. Two reviewers independently performed study screening and selection. Relevant statements were extracted, collated and classified into themes.After screening 2763 citations and 600 full-text papers, 209 articles and 13 grey literature sources were included. A total of 1426 statements related to roles were extracted, resulting in 76 unique statements. These were grouped into 13 emergent themes: proficient experts in their field (3 items), dutiful/altruistic towards scientific community (7 items), familiar with journal (2 items), unbiased and ethical professionals (18 items), self-critical professionals (4 items), reliable professionals (7 items), skilled critics (15 items), respectful communicators (6 items), gatekeepers (2 items), educators (2 items), advocates for author/editor/reader (3 items) and advisors to editors (2 items). Roles that do not fall within the remit of peer reviewers were also identified (5 items).We also extracted 2026 statements related to peer reviewers’ tasks, resulting in 73 unique statements. These were grouped under six themes: organisation and approach to reviewing (10 items), make general comments (10 items), assess and address content for each section of the manuscript (36 items), address ethical aspects (5 items), assess manuscript presentation (8 items) and provide recommendations (4 items).Peer reviewers are expected to perform a large number of roles and tasks for biomedical journals. These warrant further discussion and clarification in order not to overburden these key actors.The online version of this article (10.1186/s12916-019-1347-0) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. Evidence indicates that there is a need to improve the quality of peer reviewer reports in biomedical journals , 2. PublUnlike other professional groups, many editors and peer reviewers of biomedical journals operate largely without formal training. It is assumed that having expertise as an author provides, by default, the skills necessary to be a scientific editor and/or peer reviewer. However, this assumption is problematic, potentially having a number of negative implications for the overall quality of biomedical publishing .Alongside the lack of standardised training, the lack of a clear, accepted definition of the roles and tasks of peer reviewers has also been highlighted . A systeOrganisations such as the Council of Science Editors provide a general overview of reviewer roles and responsibilities . HoweverWhile core competencies for biomedical journal editors have already been systematically identified  and agreThe aim of this scoping review is to determine the roles and tasks of peer reviewers as depicted in biomedical literature. For the purposes of this research, we consider ‘roles’ to refer to the overarching nature of peer reviewers’ function, whereas ‘tasks’ refer more specifically to actions that fulfil these roles.What are the expected roles of peer reviewers in the editorial peer review process in biomedical journals?What are the range of tasks that peer reviewers are expected to perform for biomedical journals?Our specific objectives were to answer the following two research questions while summarising the existing literature:This scoping review was guided by the methodological framework proposed by Arksey and O’Malley , as wellWe used the PRISMA-ScR  checklist to report our results  were excluded. There were no date and language restrictions.We adopted MEDLINE’s journal selection criteria for our definition of health. This definition includes journals that are ‘predominantly devoted to reporting original investigations in the biomedical and health sciences, including research in the basic sciences; clinical trials of therapeutic agents; effectiveness of diagnostic or therapeutic techniques; or studies relating to the behavioural, epidemiological, or educational aspects of medicine’. In order to ensure feasibility of the study, we did not include journals from the disciplines of psychology, education, physical or natural sciences.The review considered all study designs to be eligible. Based on findings from a preceding scoping review of competencies for scientific editors of biomedical journals , it was The Peer Review of Electronic Search Strategies (PRESS) 2015 Guideline statement was used to guide the electronic literature search strategies . These wWe searched for grey literature on websites of existing networks ), biomedical journal publishers  and organisations that offer resources for reviewers . Relevant blogs, newsletters (e.g. The METRICS Research Digest), surveys and reports of authors/reviewer workshops were also searched. We further hand-searched available abstracts from the various International Congresses on Peer Review and Scientific Publication , 18.Following the execution of the search strategy, the identified records (titles and abstracts) were collated in a reference manager (Endnote) for de-duplication. The final unique set of records was imported into a systematic review paper manager (Covidence) that facilitated independent screening by two reviewers. The screening of titles and abstracts and subsequent full-text screening was performed independently by two reviewers (KG and DC). Disagreements between reviewers were resolved by consensus.A data extraction form was developed a priori to capture information on each eligible document included in the review. General study characteristics extracted were as follows: first author name, year of publication, country of first author, language of publication and study design. For grey literature, we extracted the URL, title of the document, language of publication and who produced the document.In addition, for all documents, we collected descriptions of any statements potentially relating to the roles and tasks of peer reviewers. Two people  carried out the data extraction. In the first step, data were extracted from eligible full texts into Microsoft Excel by KG. Subsequently, DC compared the full text of each eligible document with the extracted data on Microsoft Excel to ensure that all relevant information had been included.Initially, all relevant statements (full sentences) related to roles from all data sources were extracted into a Microsoft Excel sheet by KG. Subsequently, each sentence was coded into smaller text units semantically as close as possible to the original, full sentence. Overlapping or duplicate text units were collated following discussion and agreement with DC, resulting in a list of unique statements for roles. Finally, we grouped these statements into emergent overarching themes to provide a better overview of results. All relevant statements (full sentences) related to tasks from all data sources were also extracted into a Microsoft Excel sheet by KG and mapped using pre-defined categories adapted from work carried out by Hirst and Altman . In ordeA total of 23,176 records were returned by the search strategy which included a substantial number of records related to ‘hospital peer review’. In the first step, one researcher (KG) screened all irrelevant records out by title and abstract, leaving 2763 possibly relevant articles which were then screened by two reviewers by title and abstract (KG and DC). Six hundred records were eligible for full-text screening. Disagreements regarding eligibility were resolved through discussion and achieving consensus between the two reviewers. Subsequently, 391 biomedical publications were excluded, leaving 209 publications that met the inclusion criteria  and 2005 (n = 3).Only one of these articles was primarily focused on roles and tasks. Seven studies reported on surveys, eight were descriptive studies and two were randomised controlled trials (RCT). The remaining five articles comprised a randomised trial, two intervention studies and two systematic reviews. Publication dates ranged from 1991 to 2016. Most of the studies were published in 2013 , 2014 (n = 5) and 2015 (n = 5) were the three years with the most studies. Two review articles were in Spanish and 41 in English. This sample included 23 studies with first authors originating from the USA, five from the UK, four from Australia and Spain and one from Canada, Greece, India, Japan, Korea and Palestine.Overall, 45 publications were review articles  and 2014 (n = 15) were the two years with the most studies. All articles were written in English except for two articles that were written in Portuguese. This sample included 48 studies with first authors based in the USA; 10 in the UK; nine in Canada; seven in Australia; four in Brazil; three in Germany; two in Denmark, India, Portugal and Spain; and one each in Austria, Croatia, The Netherlands and Singapore.The remaining 140 publications consisted of 122 editorials, two book chapters, 12 commentaries, two letters and two tutorials , dutiful/altruistic towards scientific community (7 items), familiar with journal (2 items), unbiased and ethical professionals (18 items), self-critical professionals (4 items), reliable professionals (7 items), skilled critics (15 items), respectful communicators (6 items), gatekeepers (2 items), educators (2 items), advocates for author/editor/reader (3 items) and advisors to editors (2 items). Roles that do not fall within the remit of peer reviewers were also identified (5 items).The ‘skilled critics’ and ‘unbiased and ethical professionals’ themes appeared most frequently. Figure We also extracted 2026 statements related to peer reviewers’ tasks, resulting in 73 unique statements. These were grouped under six themes: organisation and approach to reviewing (10 items), make general comments (10 items), assess and address content for each section of the manuscript (36 items), address ethical aspects (5 items), assess manuscript presentation (8 items) and provide recommendations (4 items). The themes ‘assess and address content for each section of the manuscript’ had the highest number of statements while the theme related to ethical aspects had the lowest number  role is open to debate. Is it possible to be an advocate to all stakeholders simultaneously? If not, which stakeholders should take precedence and what would the order of priority be? The term ‘advocates’ needs to be unpacked and clarified in order for peer reviewers to understand what is expected from them in this particular area.This overlap of roles, and the existence of apparently malleable boundaries between editors and peer reviewers, may have significant implications for the overall peer review process because there is the potential for misunderstandings to occur, as shown by Chauvin et al. . Given tThe 13 themes identified in the list of reviewers’ roles  which, according to a systematic review (2017) of the definitions of ‘open peer review’, is one of the seven main characteristics of open peer review . These cBox 1 Construct of a peer reviewerReviewers should be proficient experts in their field with training in research methods or statistics who—out of a sense of scientific responsibility and duty—provide unbiased, objective, thorough and specific yet constructive criticism to authors on how to improve their manuscript. Importantly, prior to commencing reviewing, self-critical reviewers should be confident about their availability and competence to review and be familiar with the journal’s mission and review criteria and guidelines. Any potential or actual conflict of interest should be declared upfront or avoided entirely, in line with ethical norms. Reviewers should offer advice to editors on the merits of the manuscript while keeping in mind that they are not decision-makers regarding the fate of the manuscript. A polite, collegial attitude that promotes education of authors is vital. Lastly, they should maintain confidentiality throughout and deliver the report in a timely matter.Box 2 Critical questions related to roles and tasks of peer reviewers- What is the link between peer reviewers’ recommendations and editorial decision-making?- Who is responsible for publication of low-quality manuscripts?- Is there overlap across certain roles and tasks ?- What are the consequences of existing malleable boundaries of authority and responsibility on the review process?Additional file 1:Search strategy. (DOCX 21 kb)Additional file 2:Original articles. (DOCX 62 kb)Additional file 3:Reviews. (DOCX 122 kb)Additional file 4:Editorials. (DOCX 241 kb)Additional file 5:Grey literature. (DOCX 32 kb)Additional file 6:Prisma_ScR_Checklist. (DOCX 105 kb)Additional file 7:Data_Roles. (XLSX 188 kb)Additional file 8:Data_Tasks. (XLSX 178 kb)


It was all change in the BiO Editor team in 2018, with Steven Kelly replacing departing founding Editor-in-Chief Jordan Raff . We wereBiO has long been included in The Directory of Open Access Journals - a service that indexes high-quality, peer-reviewed Open Access research journals. BiO is now the proud owner of a DOAJ seal. This is a “mark of certification for Open Access journals, awarded by DOAJ to journals that achieve a high level of openness, adhere to best practice and high publishing standards”. In an age of proliferating ‘predatory’ Open Access journals, it is essential that authors have the means to identify journals in which they can publish with confidence.uses DOIs as permanent identifiers;provides DOAJ with article metadata;deposits content with a long-term digital preservation or archiving program;embeds machine-readable CC licensing information in articles;allows generous reuse and mixing of content, in accordance with a CC BY, CC BY-SA or CC BY-NC license;has a deposit policy registered with a deposit policy registry;allows the author to hold the copyright without restrictions.BiO has complied with the following criteria to receive the seal:First Persons have come to the fore of BiO. Our series of interviews with the first authors of a selection of papers published in BiO are now being published as articles in their own right (with their own DOI). These interviews are proving hugely popular with early-career researchers. This is just one of the ways in which BiO and The Company of Biologists give back to the biological sciences community, including scientific meeting grants, and funded places at Company workshops and meetings. BiO will also be appointing early-stage PIs to its Editorial Board team.Mentoring early-career researchers in the art of peer review is crucial to the future of scientific publishing. BiO encourages the involvement of postdocs and other early-career scientists in the peer review process. We ask that the name of the co-reviewer is reported to the Editor (a field will be provided in the report form for this purpose).reviewers for their expertise and time, as well as our authors, readers and editors for their support (see supplementary information for a list of reviewers who completed a review for BiO in 2018).BiO continues to receive increased numbers of submissions from all around the world. These articles must be rigorously reviewed by the community. We now publicly thank all our


Upsala Journal of Medical Sciences (UJMS) in terms of numbers of submissions and citations of articles. Thus, we have reported on the decline of the number of submitted manuscripts, most probably reflecting the extensive appearance of so-called predatory journals  to 8.60 (CiteScore). It is worthy of note that the corresponding difference for UJMS is close to zero, since our CiteScore is as high as 1.94 for the year 2017  that number has already been passed. Preferably, one would like to interpret that as if our measures presented a year ago have been effective—free color-prints, fast-track opportunities , free printed issues distributed to all society members, and maintenance of the ‘free-of-charge’ system despite our open-access publishing. Perhaps we could have exaggerated our presence on social media. For an old-fashioned editor the efficiency of the work load is difficult to estimate, but many high Altmetric scores  are noteOne more measure to facilitate and convince potential authors to choose UJMS for their next submission is that of ‘format-free submission’. That is supposed to make the process of preparing research papers for submission simpler and less time-consuming. The post-acceptance reformatting will be, as much as possible, managed by our publisher. Hopefully, this will ensure that the research of the authors can be disseminated quicker through a speedier publication process. By such means we should be able to attract high-quality papers, a prerequisite for remaining successful in times of impactitis , 11.Finally, we mentioned last time that special issues have been very valuable when discussing how to improve the impact of our journal. The next to follow—that from Uppsala Clinical Research Centre—will appear as the first issue of next year. The two most recent ones, denominated ‘Remembering Claes Hellerström’  and ‘Pre


We describe the results of our year-long trial of transparent peer review and announce the adoption of transparent review as permanent policy. Genome Biology published an editorial describing a trial of transparent review at the journal  [A year ago, article) . Other jarticle) , but we We have now assessed the data we collected over the year. In the trial, 45 submissions underwent transparent review for at least one round of review, and 68 went through traditional single-blind peer review. Eligible authors could opt out of the trial before the review procedure commenced either explicitly or passively (if they did not reply to our emails), which accounts for the difference in numbers between the two arms. Our main finding is that there was no significant difference in the mean time to first decision between transparent review and single-blind review. For both sides of the trial, the average number of reviewers we needed to invite for each agreed reviewer was 3.1. Thus, we can see no evidence that reviewers are more reluctant to agree to review transparently. This is also borne out in the responses we received from reviewers—those who commented at all were positive; no reviewer declined to review explicitly because of transparency, although we cannot rule out that some declined for this reason without letting us know.A low rate of reviewer engagement is only one potential downside of transparent review, though. Another concern might be that reviewers would be reluctant to be critical knowing that their criticisms would be published; however, we see no evidence of that in our data. There is no significant difference between the two arms of the trial in the proportions of manuscripts given a first decision of outright rejection, rejection with the option of resubmitting a revised version, or major revisions. Of those manuscripts that have been through the trial to a final decision (published or rejected), there is no difference in the overall rejection rate.Based on these results, it seems to us that transparent review does not affect the speed or outcome of the peer-review process. It should be noted, however, that the pool of transparently reviewed manuscripts had some element of self-selection, as authors whose manuscripts qualified to be transparently reviewed were offered the option to take part (or not) in the trial. This might introduce some bias to the results. For example, authors who suspect that their studies might be reviewed more negatively might opt for traditional review, as they might not want criticisms of their paper to be made public. Whether or not this bias affected the results, it is true that 13 out of 98 authors chose not to take part in the trial. Somewhat to our surprise, three of those 13 explicitly stated that they opted out because review would not be fully open . Moving to transparent review permanently would therefore run the risk of putting off some authors and reducing the number of manuscripts submitted to the journal.One criticism of traditional peer review is that a reader does not know who the reviewers were, and so cannot judge whether they had sufficient expertise to assess the manuscript, thus meaning the stamp of ‘peer reviewed’ is of uncertain value. Although transparent review does not fully address this, since the reader still will not know the reviewers’ identities, the reader will be able to read the comments and assess whether the reviewer has made sensible and reasonable criticism of the work, which should lead to increased confidence in the peer-review assessment. Fully open review would be even better from this point of view, but many reviewers may be reluctant to associate their names with negative reviews, even when the negative comments are justified, for fear of retaliation. It seems to us that transparent review is currently the best compromise, and we hope that, when it is well established, it will foster a more open environment where reviewers will feel more comfortable in revealing their identities.Therefore, we feel that transparent review will be the right choice for the journal. Our results suggest some authors might be reluctant to submit under those circumstances, but we nevertheless feel that the benefits of transparent review outweigh a possible small drop in submissions. We will be making this move permanently: after 1 January 2019, all submissions will be reviewed transparently. By doing this, we join an increasing number of journals that are adopting transparency. Recently, editors from over 100 journals from a variety of publishers signed an open letter committing to move to transparent review . We are


The landscape of scholarly writing, publishing, and university promotion can be complex and challenging. Mentorship may be limited. To be successful it is important to understand the key components of writing and publishing. In this article, we provide expert consensus recommendations on four key challenges faced by junior faculty: writing the paper; selecting contributors and the importance of authorship order; journal selection and indexing; and responding to critiques. After reviewing this paper, the reader should have an enhanced understanding of these challenges and strategies to successfully address them. Writing and publishing are an important component of academic medicine. However, it can be challenging for many junior academicians to navigate the process to a successful publication. In fact, studies have consistently demonstrated that less than half of all conference abstracts are ever published as full manuscripts.One of the biggest challenges to publishing is often writing the manuscript. After a study has been completed, the next step is to create the manuscript and submit for publication. Often, this can be facilitated by writing the introduction and methods sections prior to completing the study and finishing the results and discussion sections after completion, so that the burden of writing is less to overcome. Additionally, reading and peer reviewing other articles can be incredibly valuable by providing experience and insights into the scientific literature, as well as learning what features make a high-quality submission. It may be particularly useful to review several articles from the intended journal prior to submission to ensure that your style and language are consistent with prior accepted submissions. All journals also have authorship instructions, which include guidelines on formatting, section categories, and article limits . Authors should review these carefully and diligently to ensure that they completely follow all of the rules.When writing a manuscript, it is important to follow a structure. The most common format is: abstract, introduction, methods, results, discussion, limitations, and conclusion. The introduction should be formatted such that it presents a summary of the literature and how the study fits into the current understanding of the topic. This has been referred to as the problem/gap/hook heuristic.http://www.equator-network.org/) for their specific study design and ensure that their manuscript addresses all of the reporting criteria. For example, if the authors are publishing an observational study, they should adhere to the Strengthening the Reporting of Observational Studies in Epidemiology (STROBE) guidelines,The methods section should clearly define the study protocol, such that it could be easily repeated by another investigator. Authors are advised to ensure that the population, intervention, control, outcome, and time interval are explicitly described.The results section should describe the study population, adherence to the protocol, and all relevant outcomes. It may be advantageous to include data in tables and figures to avoid an overly lengthy results section. One common pitfall is to repeat the results in both the tables and figures, as well as the text. Often, only one is necessary and tables and figures are generally preferable. Another common error is to discuss the significance of the findings in the results section. Any discussion of importance and relevance should be deferred to the discussion section.The discussion section should focus on applying the results in the context of the current literature, including how it supports or refutes prior studies and how this will impact future patient care and research. The limitations section should address all potential biases and confines of the current study. All studies have limitations and it is important to address them as thoroughly as possible, both with respect to the potential influence on results and directions for future study.Academic Medicine , and could be challenged by other researchers to verify the methodology, statistics, or research results. While this is almost always the first or last author, it could be awarded to a different author to properly credit that person when she or he provided a substantial contribution to the project, but was not selected as the first or last author .https://orcid.org/).Finally, it is important to discuss the importance of unique author identification. While researchers and readers are often able to easily distinguish the work of authors with uncommon surnames from others, readers can struggle to differentiate the work of authors from others sharing a similar surname and first initial.http://www.scimagojr.com/journalrank.php?area=2700&category=2711. The Western Journal of Emergency Medicine is available here: https://escholarship.org/uc/item/4pc1v507#supplemental.There are a myriad of journals to which you could submit your research papers. To promote yourself and career, it is vital to understand the hierarchy of the quality and selectivity of journals. There are currently 78 journal titles that relate to EM in the Scimago Journal and Country Rank index (SJR). You can find an updated list at: not listed, the quality of the journal may be questionable. For newer journals, it can be valuable to review the list of accepted publications to determine the quality of submissions. Discussing with more experienced researchers and medical librarians can also be valuable for assessing the potential quality of the journal.A journal’s scope of indexing determines how another physician can find your paper to read and possibly cite. The Western Journal of Emergency Medicine no longer accepts case reports, its affiliated journal Clinical Practice and Cases in Emergency Medicine accepts exclusively case reports, images, and clinicopathologic cases; so the chance of successful acceptance is profoundly different between journals. Additionally, you should briefly review several recent issues to determine both the methodological rigor and topics typically accepted.Deciding where to submit may be overwhelming to more novice researchers. While it may seem tempting to submit to the journal with the top impact factor or a familiar journal title, it is important to select an appropriate journal to have the best chance of acceptance. You should begin by determining whether the journal accepts the category of article you are planning to submit. For example, while the Read the scope and mission statements of the journals to see if your paper fits. Aligning with the journal’s interests will foster a stronger cover letter when submitting and increase the likelihood of acceptance. There are many subspecialty journals related to EM that focus on specific arenas . If your paper deals with one of these areas, consider expanding your potential submission list to include the relevant subspecialty journals.https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nlmcatalog/journals/) to determine if the journal is indexed in PubMed or MEDLINE. Currently, 89 titles appear for the search term “emergency medicine.” However, many of these are listed as “not currently indexed in MEDLINE.” This may indicate that the journal is either new, well established but not yet accepted for inclusion, or “predatory.” Importantly, if a journal is not indexed in any of these databases listed in the Often, several journals will be a good fit for the article, and you must choose. One of the first determinants should be whether the journal is indexed in one of the United States National Library of Medicine’s (NLM) databases. This information is located in the accompanying online table. Alternatively, you can type the name of the journal in the NLM catalog of journals referenced in the National Center for Biotechnology Information Database , the NLM’s repository of full research papers. PMC currently contains 2,920 journal titles. Type the journal name into the “Search for Journals” box located under PMC Journals  to see if the journal comes up, or you can browse the journal titles through the alphabetical list tabs. If the journal is found, this indicates it has gone through a moderate, multilevel vetting process that typically requires two years of publication and 25–50 submitted papers.If the prospect journal is “open access,” check to see if the journal content is included  in PubMed Central , this may be a reflection of a lesser quality or newer publication. Quality subscription journals are commonly included in PubMed within 5–10 years of inception, and PMC within 2–3 years. Many newer journals are still developing the quality to achieve acceptance to these indices, so they may become PubMed indexed in the coming years. If so, it is customary for previous papers published in the journal before inclusion, to eventually be entered into these indices.®, CiteScoreTM, and Eigenfactor® (discussed further in a subsequent paper in the series). Selecting journals with a higher rating suggests that the article will have more visibility and, therefore, be more likely to be cited. This is important because journal ranking and the number of citations is highly valued by promotion and tenure committees. In general, there is an inverse correlation between a journal’s impact factor and its acceptance rate.Additional factors to consider when submitting include the journal’s impact factor, InCites Journal Citation ReportsOnce you’ve made a list of potential journals, rank them using the above criteria and submit to the top-listed and most relevant journal first. Often, this will be the most rigorous and may result in an early rejection. However, if selected appropriately, the article will be sent out for reviews, which can provide valuable feedback and insights even if the article is rejected.“Open access” refers to a type of scholarly publication where the author retains the copyright to the work, and access to the entirety of the work is free of charge to readers and other researchers. Typically, the author pays the publisher for their services, with fees ranging from $400 to $4,000 per paper. Legitimate open-access publishers perform substantial scientific peer review with associated detailed revisions prior to publication, and have achieved wide indexing, so that your work can be easily read and cited.Subscription-based publishers  require the author to sign over the copyright of their work to the journal in exchange for publication. Authors must subsequently ask the publisher for permission to reproduce any parts of their paper  and publishers often charge a fee for this. Because the publishing services are expensive, rather than charging a fee, the author pays for the services using their scholarly product as payment, and the publisher generates revenue through library subscriptions, copyright sales, and advertising.Conversely, so-called “predatory” open-access publishing is an exploitative model that involves charging publication fees to authors without providing any significant editorial or publishing services. Predatory journals often identify authors from prior publications or large databases of physicians and routinely solicit submissions by email. They promise rapid review and publication in time frames that preclude substantive peer review.While papers published by a predatory publisher are, in theory, accessible by other scholars, they do not return in the important indexing service searches that qualified scholars use to find and cite your work. These publishers (more than 900 worldwide in 2017) profit from inexperienced or desperate authors by charging exorbitant publication fees without providing the customary publishing services. Some of these publishers ask authors to provide substantial fees to withdraw their submission during the review period, once the authors realize they have been deceived. 7Peer review is the backbone of scientific publishing. At its best, it will provide multiple, detailed, independent, and unbiased assessments of your work by clinicians and research peers. This is intended to improve your work prior to dissemination for future use by readers and scientists. Knowing that once published, your work will need to stand alone for years to come should change your perspective to one of welcoming the most thorough critiques in the hope of identifying all flaws prior to public dissemination.Responding to reviewer critiques can be one of the most important aspects of the manuscript preparation, as it can determine whether your revised manuscript is accepted or rejected. Junior faculty submitting manuscripts for the first time can often feel quite overwhelmed by how to proceed with the critiques due to the number of requests, possible strong tones from reviewers, and the challenge of consolidating disagreements between critiques from different reviewers.Here are some general principles to consider as you approach revisions and respond to critiques. First, disagreeing or not being able to comply with reviewers, although not preferable, is quite acceptable. However, this decision needs to be factually-based, polite without added emotion, professional, and appropriately referenced.34It can be valuable to wait 1–2 days prior to responding to let any strong emotions pass and allow you to focus on the scientific components of the paper. When responding to comments, you should make sure to respond to every critique, even if you disagree. This can be facilitated by separating reviewer paragraphs into separate points, listing them in order, and then sequentially responding to each comment.When submitting the point-by-point response, it can be helpful to highlight your response in a different font style, indentation, or color. Make note of the response, corresponding line numbers, and the verbatim changes you have made in the paper for each comment. Make it as easy as possible for the reviewer and editor to know how you have addressed the request and the exact changes you have made in each specific instance.If there are concerns regarding grammar or spelling in the manuscript , you should consider having an experienced writer or professional copy editor review it to correct all language mistakes. Finally, make sure to review the journal’s revision requirements, as some require submission of manuscripts with tracked changes in the document. Pay attention to the time frame required for revisions, which can be as short as a month. If you cannot meet the deadline, make sure to contact the editor early to ask for an extension. In general, it is best to resubmit as soon as feasible, ideally within one month.This paper reviews four common challenges faced by all faculty and researchers when writing and publishing their academic work, and provides advice for effectively navigating this arena. We hope that this series will assist junior faculty, fellows, and residents as they pursue successful research and academic careers.


Scholarly communication is in a perpetual state of disruption. Within this, peer review of research articles remains an essential part of the formal publication process, distinguishing it from virtually all other modes of communication. In the last several years, there has been an explosive wave of innovation in peer review research, platforms, discussions, tools and services. This is largely coupled with the ongoing and parallel evolution of scholarly communication as it adapts to rapidly changing environments, within what is widely considered as the ‘open research’ or ‘open science’ movement. Here, we summarise the current ebb and flow around changes to peer review and consider its role in a modern digital research and communications infrastructure and suggest why uptake of new models of peer review appears to have been so low compared to what is often viewed as the ‘traditional’ method of peer review. Finally, we offer some insight into the potential futures of scholarly peer review and consider what impacts this might have on the broader scholarly research ecosystem. In particular, we focus on the key traits of certification and reputation, moderation and quality control and engagement incentives, and discuss how these interact with socio-technical aspects of peer review and academic culture. The state of the art in scholarly peer review. Peer review is one of the strongest social constructs within the self-regulated world of academia and scholarly communication. Researcher attitudes towards peer review are often in a state of reverence hailing it as a ‘golden standard’ Mayden , and eveWith so much standing attributed to peer review, one would expect that it is a relatively optimised process, generally well-understood as a theory and a practice, and stable due to its widespread adoption and acceptance as a method. However, the reality could not be further from the truth. Since its origins, there have been vocal critics about almost every aspect and form of peer review, from its implementation and management, to its wider effects on research culture and the dissemination of scholarship (SI 1) Smith . HoweverWhat is currently clear is that there is a divergence between how peer review is generally practiced as a multi-dimensional and diverse suite of processes, and how it is commonly regarded as a singular ideologue , as well as to meet increasing demands for expert authority in a research world that was becoming rapidly specialised. One consequence of this was the synonymisation of peer review with scholarly value, which catalysed commercial interest in the process, as it became a way of strengthening journal brands for marketing purposes. An additional effect of this was the effective out-sourcing of the governance of peer review, and the legitimisation that came with it, to commercial entities that operated outside of research communities. Recent developments in ‘Open Peer Review’ (OPR) can largely be viewed as a set of practices to streamline and improve the process in a variety of ways, to help realign the modern practices with the original ideals of progressive collaboration and improving the argumentation style   are unified by the more complex issue of transparency in peer review, which itself is part of wider changes in the scholarly communication system around the advent of ‘open science’. While there is no single, accepted, unified definition or vision of ‘open science’, one of the core aspects of it revolves around greater transparency throughout the entire research process, including peer review. There are numerous reasons often given for this, such as to combat the ‘reproducibility crisis’, to expose or prevent research misconduct, to introduce greater accountability for researchers, or to increase the verifiability of the research record in order to engender greater public trust for the scientific enterprise  who have adopted different and innovative aspects of open peer review since their beginnings. Very few publishers or platforms seem to fulfill the complete combination of all 7 traits, with exceptions such as ScienceOpen.Perhaps one of the most critical innovations accompanying this diversification was that of ‘soundness-only’ peer review, often considered a defining trait for megajournals, in which only the scientific rigour of research, not purported novelty or impact, was a deciding factor in publication  Ginsparg . Here, tWith the ongoing disciplinary expansion in preprint servers , there is an increasing scope for a number of new overlay journals to be developed, tailored for different research communities. Services such as F1000 Research are similar to preprint platforms, where papers are made available prior to successive iterations of peer review, with manuscripts updated through a simple system of version control. Other services such as PubPeer, PaperHive and ScienceOpen provide a range of post-publication services, typically both on preprints and final version manuscripts.There remain enormous challenges here in interoperability between vendors, formal recognition of the preprint and ‘post-publication peer review’ process, recognition of the reviews themselves, which can often remain difficult to discover, and then using such reviews to alter published articles, which are often considered to be final (and therefore immutable); a problem exacerbated by the ubiquitous usage of the PDF format and lack of version control. Aggregating reviews from across platforms, and then formalising their recognition as a method of scholarly evaluation is the clear next step here in creating a more continuous peer review and publication workflow Florian . An inteHow to provide and receive appropriate credit for peer review is an ongoing debate. Recently, Crossref, the primary Digital Object Identifier (DOI) provider for scholarly research, announced that review reports could be now registered as part of their services Lin . This heWhat would scholarly publishing look like if we rebuilt it from scratch using the tools and knowledge available to us in 2018? This question is not theoretically or conceptually difficult to explore. However, it is problematic often to even discuss, due to the instantaneous resistance that comes because we are talking about disruption of an incredibly complex system adopted by a powerful and thriving industry, and one in which cultural and social norms are deeply embedded across multi-stakeholder processes and institutes. Due to the powerful status of peer review in granting a means of academic capital and prestige, it has gradually evolved to become part of an increasingly bureaucratic and neo-liberal institutional process, which can stifle innovation. Nonetheless, it is a powerful thought process to explore, as essentially it represents a collective vision that most stakeholders in scholarly communications have to streamline the processes, but with extremely different ideas about the time frame that such a vision would be possible to realise in, as well as how to achieve it. Coupled with this, serious consideration is required into whether or not peer review requires a standard, grounded in transparency, in order to be verifiable across a diverse range of communities. This would introduce substantially more rigour into the process, which we should expect from such a critical part of scholarly research.One key element of this future is the continued decoupling of peer review from journals, through ongoing developments in preprints and community-organised peer review, as discussed above. There is a potential here that researchers begin to see journals as redundant, beyond services such as branding and archiving, and therefore we start to see publishers diversify and unbundle their publishing services. Such could be achieved through the offering or ‘unbundling’ of ‘freemium’ services, such as English-language proofing, copy-editing, type-setting, plagiarism checks and press and media services. Now, large scholarly publishers such as Elsevier are even rebranding as data and analytics companies, perhaps catalysed by the recognition that journals will have significantly less value in the future. However, it is extremely unlikely that the wider scholarly publishing industry will require, or encourage, such a radical shift into services like this, while journal brands are still a dominant factor governing research assessment processes , that call for great rigour and transparency in research assessment, do not seem to have had any significant impact on researcher behaviours; if they had, we would have expected to see a weakening of journals as the primary mode of scholarly communication, which has not occurred. Indeed, it is likely that this academic perception of journals as the authoritative source for research, in part due to the apparent verification and certification role that peer review plays when coupled to it, has stifled much of the innovation beyond journal-based peer review in many disciplinary communities . This has coincided with a developing understanding of peer review, thanks to the work of initiatives such as PEERE (http://www.peere.org/). The key to maintaining this momentum will be sustained engagement with the different stakeholders to develop a more holistic framework of peer review, in which risk perception is minimised while the advantages are made much more explicit and evidence-based  and non-community owned publishing platforms, particularly with respect to governance structures;How to close the divergence between the original ideal of peer review  and the modern practice of it;And finally, how Internet-style communication norms can be integrated into peer review, and why our expectations for this to happen seem to be lagging for scholarly publishing and peer review.We anticipate that future discussions and innovations will focus on a number of particular areas:While we should not encourage conformation to the status quo in scholarly communication, and a general lack of experimentation, we should also be fully sympathetic towards stakeholders who might not want to see such disruption of scholarly communication norms. Thus, engagement efforts should be focused more on understanding what the reasons for this might be and to use this knowledge to see how to bring what is best for different communities into line with that. There appears to be a general apathetic view towards many aspects of scholarly communication, and it is the responsibility of those who are helping to sculpt this future to maximise participation in it through effective communications. Then, the global scholarly community can collectively help to address the real issues of control and governance of public research. It is our hope that this paper highlights the incredible scope for potential innovations in the future of peer review, and that different communities draw inspiration from that to design optimal systems of research communication.Supplemental FilesClick here for additional data file.


Rheumatology Advances in Practice is a new online open access journal published by the British Society for Rheumatology (BSR) and Oxford University Press. The journal will complement the well-established journal Rheumatology and reflect the increasing breadth of rheumatology practice. In many countries a growing diversity of non-medical professionals including specialist nurses, physiotherapists, podiatrists and pharmacists play an important role in the management of patients with rheumatic diseases. The close relationship between these disciplines has recently been emphasised in the UK by the merger of professional bodies representing allied health professionals and primary care physicians into the British Society for Rheumatology. The BSR has therefore decided that to better reflect its broader membership, it will support a second journal.Rheumatology Advances in Practice is to reflect this growing research activity and to provide a truly multidisciplinary journal for this community, which we consider is not adequately served by existing publications. The core editorial team therefore has members with a physiotherapy, psychology and nursing backgrounds. Further details of the team can be found at the journal website (https://academic.oup.com/rheumap).With the expansion of non-medical care in rheumatic diseases has come an increase in academic and clinical research by the various related disciplines. The aim of Rheumatology using single blind review. We believe that this combination will enable us to achieve rapid publication of high quality papers.Our key aim is to provide rapid publication of high quality papers covering therapies, imaging, education, qualitative research, health economics, rare rheumatic diseases, and translational science, and we very much welcome papers from all healthcare professionals and BSR members. Published manuscripts from non-medical health care professionals will attract a lower open access article publication charge. As soon as papers have been fully peer reviewed and accepted, they will be published online, prior to copy-editing and typesetting, to facilitate the dissemination of papers rapidly. The final version of the paper will be subsequently posted on line following copyediting, typesetting and correction by the authors. Peer review will be rigorous and to the same high standard as Rheumatology Advances in Practice.On behalf of the editorial team, the BSR and Oxford University Press we look forward to receiving your manuscripts and to publishing them in


Dr Michel Brémont has served as Editor-in-Chief since 2009. Michel retired at the beginning of May 2019, after a life dedicated to science. Michel was a scientist specialized in virology, working in the Virology and Immunology Unit at the Animal Health Division of the French National Institute for Agricultural Research (INRA). First focused on rotavirus, he then became a leader on fish viruses and the development of viral vaccines. He has authored more than seventy research articles or reviews on these topics.Veterinary Research is a peer-reviewed journal that publishes high quality and novel research and review articles that contribute significantly to all aspect of infectious diseases and host–pathogen interactions. Veterinary Research has been edited by INRA since 1993. It is supported by INRA Animal Health Division. Before, it was published under the title Annales de Recherches Vétérinaires, which was created in 1970.Veterinary Research as an open access journal published with BMC since 2011. As Editor-in-Chief, he created a board of associate editors. He was himself in charge of the Virology section. With their contribution, he made of Veterinary Research a high-quality journal with a high impact. Veterinary Research publishes original articles and reviews on infectious diseases from around the globe. Each year, our editors receive more than 350 manuscripts, approximately a-third of which are published.Michel has been instrumental in the transformation of Veterinary Research provides the highest possible level of editorial service. Our associate editors and Editor-in-Chief  are dedicated for communicating scientifically sound work to the largest possible audience. Our editors cover all the field of infectiology and the host–pathogen interactions, including immunology and epidemiology. All pathogens are considered including bacteria, viruses, parasites and prions. Studies on zoonotic and emerging infections and on adaptation to climate change or consequences of climate change are highly appreciated.We would like to take the opportunity of this editorial to recall that Farewell Michel, and enjoy life in the South-West of France.


We have been made aware of the fact that a large proportion of the Introduction section and corresponding references of the title paper  had beenMolecules paper, which to the best of our knowledge is original.As a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), MPDI takes very seriously the responsibility to enforce a rigorous peer-review process together with strict ethical policies and standards to ensure the addition of high quality scientific works to the field of scholarly publication. In addition to an infringement of the Elsevier and American Association for Cancer Research copyright on the previous publications, this is also a clear violation of our policy to only publish new, previously unpublished material, so this paper is declared retracted and shall be marked accordingly for the scientific record. We cannot comment on any of the scientific data contained in the Molecules editorial team for the fact this event went undetected during the peer-review and pre-publication processing of the paper and for any inconvenience caused by this event.We would like to apologize to our readership on behalf of the


Evolution Letters. The purpose of this editorial is to explain the journal's scope, main features and policies. Before that though, I will give a brief history of how the journal came into being.Welcome to the inaugural issue of Evolution, the flagship journal of the SSE (Society for the Study of Evolution). Daphne recognized that Evolution was at the limit of the number of articles it could publish, and yet there was an increasing need for a top tier journal featuring short papers with high impact, that demanded rapid publication. No journal quite like that existed for evolutionary biologists. An SSE committee, chaired by Charlie Fenster, was formed to look into the feasibility of launching a new journal. At this stage, it became apparent that this was an exciting opportunity to forge closer links between SSE and the European Society for Evolutionary Biology (ESEB). Thus, discussions began around a journal that would be co‐owned by SSE, ESEB, and Wiley‐Blackwell. An oversight committee, chaired by Butch Brodie, was setup. The oversight committee was charged with identifying an editor‐in‐chief, and with ensuring that the journal got off the ground as smoothly as possible. In April 2016, formal agreements were drawn up between the publishers, the societies, and the editor. Following the recruitment of the editorial board, the journal became open to submissions in September 2016.The idea for a society‐owned evolutionary journal, that featured short articles and a fast time to publication, was first conceived in 2012 by Daphne Fairbairn when she was Editor‐in‐Chief of Evolution Letters is an attractive place to submit your best work. We aim to publish only the highest quality research papers; in particular, we seek exciting papers that demand rapid publication. A “typical” Evolution Letters paper is relatively brief, contains exciting new research findings, and is at the cutting‐edge of any area of evolutionary biology. Unfortunately, this means competition for space is tough and quite a high proportion of submissions are not considered for review. These will often be perfectly good manuscripts, but are just not sufficiently exciting to be considered as being among the best in the field. We aim to publish work from across the breadth of evolutionary biology; including not just the areas traditionally covered by our sister journals Evolution and Journal of Evolutionary Biology, but also topics such as evolutionary medicine, molecular evolution, and paleobiology, which perhaps feature in those journals quite rarely. If you are unsure whether your manuscript falls within the journal's scope, send the editor a presubmission email.We think there are a number of reasons why Evolution Letters, you are directly supporting other evolutionary biologists. All of the journal's profits that go to SSE and ESEB are put straight back into our community. Both societies fund some great initiatives, with particular support given to young and early career researchers. For example, they fund conferences run for and by graduate students, promote equal opportunities through travel stipends, fund prizes for early career researchers, cover the cost of childcare at the societies’ major meetings, and sponsor various outreach events. By choosing to publish your best work in Evolution Letters you are directly helping all of these wonderful initiatives. Our APCs are almost 30% lower for members of SSE and ESEB, so do join one of the two societies if you are considering publishing in Evolution Letters. In fact, join them both. There is an additional $50 reduction in article charge to members of both societies, so if you are a member of one, join the other, and the saving will offset the cost of joining the other society.Our Open Access Article Processing Charges (APCs) are modest relative to most other evolutionary biology journals. Furthermore, by publishing in Evolution Letters is entirely open access, so anybody will be able to read your paper when it is published. Many funding bodies will cover the authors’ costs of open access processing charges if the journal is fully Open Access but not if the journal is a hybrid model . We also require authors to make their data available, in common with the other SSE/ESEB journals. Evolution Letters is fully integrated with Dryad, and we will not be passing the costs of data deposition on to authors.Evolution Letters is to ensure rapid publication of your work. Our current turnaround time from submission to first decision is 25 days, and because we are an online‐only journal, accepted manuscripts can rapidly be published. Articles will appear on Early View as soon as proofs have been received and corrected. Just as importantly though, we are very aware that formatting manuscripts for different journals’ in‐house style can be a time‐consuming and tedious process. We endeavor to make the manuscript submission process as painless as possible. Therefore, we do not require manuscripts to be formatted for Evolution Letters until after acceptance. Obviously, it helps if articles are within the intended spirit of the journal though—i.e., relatively succinct, and to the point. This means that if you have had a manuscript turned down by another journal, you can submit the same version of the manuscript you sent to the other journal. Authors may also choose to upload the reviews from the other journal. Doing so may lead to a faster decision time, although we reserve the option of seeking further reviews of the work, especially when the previous reviews were not very comprehensive. We have no policy that says manuscripts cannot be uploaded to bioRxiv or other preprint servers prior to submission to Evolution Letters. We will continue to find ways to make the process from manuscript preparation to online publication as rapid, flexible, and author friendly as we can.One of the main aims of Of course, once a paper is published, authors will want to see their work receive as much attention as possible. We have an editorial board member, Nicola Hemmings, with the exclusive role of promoting our papers through social media (Twitter handle @EvolLetters) and other routes. Nicola's research expertise is in reproductive biology and sexual selection, and she also has considerable experience in outreach and science communication. Accepted manuscripts all include an “Impact Summary” designed to explain the importance and novelty of the work to somebody less familiar with the field. These summaries are used to help promote the work and should be pitched at a level that a popular science writer, media officer, or an intelligent reader lacking formal training in evolutionary biology would appreciate.et al. (Boechera stricta. The authors explore both viability and fecundity selection and examine the extent to which locally adapted traits are under selection in a common environment. They also report how viability selection in juveniles can influence the distribution of phenotypes under selection in adults.Our first articles cover an exciting and diverse set of evolutionary topics. Our very first paper, by Amanda Gibson et al. , is an eet al.  is a micEvolution Letters and the wider evolutionary biology community by reading the articles we publish and sending your best work to us.We hope you enjoy these papers, and agree that they have set a high benchmark for the journal. Just as importantly though, we hope that you will support


It has come to our attention that the Western blot data shown in Figure 3 of  had beenMDPI is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics and takes seriously its responsibility to publish only high-quality research. We regret that these issues were not identified earlier and apologize to readers of the journal. We note that this action is not supported by the authors, who maintain that the original results still stand.


There is clear guidance on the responsibilities of editors to ensure that the research they publish is of the highest possible quality. Poor reporting is unethical and directly impacts patient care. Reporting guidelines are a relatively recent development to help improve the accuracy, clarity, and transparency of biomedical publications. They have caught on, with hundreds of reporting guidelines now available. Some journals endorse reporting guidelines while a smaller number have used various approaches to implement them. Yet challenges remain – biomedical research is still not optimally reported despite the abundance of reporting guidelines. Electronic algorithms are now being developed to facilitate the choice of correct reporting guideline(s), while other tools are being integrated into journal editorial management processes. Universities need to consider whether it is responsible to advance careers of faculty based on poorly reported research which is of little societal value. If journals embraced auditing of the quality of articles they publish this would give them and their readers essential feedback from which to improve their product. BMC Medicine was first launched, few reporting guidelines existed [JAMA, observed “there seems to be no study too fragmented, no hypothesis too trivial, no literature citation too biased or too egotistical, no design too warped, no methodology too bungled, no presentation of results too inaccurate, too obscure, and too contradictory, no analysis too self-serving, no argument too circular, no conclusions too trifling or too unjustified, and no grammar and syntax too offensive for a paper to end up in print” [In 2003, the year when  existed  despite n print”  remindedn print” , 6.BMC Medicine celebrates its 15th anniversary, it is useful to examine whether there are now mechanisms in place to improve the clarity, accuracy, and transparency of publications – a fundamental goal and responsibility of any credible journal [As  journal .http://rewardalliance.net/), are also drawing attention to these problems and offering solutions. Machine reading tools that provide automatic and immediate assessment of reporting guideline compliance, e.g., CONSORT in the first instance [Using the CONSORT statement as a launching pad, the EQUATOR Network was established in 2006. The vision was to develop a broad basket of tools to help authors, editors, peer reviewers, and others improve the reporting of articles published in biomedicine. The network was formally launched in 2008 . The netinstance , are alsBMC Medicine has drawn attention to peer review and called for greater professionalism of it [While authors sometimes submit shoddy reports for publication consideration, peer reviewers offer a potential screen of theoretically acceptable publications. Indeed, sm of it . JournalIt is possible that the misguided ‘publish or perish’ mantra at academic centers is promoting unscientific and unethical behavior when authors report their research. The prevalence rates of reporting biases are disturbingly high , 15, andThere are now plenty of reporting guidelines to help authors, editors, and peer reviewers, yet several challenges remain. Whether there is reporting guideline inflation resulting in potential confusion for users requires serious reflection. While there is accumulating evidence that use of reporting guidelines is associated with improved reporting, albeit not in all cases , this evReaders have little information about the quality of what journals publish. Journals need to be more proactive in providing this information such as through regular audits and feedback. Auditing the quality of reports that a journal publishes might provide important information for authors, editors, peer reviewers, and readers in identifying problems and opportunities to enhance the quality of published articles. Making such information available to the public would send a strong positive signal about openness, sharing data, and the journal’s commitment to continuous quality improvement.Funding programs to improve the quality of reporting biomedical research is remarkably difficult. The irony is that there is volumetric evidence of enormous avoidable waste in the current reporting of biomedical research and why there is hesitancy to fund programs to help improve the quality of reporting is difficult to comprehend. While a few enlightened funders are recognizing the importance of funding such research as well as other journalology and meta-research, there is much to be done to galvanize the majority of funders .Clear, accurate, and transparent reporting of biomedical research remains a considerable problem. Authors, editors, and peer reviewers have failed readers in providing a product that is robust, usable, and reproducible. There are now innovative tools available to help improve this situation, yet we need more active implementation of them by authors, editors, and peer reviewers. University promotion and tenure committees should consider whether offering career advancement based on poorly reported publications is of value to society and ethically sustainable.