PIXABAY, PEXELSIt’s no different than approaching a scientist who has just given a riveting talk on unpublished work at a conference, according to Christopher “Casey” Brown, a geneticist at the University of Pennsylvania. Because part of an editor’s job is to pursue the latest and greatest research for potential publication (whether presented at a meeting or submitted online), those at plugged-in journals are prospecting preprint servers, seeking standouts among the scads of non-peer–reviewed manuscripts posted for perusal by all.
Brown is one of three “preprint editors” recently recruited by PLOS Genetics to solicit manuscripts posted to arXiv, its life sciences counterpart bioRxiv, and other servers, for peer review and potential publication. “Editors are paying very close attention—at a whole number of journals—to the preprint atmosphere,” he said. “The role of editors is changing a bit, there is more interest in this sort of thing.”
Greg Barsh and Greg Copenhaver, co-editors of PLOS Genetics, contacted Brown and other preprint editor candidates who were recommended by members of the journal’s editorial board. To Barsh’s mind, the recruitments reflect an ongoing cultural shift in science publishing. As more and more scientists post preprints, participate in social media discussions, and consider alternative metrics (altmetrics), it only makes sense ...
