1. Submission procedure and workflow

2. Editorial policy

3. Requirements for submission to the thematic PCIs

4. Formatting your article for the Peer Community Journal

5. Templates

---

 

1. Submission procedure and workflow

Peer Community Journal publishes only articles first peer-reviewed and recommended by one of the thematic PCIs (see current thematic PCIs). The editorial policy, evaluation process, and appeal process of the Peer Community Journal are those of the thematic PCIs.

 

 

1) Deposit your article on a preprint server or in an open archive and obtain a DOI (or another unique identifier). Raw data, scripts, and codes must also be deposited in a dedicated open archive and be attributed a DOI. Templates for preprints are available for word and for latex users (no google docs here because line numbering is impossible in google docs).

2) Submit your article to one of the thematic PCIs according to their scope. Please consult the guide for authors of the corresponding PCI.

3) In case of acceptance by the thematic PCI, your article is recommended. 

4) Submit your article to the Peer Community Journal for publication by completing a basic form on the journal website and uploading a formatted version of your manuscript (see below section 4. Formatting your article for Peer Community Journal).

The instructions described below are those of the thematic PCIs.

---

2. Editorial policy​

2.1 Scope

2.2 Editorial criteria

2.3 Types of articles

2.4 Repeatability of science and open science

2.5 Ethics

2.6 New taxon names

2.1 Scope​​​

You should choose one of the thematic PCIs, according to the topic of your article, for submission. The scope of the PCIs is not exhaustive. Please look at the current thematic PCIs to decide which is the most suitable for your article.

2.2 Editorial criteria

​The Peer Community Journal publishes only preprints recommended by the thematic PCIs as of high scientific quality and methodologically and ethically sound. To this end, the thematic PCIs: 
- Require raw data, computer codes and mathematical and statistical analysis scripts to be made available at least to reviewers and recommenders at the time of submission, and also to readers after recommendation. 
- Welcome reproductions of studies. 
- Welcome preprint submissions based on preregistrations (whether or not reviewed) 
- Welcome preprints reporting negative results, provided that the questions addressed and the methodology are sound. 
- Do not accept submissions of preprints presenting financial conflicts of interest. Other conflicts of interest must be minimal and declared. 
- Ensure that, as far as possible, the recommenders and referees have no conflict of interest with the content or authors of the study being evaluated. 

The thematic PCIs do not guarantee the evaluation or recommendation of all submitted preprints. Only preprints considered interesting by at least one competent recommender (equivalent to an associate editor in a classical journal) from the thematic PCI to which the preprint is submitted will be peer-reviewed. The interest of the preprint, as determined by the recommender, can relate to its context, the scientific question addressed, the methodology, or the results. Each thematic PCI has a large number of recommenders, ensuring a considerable diversity of interests.

2.3 Types of article

The articles recommended may be of different types: reviews, comments, opinion papers, research articles, data papers, technical notes, computer notes, etc. Preregistrations should be submitted to PCI Registered Reports.​

2.4 Repeatability of science and open science​

The Peer Community Journal wishes to promote scientific repeatability and reliability, to improve the overall robustness and integrity of science.

To this end, the Peer Community Journal has established three mandatory rules and makes two additional suggestions to authors:

Mandatory rules:​

Articles published by the Peer Community Journal must provide readers with: 
-Raw data, made available directly in the text or through an open repository, such as Zenodo, Dryad or some other institutional repository (see Directory of Open Access Repositories) with a DOI. Data must be reusable, and the metadata and accompanying text must, therefore, carefully describe them.

-Details of quantitative analyses (e.g. data processing and statistical scripts in R, bioinformatic pipeline scripts, etc.) and simulations (scripts, codes) must be provided in the text or through an open repository, such as Zenodo, Dryad or some other institutional repository (see Directory of Open Access Repositories) with a DOI. The scripts or codes must be carefully described such that another researcher can run them. 

-Details of experimental procedures must be provided in the text.​

Suggestions to authors:

-The Peer Community Journal encourages authors to use preregistrations. Authors may post their research questions and analysis plan to an independent registry before observing the research outcomes, and, thus, before writing and submitting their article to a thematic PCI. This provides a way of clarifying their hypotheses, avoiding confusing “postdictions” and predictions, and carefully planning appropriate statistical processing of the data (e.g. see 10.1073/pnas.1708274114).​​​

-For evaluation and recommendation, preregistrations should be submitted to PCI Registered Reports

-The Peer Community Journal welcomes recommended articles proposing replication studies. All submissions are assessed by the thematic PCIs according to the same criteria, provided that the article is considered interesting by the recommender handling it and the research question is judged to be scientifically valid.​​​

2.5 Ethics​

The Peer Community Journal is published by Peer Community In, which is a member of and subscribes to the principles of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). In addition, articles published by the Peer Community Journal respect the ethical principles defined by the European Association for Science Editors and by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors. The following guidelines are adapted from the ICMJE Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals, and of the EASE Guidelines for Authors and Translators of Scientific Articles to be Published in English. Peer Community In prepared this reprint. The ICMJE and the EASE have not endorsed nor approved the contents of this reprint. The official version of the ICMJE Recommendations and the EASE guidelines are located respectively at www.ICMJE.org and at https://ease.org.uk/.

Ethical oversight

The Managing Board of each thematic PCI (who belongs to the editorial board of the journal) is responsible for monitoring the ethical aspects of submitted articles. Reviewers are invited to expose their concerns (if any) about ethics or scientific misconduct during peer review. 
iThenticate’s CrossCheck software is used to detect plagiarism.

Original or acceptable secondary publication

• No part of the manuscript (MS) has been published, except for passages that are properly cited.
• In the MS, original data are clearly distinguished from published data. All information extracted from other publications is provided with citations.

Use of copyright material

If authors reproduce previously published materials (eg figures), they must ask the copyright owners for permission and mention them in the captions or in the acknowledgments.

Authorship

• All people listed as authors of the MS meet the authorship criteria, i.e. they contributed substantially to study planning, data collection or the interpretation of results and wrote or critically revised the MS and approved its final submitted version and agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work (ICMJE 2017).

• All people listed as authors of the MS are aware of their authorship and have agreed to be listed.
• No person who meets the authorship criteria has been omitted.

Ethical experimentation and interpretation

• If the study reported in the MS involved human participants, it should meet the ethical principles of the Declaration of Helsinki (WMA 2013).
• If appropriate, the study reported in the MS should meet the Consensus Author Guidelines on Animal Ethics and Welfare for Editors concerning the humane treatment of animals and should be approved by an ethics review committee.
• In fields of research requiring approval from an ethics committee or institutional review board, the authors should ensure that all the necessary approvals have been obtained before submission.
• If applicable, the authors should include a statement in the manuscript indicating that informed consent was obtained for experimentation with human subjects.

Case reports and informed consent

As stated in the Rules for Submission of Articles to Biomedical Journals, proposed by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE, 2019), patients' right to privacy prohibits the publication of articles without informed consent. No information should identify patients, neither in text or photos, nor in an indirect manner (descriptions of individual case histories, photos, X-rays, genetic pedigrees…).

In the case of articles reporting on research involving human subjects, the authors must specifically describe their study's compliance with the ethical rules set up by the responsible Ethics Committee and by the Declaration of Helsinki of the World Association of Physicians (WMA) revised in 2013. Unless written consent is obtained from the patient, identifying details must be removed before submission of the article (including illustrations and videos). This requirement also applies when a report involves deceased persons.

Should consent from a patient be requested, authors of the articles concerned must attest that the relevant form has been signed by the patient or a proxy.

The journal does not collect the signed patient forms: authors should attest that the original of the signed form is held by the treating institution.

Best research practices

• The authors should do their best to avoid errors in experimental design, data presentation, interpretation, etc. However, should they nevertheless ​discover a serious error in the MS (before or after publication), they will alert the Peer Community Journal.
• None of the data presented in the MS have been fabricated or distorted, and no valid data have been excluded. Images shown in figures have not been manipulated to give readers a false impression.
• The study results have been interpreted objectively. Any findings that run contrary to the authors’ point of view are discussed in the MS.
• The article does not, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, contain anything that is libelous, illegal, infringes anyone’s copyright or other rights, or poses a threat to public safety.

Acknowledgments

• All sources of funding for the study described in the MS should be reported.
• All people who are not listed as authors but made a major contribution to the study reported in the MS or who assisted in its writing (e.g. author’s editors, translators, medical writers) should be mentioned in the Acknowledgements.
• All people named in the Acknowledgements must have agreed to be mentioned. They are not, however, responsible for the final version of the MS.
• Consent must be obtained from the authors of any unpublished data cited in the MS.
• The owners of the copyright to any previously published figures or tables must agree to their inclusion in the MS.

Conflict of interest

• Financial conflicts of interest are forbidden, see the PCI code of conduct.
• Authors should declare any potential non-financial conflict of interest.

Complaints and appeal process

Authors of rejected manuscripts can appeal against the thematic PCI decision within 30 days of receiving it, by contacting the managing board of the thematic PCI at the contact email address. Appeals will be considered by the specialist recommender(s) that handled the manuscript and the thematic PCI Managing Board. Decisions following appeal are final.

Data sharing and reproducibility

See the paragraph "2.4 Repeatability of science and open science" ​above.

Misconducts
Peer Community Journal will follow the recommendations of COPE (the Committee on Publication Ethics) in the event of misconduct. 
When the executive board of Peer Community Journal has knowledge of potential misconduct regarding a paper published in Peer Community Journal, it will ask an ad hoc committee of editors to investigate the case. The ad hoc committee will advise the Executive Board of the journal, and based on COPE's recommendations, the Executive Board will make a decision on what action to take.
Retractions, expressions of concern, or corrections may be published by the journal.

Intellectual property

The articles published by Peer Community Journal are published under a CC-BY license. Authors retain the copyright and full publishing rights without restrictions.

Post-publication discussions and corrections

Readers are invited to submit articles discussing articles published by Peer Community Journal. These submissions should be submitted to the corresponding thematic PCI for evaluation and then, in case of acceptance, transferred to Peer Community Journal for publication.
In case of misconduct, retractions, expressions of concern or corrections may be published by the journal.

Reference Sources

https://www.ease.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/doi.10.20316.ESE_.2018.44.e1.pdf

https://www.wma.net/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/DoH-Oct2013-JAMA.pdf

http://www.icmje.org/icmje-recommendations.pdf

https://ethics.iit.edu/ecodes/node/5487

2.6 New taxon names​

Electronic publication of new taxonomic names is now permitted by the relevant codes of nomenclature. However, a certain number of requirements must be met for the electronic version of the work and the new names to be considered published. Authors of new zoological, botanical, and fungal names must comply with the following requirements.

Zoological names

The International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN) allows electronic publication of new zoological names and nomenclatural acts as long as the work in which they appear is properly archived and registered. Details of the publication must be entered into Zoobank, the official ICZN registry. Peer Community Journal is archived in CLOCKSS and will appear as a known journal during the Zoobank registration process.

Authors must register their publication and their new names into Zoobank to obtain corresponding LSIDs (Life Science Identifiers). For nomenclatural acts other that a new species, genus, or family name, only the registration of the published work is currently mandatory.

In the Systematics or Results section, the LSID must be listed after each new species, genus, and family name, for example:

Homo naledi sp. nov.

urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:C85CAAC2-658B-4189-B1D8-F9488F67E544

In the Methods section, authors must also include the following statement:

"The electronic version of this article conforms with the requirements of the amended International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN). Hence the new names and nomenclatural acts contained herein are effectively published under that Code from the electronic edition alone. This published work and the nomenclatural acts it contains have been registered in ZooBank, the online registration system for the ICZN. The ZooBank LSIDs (Life Science Identifiers) can be resolved and the associated information viewed through any standard web browser by appending the LSID to the prefix “http://zoobank.org/”. The LSID for this publication is: urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:XXXXXXX. The electronic edition of this work is archived and available from the following digital repositories: Peer Community Journal and CLOCKSS."

Botanical names

Since January 2012, the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (ICN) recognizes electronic work published with an ISSN or an ISBN as effectively published under the Code. It is also accepted that the description or diagnosis of a new taxon can be given in either Latin or English. For vascular plants and fungi, please see the additional requirements below.

For vascular plants

Peer Community Journal requires new names, new combinations, or replacement names to be registered into the International Plant Names Index (IPNI).

The LSIDs (Life Science Identifiers) obtained from the IPNI should be listed under the new names in the Systematics or Results section. And the following text should be added in the Methods section:

"The electronic version of this article conforms with the requirements of the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (ICN). Hence the new names and nomenclatural acts contained herein are effectively published under that Code from the electronic edition alone. In addition, new names contained in this work have been submitted to the International Plant Names Index (IPNI), from where they will be made available to the Global Names Index. The IPNI LSIDs can be resolved and the associated information viewed through any standard web browser by appending the LSID to the prefix https://ipni.org/. The electronic edition of this work is archived and available from the following digital repositories: Peer Community Journal and CLOCKSS."

For fungi

Authors need to contact either MycoBank or Index Fungorum to obtain a LSID (Life Science identifier) for their new name or nomenclatural act (mandatory since January 1st, 2013). The LSID must be included in the protologue. Authors must also add the following text in the Methods section (update as necessary):

"The electronic version of this article conforms with the requirements of the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (ICN). Hence the new names and nomenclatural acts contained herein are effectively published under that Code from the electronic edition alone. In addition, new names contained in this work have been submitted to the MycoBank / Index Fungorum, from where they will be made available to the Global Names Index. The LSIDs can be resolved and the associated information viewed through any standard web browser by appending the LSID to the prefix https://www.MycoBank.org/MB/ OR http://www.indexfungorum.org/Names/NamesRecord.asp?RecordID=. The electronic edition of this work is archived and available from the following digital repositories: Peer Community Journal and CLOCKSS."

---

3. Requirements for submission to the thematic PCIs

3.1 Deposition of the MS and supplementary information, submission to a thematic PCI, recommendation by the thematic PCI

• Authors should first post their article on a preprint server, such as bioRxiv or arXiv (see details). Templates for preprints are available for word and for latex users (no google docs here because line numbering is impossible in google docs).
• Raw data, statistical scripts in R, bioinformatic pipeline scripts, scripts and codes used for simulation or for statistical analyses and all other supplementary information must be deposited in an open repository, such as Zenodo, Dryad or some other institutional repository (see Directory of Open Access Repositories) with a DOI. 
• When the article has appeared on the preprint server and when the raw data, scripts and codes have appeared on their repository, authors can submit their article to a thematic PCI (see guide for authors).

3.2 Ethics

When submitting their manuscripts to a thematic PCI, authors should agree to respect the ethical principles described above.

---

4. Formatting your article for Peer Community Journal

4.1 Structure of your article

4.2 If you formatted your article with the PCI submission template

4.3 If you did not use the PCI submission template

4.3.1 For LaTex users

4.3.2 For Microsoft Word users

4.3.3 For LibreOffice / OpenOffice users

4.3.4 For Google Docs users

 

4.1 Structure of your article

The format of the article for submission (i.e. transfer from a PCI) to the Peer Community Journal is very simple. The text should begin with the introduction, with no cover page, header or footer. Templates are available for word, Google Docs and for latex users.
We will add a cover page, headers and footers to the pdf of your article after submission (an example of an article can be seen here).

The structure of your article should follow this classic structure (the first 4 sections can be changed depending on the article type): 

• Introduction
• Material and methods
• Results
• Discussion
• Acknowledgments
• Funding
• Conflict of interest disclosure
• Data, script, code, and supplementary information availability
• References

Data, statistical scripts, command lines and simulation code, and all supplementary information must be made available to readers, in an open repository with a DOI (see the repositories listed by OpenDOAR, eg. Zenodo). A perennial URL can be provided if no DOI is available; please note that GitHub URLs are not perennial. Information on how to issue a DOI for a GitHub repository is given at https://docs.github.com/en/repositories/archiving-a-github-repository/referencing-and-citing-content
If data are not directly accessible, the reason should be given in the "Data, scripts, code, and supplementary information availability" section
Wherever possible, data, scripts, codes, and supplementary information should be provided in machine-readable formats. Avoid PDFs other than for textual or figure supplementary information.
Readme files explaining data, scripts, and code are required to make data, scripts, and code understandable and reusable by the reader.

If the data, script, code, and supplementary information availability section contains one or several DOIs (or URLs), it is necessary to cite the corresponding reference(s) in the text when data, scripts, code, or supplementary information are mentioned and to list the corresponding reference(s) in the reference list. 

Make sure that your references are correct, and accurate and have a DOI when possible (e.g. https://doi.org/10111/100.1023). All the citations in the text should be cited in the references and reciprocally (see 4.3.2.4 for the complete requirements for references). A simple way to obtain the URL for the DOI at the end of each reference is to copy/paste your list of references into https://apps.crossref.org/simpleTextQuery. Some DOIs cannot be found in this way, but a Google search with the title of the article generally finds the corresponding DOI.

4.2 If you formatted your article with the PCI submission template

The optional templates to submit to PCI allow you to have your article ready for submission to Peer Community Journal very quickly and simply: Just remove the line numbers, delete the first page, and export as pdf. The file is ready to be transferred to Peer Community Journal.
Please do NOT use the file downloaded from the preprint server (because it often includes inappropriate formatting, such as unwanted headers and footers).

4.3 If you did not use the PCI submission template

4.3.1 For LaTex users

Simply use this PCJ LaTex package, and please add the option mode=plain to the classcopy. Paste your text, figures, tables, etc. into the PCJ-sample.tex file, change the PCJ-sample.bib file, add the required image files. Do not fill the metadata fields (names, affiliations, emails, etc.).

4.3.2 For Microsoft Word users

Use the word template file (PCJ.dotx) and follow the instructions below.

4.3.2.1 Download and save the template PCJ.dotx on your computer

4.3.2.2 If you start a document from scratch

• Open a new document from the template (or open the template by double-clicking on it in your file browser to create a new document)
• Save this new document with a convenient name (in .docx format)
• Start your document with the Introduction
• Check that all margins of all sections are set to 2.54 cm
• Use the predefined PCJ styles to format your document (see below).

4.3.2.2bis If you want to format an existing document

Open your document and link it to the PCJ.dotx template. To do this:

• In macOS: (1) Go to the "Tools" menu, (2) choose "Templates and Add-ins" and, (3) Check the “Automatically update document styles” option, (4) click on the "Attach" button and choose the PCJ.dotx template file.
• In Windows: In the Word Options dialog box, (1) click on “Add-ins” in the left bar, (2) select the template file from the Manage drop-down list, and (3) click on “Go”. A new dialog box should appear for Templates and Add-ins. Check the “Automatically update document” styles option and click on the “Attach” button. In the Attach Template dialog box, select the folder containing the PCJ.dotx template, and click on “Open”. Click on the “OK” button when it returns to the Templates and Add-ins dialog box.
• In Linux: try LaTex! 

4.3.2.3 Format your text

• Check that all the margins of all sections are set (top, left, right, bottom) to 2.54 cm
• Use the predefined PCJ styles to format your document (see below).

In all cases:

==> Do not include any front page containing the title, authors' names and affiliations, keywords and abstract. We will insert these items ourselves after the submission of your article.

==> Do not include any footer, page numbers, or header. We will insert these items ourselves after the submission of your article.

==> Do not insert blank lines or tabs; just use the predefined styles.

 

Use the predefined PCJ styles:

PCJ styles appear in the style gallery of the home tab. 

Once you have attached your article to the template PCJ.dotx, you can use the predefined style: click on the text you want to format (e.g. a section title) and then click on the corresponding predefined PCJ style in the style gallery of the home tab.

Use the following predefined PCJ styles in the corresponding parts of the document:

• PCJ Text. This style is used to format the text into sections, subsections, sub-subsections, etc.
• PCJ Section. This style is used to format the names of the different sections (i.e. “Introduction”, “Material and methods”, “Results” and “Discussion”). It should also be used to format the names of the final sections (i.e. “Data availability”, “Acknowledgements”, “Conflict of interest disclosure” and “References”).
• PCJ Subsection and PCJ sub-subsection. These styles are used to format the names of the different subsections and sub-subsections, respectively.
• PCJ Table. This style may be used to format the text in tables. Please note: Tables should be centered and adapted to fit into the space delimited by the margins. It may be necessary to create a section in landscape layout. If the table is too large and overlaps the margin, use the Table > AutoFit Windows option of Word. If inserted as images, tables should be positioned "In line with text".  If your original table contained bold or italics font, do not forget to apply again these font types to the tables once formatted with the PCI table style.
• PCJ Table legend. This style is used to format the legends above tables. It also puts the title "Table x." in bold typeface.
• PCJ note Table. This style is used to format the notes below the table.
• PCJ Figure. This style simply defines the space before and after figures. Figures should be adapted to fit into the space delimited by the margins. It may be necessary to create a section in landscape layout. Figures should be positioned "in line with text".
• PCJ Caption Figure. This style is used to format the captions below the figure. It also puts "Figure x." in bold typeface.
• PCJ Reference. This style should be used for the Bibliography section of your article
• PCJ Equation. This style can be used optionally to format isolated equations (i.e. equations not included in the text).

4.3.2.4 Format your references

Please carefully check that all the references cited in the text are in the reference list, and reciprocally. 

Please also check that the references are complete (with authors, title, year, volume number, page number or article number and DOI at the end) and correct. If any of the preprints listed in your reference list have been published in a journal in the meantime, you may either leave the reference to the preprint or indicate the reference to the journal - in the latter case, please update your reference list accordingly.

References may be formatted using the following styles (right-click and save as...):

• • Zotero/Mendeley style Peer Community Journal.
  • Endnote style Peer Community Journal.

These styles should first be imported into your reference management software (Zotero, Mendeley, Endnote).

References should mandatorily:

• Contain the URL of their DOI (e.g. https://doi.org/10111/100.1023). A simple way to obtain the URL for the DOI at the end of each reference is to copy/paste your list of references into https://apps.crossref.org/simpleTextQuery. Some DOIs cannot be found in this way, but a Google search with the title of the article generally finds the corresponding DOI.
• Contain authors' names and first name initials, year, title, volume and page numbers for articles; authors' names and first name initials, year, chapter title, book title, publisher name, page numbers for book chapters; authors' names and first name initials, year, chapter title, publisher name for books; 
• Be listed in alphabetical (or numerical) order
• Be cited as follows: 2 authors or less: (Does & Smith, 2010); 3 authors or more: (Smith et al., 2010); or numerically [1,3], [4-6].

4.3.2.5 Save your document

Once your document is fully formatted, save it as a .docx file and then as a PDF file.

4.3.3 For LibreOffice/OpenOffice users

The word template file (PCJ.dotx) can be used in LibreOffice/OpenOffice.

4.3.3.1 If you start a document from scratch

• Open the template by double-clicking on it in your file browser to create a new document
• Save this new document with a convenient name (in .odt format)
• Start your document with the Introduction.
• Set the all margins of all sections to 2.54 cm
• Use the predefined PCJ styles to format your document (see 2) For Word users)

4.3.3.2 If you want to format an existing document

• Go to File > Templates > Manage Templates, and select PCJ.dotx. A new document opens, containing any text or graphics present in the template.
• Delete any unwanted text or graphics from this new document
• Open the document you want to change, select all the content and copy it
• Paste it in the new document created from the template
• Set the margins of all sections to 2.54 cm
• Use the predefined PCJ styles to format your document (see 2) For Word users).

4.3.3.3 Format your text

See 4.3.2.3 (for Word Users)

4.3.3.4 Format your references

See 4.3.2.4 (for Word Users)

4.3.3.5 Save your document

Once your document is fully formatted, save it as an .odt file and then as a PDF file

4.3.4 For Google Docs users

Use the Google Doc template.

 

5. Templates

• Templates to submit your article to Peer Community Journal: word, Google Doc, LaTex