Procedures for JDS Section Editors Matt Lucy, EIC Revised 2018 General procedures, workflow, and timeline for review 1. Manuscripts come to different sections according to the author selection during submission. 2. The submitted manuscript arrives directly in the Senior Editor Queue. 3. The Senior Editor should do a preliminary assessment of the manuscript. The items listed below are reasons for immediate rejection (inappropriate topic, incorrect formatting, poor English), which the Senior Editor may wish to do. Alternatively, the Senior Editor may send the paper to a Section Editor and allow the Section Editor to screen the paper for immediate rejection. Reasons for immediate rejection are: a. Reject if the topic is inappropriate for JDS. i. See Journal of Dairy Science New Sections and Descriptions document (https://www.journalofdairyscience.org/scientificsections), which lists appropriate topics for JDS. b. Reject if there are major deviations from JDS formatting guidelines (i.e., it is obvious that the authors ignored the JDS Instructions for Authors in their entirety). i. Minor formatting issues should be ignored as long as they do not interfere with efficient review. Remember, rejected manuscripts cannot be resubmitted so if simple formatting problems can be fixed in revision then consider asking the authors to correct those during revision. Simple formatting issues that would make review difficult (i.e., missing line numbers) can be fixed by Shauna Miller, who will correct the problem and upload the revised manuscript before it is sent out for review. c. Reject the manuscript if the English language is very poor and cannot be understood. Numerous typos, grammatical errors, or unintelligible sentences within the first paragraph of the introduction or discussion would be a good indicator to use for rejection. The extent to which the Senior Editor or the Section editor is doing preliminary assessments for rejection varies for individual sections. Editors within individual sections may wish to discuss the process annually as new Editors rotate in. In all cases of immediate rejection the editor must explain to the authors why the paper was rejected. 4. The Senior Editor assigns manuscripts to Section Editors. 1
a. This task occurs at least twice weekly (i.e., once every 3 days). b. If the manuscript is in the incorrect section then the Senior Editor contacts the alternative Senior Editor (copying the EIC and Shauna) and assuming that receiving editor agrees, Shauna Miller moves the manuscript to the new section. c. The Senior Editor of each section makes a good faith effort to match Section Editor expertise with the paper topic and to balance the load among all Section Editors within the particular section. d. 5. The submitted manuscript arrives in the Section Editor Queue. a. Section editors are expected to process incoming manuscripts at least once weekly. 6. The Section Editor determines if the manuscript should undergo immediate rejection. In all cases of immediate rejection the Section Editor must explain to the authors why the paper was rejected. Reasons for immediate rejection are listed in item 3 (above). a. Perform Duplicate Submission Check within ScholarOne Manuscripts i. The Duplicate Submission feature checks for duplication in title and author lists. If the author has submitted a new paper with an identical or nearly identical title or author list to a previous JDS submission, this feature will flag it. If there is a previous manuscript, then check it to make sure that it is truly a duplicate submission and not just a related paper with similar title and author list. If the two manuscripts are the same and the original manuscript was rejected then reject the new manuscript and explain to the author that JDS does not allow resubmission of rejected manuscripts. 1. If an author s option to revise a paper has expired, they might upload the revision as a new manuscript. If the Section Editor has granted a revision extension, contact Shauna to withdraw the duplicate submission and apply the revised paper to the original manuscript number so that the record of reviews and revisions remains with the same Section Editor. b. Perform Plagiarism Check by using CrossCheck within ScholarOne Manuscripts i. We use the COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics) guidelines and the COPE flow charts when dealing with plagiarism. (http://publicationethics.org/). ii. View the originality report. Examine literature references with a high percentage of similarity with the submitted manuscript. We allow some overlapping text in the methods section as long as the text arises from a previous publication from the authors (this is called text recycling ). We do not allow overlapping text in other sections. If there is overlapping text then consult the COPE guidelines for handling it. Description: (http://publicationethics.org/text-recycling-guidelines). Flowchart: (http://publicationethics.org/files/u7140/redundant%20publication%20a.pdf) 2
iii. If there is clearly evidence of plagiarism (i.e., the authors copied from someone else s work without appropriate attribution) then consult the COPE flowchart on how to handle it. Flowchart: (http://publicationethics.org/files/u7140/plagiarism%20a.pdf) c. Read the abstract to determine general suitability of the paper. i. If there are obvious grammatical problems (the manuscript is unreadable, numerous misspelled words, etc.) then reject the paper. You may wish to read a paragraph of the introduction or discussion to assess readability as well. ii. If the topic is clearly not suitable for JDS then reject the paper. See Journal of Dairy Science New Sections and Descriptions document (https://www.journalofdairyscience.org/scientificsections), which lists appropriate topics for JDS. If you are unsure then contact the EIC or Senior Editor for advice. As a general rule, we publish papers that address the science behind producing and processing milk for human consumption and the healthfulness of milk when included in the human diet. We typically publish papers on biochemistry, breeding, economics, engineering, environment, food science, genetics, microbiology, nutrition, pathology, physiology, processing, public health, quality assurance, and sanitation. We generally do not publish papers that address unique or unusual aspects of locally important breeds or species. For example, we generally would not publish an article on Milk production of Brown Swiss cows near the city of Interlaken in the Bernese Highlands unless there was some unique hypothesis that could be tested with these cows that could be broadly applied to dairy production. In many cases, regional studies are better suited for local agricultural journals. We will publish articles that test novel hypotheses from emerging dairy regions even if these hypotheses are not specific to traditional methods of dairy production. We recognize that new systems of dairy production generate new questions that need to be addressed through scientific investigation. The key question is whether existing knowledge can be applied or if new information is needed. So, we would not publish a paper from China that demonstrates shade and evaporative cooling reduces respiration rate but we may publish a paper demonstrating that a locally grown forage unique to Chinese agriculture can be substituted for alfalfa hay. d. Check the paper for correct JDS formatting (title page, references, figures, etc.) i. If the paper does not have line numbers then send an email to Shauna Miller and she will add line numbers and re-upload the paper. ii. If the paper has additional formatting issues then consider the following. 3
1. If the paper is an average or below average contribution then incorrect formatting can be used as an additional reason for immediate rejection. The JDS instructions for authors state Papers that do not follow the form and style of the journal may be rejected without review. 2. If the paper appears to be a solid contribution then send the paper out for review and ask the authors to correct formatting problems during the first revision. e. Do not use the unsubmit option at any time during the process. Withdraw is sometimes used but is generally initiated by the author wishing to take the paper out of the system. If there is any confusion with how to handle papers that need to come out of the system then consult with Shauna Miller on how to proceed. 7. The Section Editor selects and invites reviewers. a. The expectation is that reviewers will be selected and invited within one week (or earlier) from the time the manuscript arrives in the Section Editor Queue. b. Selecting reviewers. i. Reviewer selection is perhaps the most important step in the process and also the step that takes the most time. Everyone (Section Editor, authors, and reviewers) is happiest when the reviewers are highly qualified to review the manuscript that they are assigned. ii. Suggestions for selecting reviewers 1. Consider selecting a preferred reviewer (author identified) a. Avoid reviewers from author s own institution or known collaborators. b. There are authors who will attempt to scam the peer-review system by using a pseudonym and generic email so that they themselves are asked to review the paper via the preferred reviewer system. Avoid preferred reviewers whose name you do not recognize and who are in the same department or published previously with the authors of the paper to be reviewed 2. You can select a non-preferred reviewer if you deem that reviewer to be appropriate to review the manuscript. If you have numerous options for suitable reviewers then honor the author s request of the non-preferred reviewer. 3. Select one or two members of the editorial board a. Editorial board members agreed to review 12 to 24 manuscripts each year for JDS. It is important that we select editorial board members for reviews (see Advanced Search in Section Editor Center Guide: https://www.adsa.org/publications/journal-of- Dairy-Science/JDSEditors). If we need additional editorial board 4
iii. members then please nominate additional people to the EIC. The editorial board is updated annually. 4. Other good sources for reviewers a. Reviewer Locator Feature within ScholarOne. b. Personal experience or knowledge (including Excel spread sheets with suitable reviewer names and topics) c. Search engine within ScholarOne d. Reference list of the submitted manuscript (identify authors of similar papers who could be suitable reviewers) e. Use the External Searches link in ScholarOne to search PubMed or Highwire or Google by using keywords to identify authors of similar papers that could be suitable reviewers. f. Search directly within Journal of Dairy Science using keywords for recent articles in topic area. g. Google Scholar search engine. Inviting reviewers 1. The default number of reviewers for each manuscript is 2. This is the minimum number of reviews that we must have for each manuscript. The recommendation below is to select and invite 3 so that you have one extra reviewer for each manuscript. It is not always possible to have the extra reviewer but will save time if one reviewer does not return a review in a timely manner. If everyone submits a review then it is perfectly fine to have 3 reviews for the manuscript. If you decide to select and invite 3 then you must change the default number of reviewers needed to make a decision from 2 to 3. 2. Recommend selecting and inviting 3 reviewers as well as 2 alternate reviewers for papers with strong appeal (interesting and timely topic). Selection and invitation are two independent processes and each must be completed to make things work. 3. Recommend selecting and inviting 3 reviewers and 5 alternate reviewers for papers with weak appeal (limited interest or readership) 4. If a reviewer declines then the system will automatically promote and invite the next reviewer (an alternate reviewer). 5. If a reviewer fails to accept or decline then the system will auto-decline the reviewer after 7 days and as well as automatically promote and invite the next reviewer in queue (an alternate reviewer, if the SE has placed one in queue). 6. If you have extreme difficulty in securing reviewers who agree to evaluate a manuscript, consider the possibility that the topic is not novel or may be outside the scope of the journal. You may wish to reject the paper (based on novelty or scope) if you cannot find anyone willing to review the paper. 5
iv. Personal notes to potential reviewers. Most reviewers appreciate a note from the Section Editor when they are asked to review a manuscript. Something like, Hello Mark, I know that your lab did similar work in the past on this topic. Could you help me out by providing a review for this manuscript? You will find additional information below. A note is not required but everyone is busy and everyone gets a lot of computer-generated review requests. Write this note above the computergenerated request so that the viewer has all of the other information that they need. If you write a note, please do not direct the reviewer in any manner. For example, do not say, Hey Mark, this paper is awesome, would you like to look it over and return a review to JDS? 8. Handling papers that are in review. a. Reviewers have 14 days after accepting an invitation to complete their review. b. After 14 days the review becomes overdue how to deal with late reviews. i. The following are suggestions for dealing with overdue reviews. 1. Allow up to 7 days overdue before contacting reviewer directly via email. 2. Send a personal email to the reviewer asking when you should expect to receive the review. If the reviewer doesn t respond to the personal emails, then finding a new reviewer is a good idea. 3. If you already have two suitable reviews (minimum required to make a decision) and a third review is forthcoming, then send an email and ask the third reviewer if they would like to opt out of their review. Some reviewers are very happy to opt out; other reviewers prefer to complete the review, which will give you three reviews for the manuscript. If the third reviewer opts out at this time then change the number of required reviews from 3 to 2 and the manuscript will automatically go into your decision queue. ii. The following are suggestions for dealing with extremely late reviews (14 or more days late). 1. If you only have one review, send an email and explain that you will need to solicit a second reviewer in the near future. Ask if there is still a possibility of obtaining the review. 2. Solicit a second reviewer that you trust will return a review quickly (best option) or assign yourself as the second reviewer and read/review the paper (last resort option). 3. If you have two reviews (and the third review is late), send an email and explain that you will be making a decision by a specific date. Change the number of required reviews from 3 to 2 on that date + 1 day and the manuscript will automatically go into your decision queue. The reviewer will no longer be able to submit the review. 4. If three reviewers agreed to review and two have returned reviews with one recommendation to reject and one to accept, and if it seems apparent 6
that the third review likely may not be submitted, it might be timely to request and secure a third reviewer immediately (to expedite the process) c. Automated reminders from ScholarOne Manuscripts. i. The peer-review system sends out automated email reminders to reviewers at 1 and 2 wk after the review is due. The system stops sending reminders after that time (technically 30 days after the reviewer agreed). ii. Shauna keeps an eye on papers with overdue reviews. If she sees a paper that is beyond 30 days overdue (6 wk in review) she will check the audit trail for Section Editor correspondence with the reviewer. iii. If the Section Editor has not followed up then Shauna will follow up with a personal email to the reviewer and cc the Section Editor on the email. The personal email encourages submission of the review as soon as possible. iv. Personal follow-ups from Shauna to overdue reviewers will occur about every 2 weeks. 9. Handling papers in the Decision Queue First Decision. a. Make a decision on papers within 7 days of their arrival in the Decision Queue. b. The decision to accept or reject a manuscript is entirely up to the Section Editor. The EIC rarely gets involved in this process. Appeals are allowed, but the EIC almost never overrules a Section Editor. i. Recommendations for making a decision. 1. Two or more reviewers recommend rejection. a. Examine the reviews and the reasons for rejection and reject the paper as long as you are satisfied that the paper was treated fairly and there is good rationale for rejection. 2. One reject and one major revision. a. Examine the reviews and examine the paper. Side with one reviewer or the other and either reject or ask for major revision. If there are three reviews then you may wish to allow the third reviewer to make the decision for you. Two rejects = rejection as long as the reviews are fair. One reject and two major revisions may still = reject if the Section Editor feels that rejection is appropriate. 3. One reject and one minor revision/accept (split decision). a. Examine the reviews and examine the paper. If there are three reviews then you may wish to allow the third reviewer to make the decision for you. If there are only two reviews then consider soliciting a third reviewer. 4. Two major revisions. a. Examine the paper. Return the paper for major revision (see below for general rules for returning papers to authors) or reject the paper if you doubt that revisions can eventually lead to acceptance. 5. One major revision and one minor revision. 7
a. Return the paper for major revision (see below for general rules for returning papers to authors). 6. Two minor revisions or some combination of minor revision and accept (including two accept). a. Return the paper for minor revision (see below for general rules for returning papers to authors). ii. Reading/evaluating papers and sending papers back to authors. 1. The best time for a Section Editor to thoroughly read and evaluate a paper is after it comes back from the first review and before it is sent back to the authors. There is no need to spend a lot of time looking at manuscripts that are rejected. 2. If a manuscript is being sent back for major revision a. It is possible that this paper will eventually be rejected so consider saving your in-depth read of the manuscript until after the paper has been revised. Instead, give the paper a quick look-over at this time. b. Identify major problems in terms of formatting, figures, photographs, and tables. The most difficult problems for our technical editors to address are: i. Numbered references (cannot be fixed easily by tech editors; this must be fixed by authors. JDS does not use numbered references). ii. Poor quality figures (text in graphic or fill patterns will be unreadable/indistinguishable if reduced to printing size); this also includes figures with no indication of statistical analysis (SEM). Please see very complete description for preparing figures in the JDS instructions for authors and in the Journal of Dairy Science Revision Checklist for Authors. Please make sure that the axes labels and symbols are large enough to be read easily. Discourage color in figures unless absolutely necessary. Any mean that is presented must have some indication of the variation around that mean. Use SEM for treatment means. Use SD if describing populations (i.e., the average weight of the cows on the project was 550 ± 10 kg). iii. Poor quality, low-resolution photographs of cells, gels, or other. Acceptable resolution is defined in JDS Instructions for Authors. Ensure that all photomicrographs include indication of scale. Lanes on gels should be labeled. 8
iv. Tables that are made without using the Table function in Word (occurs when authors use tabs and spaces to separate data, rather than cells within tables). Please see JDS Instructions for Authors. You will need to open the Word file associated with the pdf to determine if the table function was used. c. Other problems that you can quickly identify and ask for correction. i. Extremely long abstract and (or) introduction. ii. Absence of statistical analysis or inclusion of means without SEM or SD. iii. Use of SD instead of SEM to compare means in graphs, tables, and text. SEM should be used when means are compared. iv. Misspelled words, abbreviations that are not defined, etc. v. Absence of Interpretative Summary. d. Include the major formatting issues in your response and direct authors to the Journal of Dairy Science Revision Checklist for Authors. Explain that the revised manuscript will be immediately rejected upon return and not sent out for review if the formatting issues have not been addressed. 3. If the manuscript is being sent back for minor revision a. All of the rules above for major revisions apply. b. Please perform an in-depth read of the manuscript and make sure you are comfortable with the content. Ask the authors to correct any additional items that you have concerns about. Section Editors do not need to do a line-by-line review. Simply read the manuscript and make sure that you can live with the content. It is not necessary to do grammatical editing. 10. Author requests for extensions to revision time. Authors have 6 weeks to revise their manuscripts. If the first review requires additional work that will take longer than six weeks (for example, an additional full lactation trial) then reject the manuscript because the 6-week time for revision cannot be met. Some authors will ask for an extension because they cannot revise in time. Although we are sympathetic, the time that the author spends revising the manuscript is a major factor that determines total time in review (which we are trying to shorten). The following rules apply to requests for extension. a. If an author requests an extension from Shauna Miller, she will notify the Section Editor and ask if it is okay. Once the Section Editor responds, then she will extend or not extend in the system according to the decision of the Section Editor. 9
b. If an author requests an extension from a Section Editor, the Section Editor simply decides yes or no and forwards the email to Shauna. If the decision is to extend then Shauna will extend the deadline in the system. c. We will make a one-time extension of 4 weeks which means that the authors will have had 10 weeks to revise the manuscript. If the author cannot submit their paper within this period then it will be withdrawn. d. We certainly understand that personal emergencies can arise with authors that make it impossible to deal with revisions in a timely matter. The Section Editor can, of course, consider these on an individual basis and override this policy. 11. Handling revised (first revision/.r1) papers in the Decision Queue. a. All of the rules above apply for the revised papers coming back into the decision queue. i. Papers coming back following major revision. 1. Examine the paper quickly to make sure that the authors have addressed any formatting issues that were raised following the first review. If they have completely ignored your request for proper formatting of figures, tables, spelling, etc. and the paper appears to be marginal at best and they do not appear to have addressed reviewer concerns then reject the paper immediately. 2. If the paper appears to have been suitably revised (check the response to first review) then invite the same reviewers unless they indicated when submitting their first review that they are unwilling to review the revision. Experience is that even if they say that they will not review the revision that they will if you ask politely and emphasize that JDS strives to have the same reviewers consider subsequent revisions for consistency of review and to reduce overall time in review for all submitting authors. If you had three reviewers and one of the reviewers returned a low-quality review then do not re-invite that reviewer. ii. Papers coming back with minor revision. 1. Look at the response to review to determine if the authors have revised the paper suitably. Examine the paper quickly to make sure that the authors have addressed any formatting issues that were raised following the first review. Assuming that you read the initial submission (see above) and things are OK then accept the paper. 12. Handling revised (second revision) papers in the Decision Queue. a. The process continues until the paper receives two minor revision (or better) recommendations and the Section Editor is satisfied with the paper. When all of the conditions are met, accept the paper. 10
b. Authors typically expect that their paper will be accepted if you do not reject after their first revision. If the paper has no chance of becoming acceptable for publication, then it is best to reject early rather than late in the process. c. Recommend not allowing a paper to go beyond the R3 stage. In other words, make a go, no-go decision for problem papers at the R2 stage. What this means is that the original submission (R0) was reviewed, an R1 was returned and reviewed, and a R2 was returned and reviewed (you are looking at the R2 paper and reviews). At this point do one of the following: accept the paper, request a minor revision, or reject. A minor revision at this step could be thought of as Accept with minor revision, where you will get the R3 version and then accept the paper. d. It is sometimes helpful to tell the author that the manuscript will be accepted after the minor corrections are completed. This may speed-up the process if the author knows that their immediate effort will lead to acceptance of a manuscript returned with minor revision. Goals for moving papers through the system The following figure depicts goals for moving manuscripts through ScholarOne Manuscripts. 11