At the end of this month, John Maunsell will complete his seven-year term as the Editor-in-Chief of The Journal of Neuroscience. Dora Angelaki will become the new Editor-in-Chief effective January 1, 2015.
Throughout his tenure, John has worked tirelessly to improve the editorial process for both authors and reviewers. His hands-on approach to working with authors, reviewers, and the SfN staff have witnessed not only the improvement and clarification of processes related to submitting to The Journal of Neuroscience, but the editorial process itself. These included the implementation of a new manuscript submission system early in 2008 (eJournalPress), updated policies on supplemental material and PubMed Central article deposits, along with constant attention and revision to the Instructions for Authors. In addition, he has provided invaluable service in ensuring the scientific integrity of the research published in The Journal of Neuroscience by handling each allegation of misconduct through his office. His expertise proved instrumental when he agreed to serve on SfN′s inaugural Ethics Committee, founded in 2013.
Under John's leadership, The Journal of Neuroscience is better positioned as a leader in promoting scientific accuracy throughout the neuroscience community. John's significant impact on The Journal of Neuroscience has been far-reaching and comprehensive. Here is a brief chronological summary of but a few of his many accomplishments as Editor-in-Chief.
2008
Open Choice available to authors
The Journal of Neuroscience began offering an Open Choice option to authors, giving them the opportunity to make their article freely accessible immediately upon publication.
New manuscript submission system
In April, The Journal of Neuroscience manuscript submission system transferred from Scholar One to eJournalPress. The new system presented a more user-friendly environment for authors, reviewers, and editors, and resulted in a more efficient review process.
Neuroscience Peer Review Consortium
The Journal of Neuroscience became a member of the Consortium, which allows neuroscience journals to forward their reviews of rejected manuscripts to other members of the Consortium.
2009
Editor wiki page
A separate website was established for senior and reviewing editors. In addition to providing a valuable forum for discussion among editors, it was helpful in orienting new editors to J. Neurosci policies.
Prepublication of manuscripts
A change of policy was implemented to allow consideration of manuscripts that have been posted on the internet before submission. The policy was changed in recognition of the fact that posting manuscripts is a potentially valuable mechanism for open exchange and discussion of ideas, much like the presentation of data in abstract form.
2010
Update on supplemental material policy
In November 2010, The Journal of Neuroscience stopped accepting supplemental material with new submissions. There have since been no appreciable negative effects. Authors have not taken to bundling supplemental material into their manuscripts; the J. Neurosci editorial board saw no change in the number of figures or the length of text. Reviewers seem to have had no trouble making the adjustment, and the acceptance rate has not changed noticeably.
Mobile access to eJournalPress
By working with eJournalPress, John established the ability for users to access the manuscript submission site via mobile devices. This allowed editors and reviewers to access manuscripts from their smart phones, therefore accelerating the review process.
2011
CrossCheck software
The Journal of Neuroscience began using CrossCheck to help its staff actively work to prevent plagiarism. CrossCheck uses an expansive database to search for textual overlap, and is a valuable tool in ensuring the scientific rigor of J. Neurosci's research.
Ethics workspace created online
Before the formation of the SfN Ethics Committee, which handles allegations of ethical misconduct in The Journal of Neuroscience's research, such allegations were handled by the Editor-in-Chief's office. The creation of an online workspace provided a more efficient method of monitoring ethics cases. Because of this hands-on knowledge, John was invaluable to the newly-formed Ethics Committee in 2013.
2012
First mobile app, optimized website launched
The mobile apps for The Journal of Neuroscience were the first launched by SfN, and allow readers to access the most recent issues of J. Neurosci through their iOS devices. The Journal of Neuroscience was also made available for additional platforms through its mobile-optimized website.
PubMed Central policy change
To satisfy the requirements of NIH and other funding agencies, The Journal of Neuroscience deposits articles funded by those agencies into PubMed Central (PMC). The previous process was to deposit final manuscripts, not formatted articles. By depositing the final formatted articles on behalf of authors, the process became more streamlined and timely to accommodate the funding needs of authors.
2013
New journal section
The Journal of Neuroscience divided the Behavioral/Systems/Cognitive (BSC) sections in two: Behavioral/Cognitive and Systems/Circuits. This corrected an imbalance in which the BSC section was roughly twice the size of the other three sections. This reorganization caused no obvious problems and has left The Journal of Neuroscience with five better-balanced sections. John also added a feature type called Disease Focus to provide brief overviews of neurological diseases and syndromes and describe how that disorder might be linked to basic neural mechanisms.
Top reviewers
John initiated the formal recognition of J. Neurosci's most valuable reviewers by giving them a certificate and eligibility for early housing at the SfN annual meeting. This recognition is awarded to all reviewers who have completed 30 or more reviews for J. Neurosci within three years. The Journal of Neuroscience critically depends on the efforts of its reviewers, and this acknowledgment will reward them by providing valuable recognition.
Ethics Committee formation
The SfN Ethics Committee formed in 2013, taking over responsibility for investigations of allegations of unethical scientific behavior from the J. Neurosci Editor-in-Chief's office. Since its formation, the Ethics Committee has dramatically relieved the workload on the Editor-in-Chief, and it is positioned to provide a more comprehensive and consistent service in SfN′s commitment to the scientific rigor of its publications.
2014
ORCiD
The J. Neurosci website, as well as the manuscript submission system, became able to capture unique identifiers for individual authors via ORCiD, which has become the standard for identifying individual research contributions. Linking ORCiD identifiers helps authors receive credit for their publications and makes possible the future creation of productivity metrics based on specifically on individual author contributions.
Research Resource Identifiers project
The Journal of Neuroscience joined a group of neuroscience journals taking part in a 3-month pilot project for the Resource Identification Initiative in an effort to help researchers cite key resources (animal models, reagents, software) with sufficient detail to support efficient reproducibility and re-use. If successful, the test might lead to more structured publications in the future.
These are highlights of the vast accomplishments during John's tenure as Editor-in-Chief. His leadership in these realms has helped enormously to maintain the stature of The Journal of Neuroscience. That he did all of this while continuing to conduct distinguished scientific work in his own lab endorses why we investigators feel so strongly about the advantages of publishing in journals edited by working scientists. His significant impact on The Journal of Neuroscience has been far-reaching and comprehensive, and on behalf of SfN′s leadership and membership, I thank him for his years of service and dedication to the publishing endeavors of SfN.
