Nature Publishing GroupQuality, Impact & Vision

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Presented by Managing Editor, Professor Roger K Butlinand Publishing Manager, Rebecca Vickerstaff

www.nature.com/hdy

How to Get Your Paper Published in Heredity

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Heredity is an official journal of the Genetics Society, and publishes original research in all areas of genetics, with a particular focus on population, evolutionary and quantitative aspects, animal and plant breeding and cytogenetics. Primary research papers are complemented by Reviews covering currently developing areas and News and Commentary articles keeping researchers and students abreast of hot topics.

Key Facts

First published in 1947

High profile editor and supporting editors

12 issues a year

Print and online publication

Impact Factor 4.569

Approximately 430 submissions received each year, ~70% rejected

Over 1,300,000 page views to the Heredity website and

650,000 article downloads

Table of Contents alerts are sent to 78,000 registrants

International readership= 46% subscribers are from North America/ 28% are

from Europe/ 19% are from ROW and 7% are from Japan

Podcast (http://www.nature.com/hdy/podcast/index.html)

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Journal scope and content

Heredity covers a broad range of topics within the field of genetics and therefore papers must address conceptual or applied issues of interest to the journal's wide readership. The journal particularly encourages submissions in the following areas:

• population genetics (including human) • genomics, functional genomics and proteomics • evo-devo • biometrical and statistical genetics • ecological and evolutionary genetics • animal and plant breeding • cytogenetics

Heredity's original articles cover new theory and primary empirical research. The journal also publishes regular reviews and news & commentary articles.

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Open Access

Heredity offers authors open access – option to pay a one-off feeTo have your final published version made freely availableimmediately on publication rather rely on readers who have paidsubscriptions

Fee is £2,000 (reduced for Genetics Society members) NPG already complies with major funding agencies but this is a

further step forward Final version automatically deposited into PubMed Central Choose one of two creative commons licences Research receives greater visibility

6 papers published open access in 2011 so far – expected growthyear on year

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Novel or original findings Credibility Brevity Clarity of data and conclusions Interesting to a broad, international readership

Good standard of English (seek help if necessary) Compliance with ethical standards and approval by

Institutional Review Board if appropriate Disclosure of possible conflicts of interests by all authors References complete and up-to-date

What are Editors looking for?

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The peer review process

Upon submission your manuscript will follow the followingprocedure:

The Editor will determine with the help of a board member if the manuscript is suitable for review

Title and Abstract are crucial!

If it is, a Subject Editor is assigned and the reviewer selection procedure begins

The board member receives the reviewer’s comments and then makes a recommendation to the Editor

The Editor will communicate the final decisions

Subject Editors remain anonymous and all disputes are sent to the Editor

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What do we expect of reviewers?

• Your opinion, supported by clear arguments (recommendation and ‘scoring’ are helpful, but less important)

• NOT detailed language editing• NOT a précis• DO say what is most interesting, to whom and why• DO identify major issues and make recommendations for improvement• DO list minor scientific issues• DO be constructive and polite!

• DO review on time – (it is better to say No quickly than to say Yes and then delay)

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On acceptance

• All manuscripts are checked for plagiarism

• Data archiving is mandatory (data-specific repository, e.g. GenBank, or Dryad: datadryad.org)

• Colour figures must be paid for…

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The production process

Accepted manuscripts are passed to the production team

A production editor will ensure your paper meets Heredity’s house style: Check punctuation, grammar, and consistency of terminology Check pharmaceutical names and abbreviations Check references Figures and tables are formatted and the manuscript is typeset

Reasons for delays to starting work on a paper: Artwork in wrong format Licence To Publish form not complete Open access payment form not received

Page proofs are e-mailed to the corresponding author within 8 weeks of acceptance – corrections to be made to a .pdf version.

Once paper is returned a Document Object Identifier (DOI) number is assigned and paper is ‘queued’ for advanced online publication (AOP).

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Advanced online publication (AOP)

Your AOP version should appear online within 25 days. It now has a ‘Digital Object Identifier’ (DOI) number and date online and can now be cited.

Your paper is recorded in any relevant databases with which we have agreements as soon as it is published online, ensuring more people see your article over a longer amount of time

The print version of your paper ideally will appear around 3-4 months after acceptance

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Once published: promotion and visibility

Selected articles are press-released

Electronic table of contents (e-ToC alerts)

Selected articles appear on www.nature.com homepage and NPG’s community and subject based platforms

All articles are included in key abstracting, indexing and linking services

We also look to cross promote with other relevant NPG titles and across www.nature.com

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Please submit your article online to Heredity

www.nature.com/hdy

Any Comments or questions?