ASCB’s journal Molecular Biology of the Cell (MBoC) has been highlighting preprints since March 2022. Now, for the project’s next phase, MBoC Preprint Highlights are migrating to a new home on ASCB.org.
As we detail in a recent Editorial in the journal, we were pleased to see that preprint curation provided value for readers and authors faster than journal publication. Preprint Highlights received consistent usage in MBoC and led to increased usage of the selected preprints on bioRxiv. Feedback from editors and preprint authors indicated many positive experiences. Moreover, the creation of a new Early-Career Editor (ECE) role enabled broader participation in MBoC’s editorial board and provided an outlet for contributions from early-career researchers.
Preprint curation by MBoC Early-Career Editors
Going forward, we will keep many of the features that made Preprint Highlights successful, including the format of Significance Statements and Badges, selection by ECEs, and connections with MBoC. This new platform will also provide a faster workflow for our editors, opportunities for future flexibility, and connections with the broader ASCB community.
The effort will now be led by a team of Lead Curation Editors appointed from the ECE board: Luis Bonet-Ponce (National Institute of Aging, NIH), Jacqueline De Lora (Max Planck Institute for Medical Research), Jennifer Landino (University of Michigan), and Adriana Mantegazza (Thomas Jefferson University). Stay tuned for a call for applications to join the ECE board coming later this year!
As preprint usage continues to grow, we hope that MBoC Preprint Highlights can serve as a model for future efforts, as well as a platform for the cell biology community to discover and curate preprints of broad interest and significance.
Learn more about the Curation Tools and find past Preprint Highlights on MBoC’s website.
Acknowledgements
The initial implementation of this project was supported by a grant from the Wellcome Trust and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute to ASCB.
About the Author:
Michael Lacy is ASCB's Curation Manager.
