PLOS/Reviewer Guide

PLOS Topic Pages
PLOS Computational Biology • PLOS Genetics • PLOS ONE

Thank you for agreeing to review a topic page submission! This page provides instruction and guidelines for submitting your review. All reviews are open and will be published on the Discussion (Talk) page associated with the article. In the spirit of openness, we also strongly encourage reviewers to sign their reviews.

Submitting a review

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Agreeing to peer review an article is already a generous donation of time. Therefore, if you are experiencing technical difficulties with submitting your review on the wiki, reviews can always be submitted directly to the relevant editors by email (ploscompbiol@plos.org for PLOS Computational Biology, plosgenetics@plos.org for PLOS Genetics, or onecalls@plos.org for PLOS ONE). This is also the best option if you feel there is a compelling reason for anonymity in your review. That said, part of the allure of a wiki is the ability to collaborate, and by attaching your comments directly to the article you become part of the creative process. We encourage reviewers to follow the following process:

1. Create an account on this wiki. Check your email for the conformation link. To reduce spam, newly created accounts may notice some restrictions until the account is approved by an editor.

2. Navigate to the Discussion page for your article (sometime called the 'Talk' page). If the page does not exist, you can create it.

 

3. Edit or create a section 'Reviews' and a subsection for your review. The following wiki code is a good place to start. For help with syntax and formatting, see Formatting

Wiki Markup Result
== Review by Charles Darwin ==

Write your review here.

# You can use numbered lists
# or any other wiki formatting

~~~~

Review by Charles Darwin

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Write your review here.

  1. You can use numbered lists
  2. or any other wiki formatting

Charlie Darwin 08:35, 1 February 1862 (PST)

In the wiki community it is customary to always sign posts to the discussion page with four tildes (~~~~), which will be expanded to the date and a link to your username on this wiki. If desired, you may also want to include your Wikipedia username.

Review contents

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Reviews should address the scientific merits of the article, as well as stylistic considerations and issues that might impact its suitability for Wikipedia. Articles should cover a topic, much like a traditional review article. The article should be well-cited, but review articles and secondary sources may be preferable to the primary literature references (See Wikipedia's scientific citation guidelines). Violations of Wikipedia policies can also be noted.

In addition to the formal review, minor typos and errors can be corrected directly in the article. The wiki preserves a history of all changes, making it easy to view any modifications made.