WikiJournal of Science/Editorial board

WikiJournal of Science
Open access • Publication charge free • Public peer review • Wikipedia-integrated

The editorial board handles any confidential article submissions, and has final responsibility for ensuring that robust academic peer review is performed in a timely manner. Information about editorial board responsibilities, and how to apply to join the editorial board, are found below.

WikiJournal of Science

An open access journal with
no publication costs – About

www.WikiJSci.org
ISSN: 2470-6345
Frequency: Continuous
Since: December 2017
Funding: Wikimedia Foundation
Publisher: WikiJournal User Group

On social media

RSS feed
Facebook
Twitter
Mailing list

Contact & Contribute

Editorial board members

Andrew Leung
From: 21 April 2018
Fields: climatology, atmospheric sciences, aviation

Dr. Andrew Leung is a climatologist working at Polar Knowledge Canada. He is a contributor to Wikipedia and many of its sister projects.

Thomas Shafee
From: 30 October 2017
Fields: biochemistry, protein evolution, bioinformatics, convergent evolution, protein engineering, experimental evolution, data science, data visualization, science communication

Dr. Thomas Shafee is an evolutionary biochemist and data scientist at La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia. He is particularly interested in how protein superfamilies evolve and how that information can be used to engineer proteins for human uses.

Henry Hoff
From: 5 November 2017
Fields: physics, mathematics, geology, materials science, mineralogy, high temperature superconductor, radiation, spectroscopy, surface science, astrophysics, metallurgy, electronics, diffusion, crystallography, polarization, metallography, microanalysis, physical chemistry, pyrometer, crystal growth, alloying, material defect, electrical resistivity, electron microscopy, actinide, ferromagnetism, transmission electron microscope, X-ray spectroscopy, insulator, Electron diffraction, crystal structure, crystal chemistry, doping, casting, optical microscopy, temperature, fracture, phase, calibration, lattice, grain growth, irradiation, surface roughness, superconductivity, fractography, mathematical model, thin film, electric current

My original research efforts have been performed through participation per numerous grants from the USA Department of Energy at Argonne National Laboratory and Department of Defense at the Naval Research Laboratory.

W. Brian Whalley
From: 5 November 2017
Fields: geomorphology, glacial geology, sediment, weathering, pedagogy

Ian Alexander
From: 5 November 2017
Fields: requirements engineering, biology, history and philosophy of science

Ian Alexander is a retired systems engineer who has helped to bring over 100 Wikipedia articles on biology, and its history and philosophy, to 'Good Article' status.

Daniele Pugliesi
From: 5 November 2017
Fields: Chemical engineering, process engineering

Daniele Pugliesi is a multipotentialite Lecturer and Technical Consultant providing training and assistance in many fields related to industrial activities, management and sustainability.

Sylvain Ribault
From: 24 November 2017 to 24 January 2023
Fields: mathematical physics, theoretical physics, mathematics

Sylvain Ribault is a researcher at the Institute for Theoretical Physics in Saclay. He sometimes blogs on the subjects of scientific publishing and conformal field theory.

Jack Nunn
From: 24 November 2017
Additionally: social media manager
Fields: participatory research, public health genomics

Jack Nunn is a researcher in the Department of Public Health at La Trobe University. His research is in creating and evaluating equitable and ethical ways for people to participate in all aspects of research and science. Jack is currently a PhD candidate exploring genomics research and ways of involving people. Jack is the founder and Director of the not-for-profit education organisation 'Science for All'.

Sridhar Gutam
From: 24 November 2017
Fields: plant physiology, agricultural science, horticultural science

Guy Vandegrift
From: 5 November 2017
Fields: physics, engineering, mathematics

Guy Vandegrift teaches physics and astronomy at the Lake Campus of Wright State University, and is currently working to develop Quizbank.

Thijs van Vlijmen
From: 6 March 2018
Fields: cell biology, protein science

Dr. Thijs van Vlijmen completed his Ph.D. at Utrecht University in the Department of Cell Biology in the University Medical Center Utrecht in 2008. After that he started working at Springer Science+Business Media as a publishing editor. He is currently Associate Editorial Director for Australia and New Zealand at Taylor & Francis.

Kelee Pacion
From: 21 April 2018
Additionally: social media manager
Fields: instructional design, science communication, research, education, research policy

Kelee Pacion is the Biology and Environmental Sciences Librarian at Princeton University. Her interests are science communication, information literacy, and education.

Edmund Palermo
From: 21 April 2018
Fields: polymer, biomaterial, biomimetics

Ed Palermo is an Assistant Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (Troy, NY). His interests are in polymer science and biomaterials.

Tina Qin
From: 21 April 2018
Fields: e-Science, scholarly communication, cheminformatics

Tina Qin is the science and engineering librarian and lecturer at Department of Chemistry at Vanderbilt University. She is particular interested in e-Science, scholarly communication and chemical informatics.

Loren Cobb
From: 21 April 2018
Fields: applied mathematics, simulation, statistics, sociology, Economics, political science, computer science

Paula Diaconescu
From: 21 April 2018
Fields: inorganic chemistry, organometallic chemistry, catalysis, polymer

Paula Diaconescu is a Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of California, Los Angeles. Her research group focuses on switchable catalysis, a new area of chemistry inspired by nature’s sensory processes. Switchable catalysts use external triggers in order to toggle between multiple species with different reactivity.

José Lages
From: 21 April 2018
Fields: theoretical physics

José Lages is an Associate Professor of Theoretical Physics at the University of Burgundy Franche-Comté, Besançon, France. His recent researches focus on Chaos in Quantum Physics, Chaos in Astrophysics, and Complex Networks. He co-invented the Wikipedia Ranking of World Universities obtained from the statistical analysis of Wikipedia articles network for different language editions.

Thais C. Morata
From: 20 May 2018 to 21 January 2023
Fields: public health, occupational health, hearing science, communication studies, communication disorder

Thais Morata is a Research Audiologist at the US NIOSH and coordinator of the NORA Manufacturing Sector Council. She created the Safe-in-Sound Excellence in Hearing Loss Prevention Awards™, is a founding associate editor for the International Journal of Audiology, and a founding editor of the Cochrane Work Review Group. She co-instructs several graduate classes and promotes the Wiki Edu platform.

Jonathan Holland
From: 20 May 2018
Fields: mathematical analysis, differential geometry, general relativity, twistor theory

Vinod Scaria
From: 20 May 2018
Fields: genomics, genome informatics, RNA

Edward Baker
From: 31 January 2019
Fields: taxonomy, zoological nomenclature, biodiversity informatics, bioacoustics

Ed Baker is an orthopterist and bioacoustician at the University of York, and Scientific Associate of the Natural History Museum, London.

Mad Ball
From: 11 December 2019
Fields: open science, citizen science, participatory research, genetics, biotechnology, health research

Trained in biotech, now highly interdisciplinary focus on empowering individuals & community to take an active role in leading and contributing to research about themselves.

Jeff Lundeen
From: 28 January 2020
Fields: physics, metrology, optics, quantum information, quantum metrology, photonics, fundamental science

Jeff Lundeen is the Canada Research Chair in Quantum Photonics. He heads an experimental laboratory at the University of Ottawa that uses photons to study the unique characteristics of quantum physics, to carry information for quantum computing, and to build quantum-enhanced sensing and measurement devices.

Moritz Schubotz
From: 16 August 2020
Fields: computer science, digital library

Moritz Schubotz and his group research on Mathematical Information Retrieval at the Department of Mathematics at FIZ Karlsruhe – Leibniz Institute for Information Infrastructure. His main interests are: research, teaching, building research infrastructure, establish a FAIR scholary practice.

Michel Bakni
From: 19 November 2022
Fields: telecommunications network, simulation, wireless sensor network, energy

Kevin M. Moerman
From: 19 June 2023
Fields: computational mechanics, finite element analysis, biomechanics, image-based modeling and rendering, computational design

Previous board members

Mikael Häggström
From: 5 November 2017 to 16 March 2019
Additionally: adviser
Fields: medicine, radiology, pathology, informatics

Marc Robinson-Rechavi
From: 24 November 2017 to 6 February 2019
Fields: molecular evolution, bioinformatics, genomics

Felipe Schenone
From: 5 November 2017 to 2 August 2022
Fields: wiki, logic, philosophy, MediaWiki

Felipe Schenone is a philosopher and logician by training, web developer and wiki-expert by trade. Contributor to Wikipedia and other wikis since 2008, he believes that science and academia should ditch paid journals and embrace open knowledge.

Rosemary Redfield
From: 3 May 2020
Fields: microbiology, genetics, evolution

Florian Weller
From: 24 November 2017 to 12 September 2022
Fields: zoology, conservation biology, ecosystem model, paleontology, geology

Markus Pössel
From: 5 November 2017
Additionally: social media manager
Fields: astrophysics, astronomy, general relativity

Scott Thomson
From: 19 June 2019
Fields: zoology, paleontology, taxonomy, zoological nomenclature, International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, turtle, conservation science

Yulia Sevryugina
From: 16 August 2020
Fields: metascience, data science, cheminformatics, information science, crystallography, inorganic chemistry, chemical education

Research career in chemistry: coordination chemistry, small molecule crystallography, medicinal, and boron chemistry. As faculty at TCU, I was leading a research group in the the development of dopamine targeting drugs. Currently, at the University of Michigan, my research interests are in data science and scientometrics as related to chemistry and biomedical research.

Melanie Stefan
From: 24 November 2017
Additionally: social media manager
Fields: computational biology, biochemistry, neurobiology, statistics

Melanie Stefan is a Professor of Physiology at Medical School Berlin. Her research group focuses on using computational tools to understand learning and memory.

Activity

Coordinating peer reviews

edit

Editorial board members are expected to participate in the coordination of the peer review process of submitted articles to the board. This includes corresponding with the author, identifying potential peer reviewers, corresponding with peer reviewers and reminding peer reviewers of the review due dates. An editorial board member does not need to participate in the peer review coordination of every submitted article.

Article decisions

edit

The purpose of the editorial board is to form consensus about whether to include upcoming articles in the journal, based on multiple factors such as scope, peer reviewer recommendations and utility for Wikipedia. In the same manner as Wikipedia is not a democracy, the means of decision making is discussion leading to consensus; Straw polls can be used to test for consensus, but polls or surveys can impede, rather than foster, discussion.

Editorial board members will be notified by email to wjsboard googlegroups.com (only accepting emails from board members) when an article submission is up for decision, together with whether it needs to be held strictly confidential or not. An editorial board member does not need to comment on every article submission. In addition, editorial board members should join the public group of WikiJSci to stay updated about what's going on in the project. In practice, members of the editorial board have substantial communication by email, especially for confidential submissions. Public submissions can be discussed at their pages. Anyone may add their opinions and comments for such online discussions.

The main outcomes from inclusion discussions are:

Acceptance of the article
Rejection until there is an acceptable peer review of the article
Rejection until article is modified
Rejection outright

Other activities

edit

The editorial board also discusses and makes decisions regarding the overall operation of the journal. However, major issues that do not involve confidential matters should be discussed at the journal's public forums, at Talk:WikiJournal of Science, and/or the public Google Group of the journal through wikijsci googlegroups.com. Editorial board members are encouraged to invite potential additional participants to the journal.

Editorial board members may also opt to include themselves in the mailing list about matters related to the overall WikiJournal organization at the general WikiJournal mailing list. Matters that are important to the WikiJournal of Science should be emailed to its own mailing list as well. Editorial board members may also participate in online meetings, whose dates are usually announced by the board email list.

All positions in the journal are voluntary, that is, for no financial gain.

Editor-in-chief and assistant

edit

The editor-in-chief has final responsibility for all operations and policies.

The assistant to the editor-in-chief will act in place of the editor-in-chief on the event of his resignation or incapacity.

Both the editor-in-chief and the assistant to the editor-in-chief are expected to participate in public relations of the journal, including interviews and articles when opportunities arise. They are expected to add newly elected board members to the wjsboard googlegroups.com, whose presentation page (visible to members only) contains additional information for board members.

At least the editor-in-chief and the assistant to the editor-in-chief are entrusted with the journal's password to administer the journal's WikiJSci.org domain at GoDaddy. This domain needs to be renewed every other year, at a cost of approximately $30 each time. Logging into the domain's account at GoDaddy also avails for changing the email addresses included in the common email address (known by the editorial board) for updates about the journal. This site is also where redirection to another target than the current one may be done in the future.

Duties of the editor-in-chief

The editor-in-chief has final responsibilities for the operations and policies of the journal. Contact details of the editor-in-chief should be stated online. The editor-in-chief should act as the point of contact for questions relating to research and publication ethics. The editor-in-chief should acknowledge receipt of communications from institutions and should promptly bring the matter to the editorial board for action. The editor-in-chief should keep the public informed about any changes in the aims and scope of the journal.

The editor-in-chief should not disclose confidential details about work submissions with editor-in-chiefs of other journals, unless the following requirements are fulfilled:

Such sharing is a necessary part of fulfilling the obligation to prevent and respond to suspected research misconduct
The authors of the work have been informed about the issue at hand, and have not given a response, or the response was not satisfactory
The disclosure is limited to journals which are suspected of having been targeted by the research misconduct at hand, or are believed to have pertinent information of the case at hand.
The recipient editor-in-chief is notified about the sensitive nature of the information.

The amount of disclosed information should be limited to the minimum required. The shared information should be factual, while avoiding conjecture and speculation.

Further reading

Sharing of Information Among Editors-in-Chief Regarding Possible Misconduct, by COPE

Join

If you are interested in becoming an editorial board member, you need to abide by the following:

You should be willing to have your full name displayed online as seen in the list of editorial board members. Affiliations should be stated as well.
You should be familiar with the purpose and structure of the journal, as well as its Bylaws. It is also recommended to be familiar with external guidelines by which the journal abides:

ICMJE Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication: [1]
COPE code of conduct for journal editors: [2]

You should abide by the confidentiality policies of the journal:

Confidentiality policies

edit

Most authors have allowed their article submissions to WikiJournal to be open-access in the wiki from the very beginning. Still, the main requirement as a member of the editorial board is to not leak those works that authors wish to be confidential up until publication. Many journals do not accept submissions that have been in the open at any time, and thereby authors may be harmed by premature disclosure of any or all of an article submission's details. Editorial board members therefore keep such works confidential by restricting discussions about such articles in email communications or at a closed group at Google Sites, rather than talk page entries in Wikipedia or Wikiversity. Members of the editorial board must not retain such works for their personal use.

You should generally ask for permission from the sender before posting non-public board emails to a public location such as in this wiki or forwarding to the journal's public email lists (wikijsci googlegroups.com and wikijournal-en lists.wikimedia.org).

Applying

edit

If you agree with the policies, please apply here. This should include a short summary of:

STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) education and experience
Wikipedia or related project experience
Publishing or editorial experience
A statement of acceptance of the policies

All fields are optional, and you do not need to have experience in every area, however some relevant experience is very useful.

Apply to the Editorial Board

The editor-in-chief, or someone appointed by the editor-in-chief, should perform the following tasks:

Monitor the applications page, and let the editorial board know about knew applications.
The identity of the applicant should be confirmed, if not already properly evidenced. It may be done by contacting the person through an email or number from a public website (suggested email template).
Journal members may ask for clarifications or complementary information.
The editorial board will form a consensus of whether to let the applicant join the board.

Onboarding process

edit

For applicants accepted to the board, the following tasks should be performed:

Mark their application as accepted, by copy-pasting {{subst:WikiJournal accepted board member}} at the bottom of the section.
Contact the new editorial board member via email to inform them (Suggested email template)
Direct-add the new editorial board member to the board's private email group, which will grant them access to the private page only visible to board members
Add them to the Editorial board page using the WikiJournal editor summary template

These tasks can be distributed to any editorial board members of the journal.

Duties of editorial board members

Editorial board members should have a set of talents, experience, and competencies that will best fulfill the needs of the WikiJournal of Science. The full names and affiliations of the editorial board members should be displayed online.

Confidentiality

edit

Editorial board members must keep the confidentiality of works, author or peer reviewer identities, or other privileged information unless permission has been granted to disclose such material or information. Editorial board members must not retain confidential works or information for their personal use.

Scientific misconduct

edit

Scientific misconduct is defined as intention or gross negligence leading to fabrication of the scientific message or a false credit or emphasis given to a scientist. The editorial board members should inform institutions if they suspect misconduct by their researchers, and provide evidence to support these concerns, such as analysis of text similarity in cases of suspected plagiarism, or evidence of inappropriate image manipulation. They should cooperate with investigations and respond to institutions’ questions about misconduct allegations. They should be prepared to issue retractions or corrections when provided with findings of misconduct arising from investigations. They should correct or retract findings that are invalid or unreliable, both when caused by misconduct and by honest errors. Publications should be retracted if they are evidenced to be generally unreliable, while on the other hand a correction should be made in cases where only a small part of the publication is affected while the majority of findings and conclusions are valid.

Editorial board members should investigate allegations of misconduct targeted at peer reviewers of the journal. However, editorial board members may be obliged to protect the identity of whistleblowers.

In cases of scientific misconduct involving several journals, these journals should cooperate and share information as required to resolve the issues.

Editorial board members should keep communications relating to ongoing misconduct investigations confidential between parties.

Expression of concern

edit

An Expression of Concern may be used to inform readers about serious allegations likely to affect the reliability or integrity of a work. Expressions of Concern should not be viewed as ‘milder’ versions of retractions. The editorial board should consider issuing an Expression of Concern if:

There is inconclusive evidence scientific misconduct by the authors
There is evidence that the findings are unreliable, but there is no institution or entity available to properly investigate the case
There is reason to believe that an investigation into alleged misconduct either has not been, or would not be, fair and impartial or conclusive
An investigation is underway but a decision thereof will not be available for a considerable time

Correction

edit

The editorial board should consider issuing a correction if:

A small portion of an otherwise reliable publication is evidenced to be misleading, particularly if it appears to be an honest error such as a methodological error or a miscalculation
The author list is incorrect. For example, a deserving author may have been omitted or somebody who does not meet authorship criteria may have been included

Retraction

edit

The editorial board should consider retracting a publication if:

There is clear evidence that the findings are unreliable, either as a result of honest error or scientific misconduct such as data fabrication
The findings have previously been published elsewhere without proper permission or justification for publication in WikiJournal of Science as well
It contains plagiarism
It reports unethical research

Retractions are not usually appropriate in cases where the authorship needs to be changed but there is no reason to doubt the validity of the findings.

A retraction statement must be added in each retraced work. A retraction statements should:

Be clearly identifiable as a retraction statement, including having a title starting "Retraction statement"
Include the reasons for the retraction
Distinguish between cases of misconduct and honest error to encourage researchers to report errors when they occur and ensure no stigma is attached to this.
Be linked to the retracted work and be open access
Clearly identify which work it refers to, by at least title and authors
Be published promptly after the retraction decision
State that the editorial board has made the retraction decision

If a retraction is due to the actions of only some of the authors, the statement should mention this. However, authorship entails some degree of joint responsibility for the entire work, so the author list of a work should not change after retraction.

A retraction statement may undergo amendments by consensus of the editorial board.

Further reading

Duties of the editor-in-chief

WikiJournal User Group/Ethics statement

Full ethics statement, by the WikiJournal User Group