Journals update

Journal of Medical Microbiology

Since taking up the reins of Journal of Medical Microbiology in April 2017, we are now, more than ever, intensely aware of both the legacy left to us by our predecessors as well as our own commitment to build and improve on the journal during our term. We will also be celebrating 50 years of Journal of Medical Microbiology in 2018, as Journal of Medical Microbiology was officially separated from the Journal of Pathology and Bacteriology in 1968.

What have we been doing since we started as Editors-in-Chief? 

At the Microbiology Society Annual Conference 2017, we co-led two scientific publishing workshops alongside the Professional Development Team at the Society. The two sessions ‘How to review a scientific manuscript’ and ‘How to write a scientific manuscript for submission’ were both well received at the 2017 Conference. We have also been chairing Editorial Board meetings and representing the journal by ensuring the visibility of the journal at conferences and Society-related events. 

We have expanded the Editorial Board to better represent the international community that we serve, and revisited the journal scope leading to a revision of our Sections (and Section Editors) as follows: 

• Antimicrobial Resistance: Vincent Cattoir, France
• Clinical Microbiology: Direk Limmathurotsakul, Thailand
• Disease, Diagnosis and Diagnostics: Arunaloke Chakrabarti, India
• Microbiome and Microbial Ecology in Health: Marcello Riggio, UK
• Molecular and Microbial Epidemiology: Tim Inglis, Australia
• One Health – Emerging, Zoonotic and Environmental Diseases: Roberto La Ragione, UK
• Pathogenesis, Virulence and Host Response: Kim Hardie, UK
• Prevention, Therapy and Therapeutics: Rikke Meyer, Denmark

For more information on the journal sections, read our document on the journals platform. 

The full range of article types and submission criteria can be found on the journal website. 

Journal of Medical Microbiology as a presence:

To see what some of our Editors have been up to, have a read of the article on the 15th Asian Conference on Transcription 2017, Malaysia, in this issue in the article about the Asian Conference on Transcription.

It’s never too early to get future conference dates in your diaries – you can get a full listing of forthcoming events. We would like to give a special mention about the Focused Meeting on Emerging Zoonoses and Antimicrobial Resistance: A Global Threat, taking place 2 July 2018 at the University of Surrey, UK, and organised by one of Journal of Medical Microbiology’s Section Editors, Roberto La Ragione.

Prof Kalai Mathee & Dr Norman Fry

Co-Editors-in-Chief 

Call for papers: Arboviruses and their Vectors

Following the 2nd International Meeting on Arboviruses and their Vectors (IMAV) 2017 Focused Meeting, Journal of General Virology is inviting submissions of research papers and reviews for a new thematic collection: Arboviruses and their Vectors.

Curated by Professor Eng Eong Ooi (Duke NUS Medical School), Professor Alain Kohl (University of Glasgow) and Dr Esther Schnettler (Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine), the collection will present the latest advances in arbovirus research. 

Articles are invited on the following topics:

• virus discovery and emergence
• virus–host interactions and evolution
• vector biology and ecology
• antivirals/vaccines

For more information on how to submit, please contact [email protected] using the subject line ‘Arboviruses and their Vectors Collection’ or go to the journal’s homepage.

Microbial Genomics article processing charges 

As an open access journal, Microbial Genomics introduced article processing charges (APCs) in January 2018. The Microbiology Society will partially subsidise these rates, which will be at the reduced price of £700 throughout 2018 (one-third of the full APC).

Any new manuscripts submitted will receive this discounted price, but free content such as invited reviews will remain free to publish. Any articles that were submitted before 1 January 2018 and are still under revision by this date will also not be charged an APC.

Microbiology Society Journals Author Survey 2018

Last year, the Microbiology Society surveyed over 350 authors to find out about their experience of publishing with a Society journal and we would like to share the results with our members.

The survey was conducted in June 2017, across the portfolio of Microbiology Society journals. The questions asked for feedback from researchers who had submitted an article to one of the journals in the past year. We wanted to find out about authors’ experiences and learn where we could improve. 

Would submit again and recommend to a friend

Once again, we are happy to announce that the response to the survey was positive overall. On a scale of 1–5 (1 being very poor; 5 being excellent), the response was 4 overall, with authors outlining that they would be ‘submitting again’ and ‘recommending to a friend’. We are pleased that our responding authors have continued to have an experience that is 4/5 across the journals, in line with the 2016 results. We hope that the changes following feedback from last year’s survey have made a difference to our authors. 

Revised open access process

In response to feedback from 2016 regarding the open access process, we have fully implemented a streamlined online system with Copyright Clearance Centre, who handled the article processing charges for our open access papers.

Leading publisher in the field of microbiology

We asked our authors what the main reason was for submitting to their journal of choice. Across the journals, 1/3 of our respondents agreed with the statement that the Society is a ‘leading publisher in the field of microbiology’, followed by ‘the scope of the journals’. 

International reach

We are delighted that so many of our authors view the Microbiology Society’s journals as leaders in their fields. Our Editorial Boards have a global reach and consist of experts within the broad scope of microbiology. We continue to strive towards continued author satisfaction and aim to remain a leader in the field of microbiology for our authors. 

Peer review process and production

The overall peer review process and production were both rated as above 4/5. This result is in line with the 2016 survey and we will continue to listen to the feedback from our authors to ensure that the peer review experience is as positive as possible. 

Continuous Publication 

From the feedback of the 2016 survey, we have implemented a Continuous Publication model for our articles as 81% of respondents agreed on preferring the version of record being the first published form of article. This was implemented at the end of 2016. 

Thank you to everyone who completed the survey, we really appreciate your feedback and hope that we can continue the success of the Microbiology Society’s journals. If you have any queries or questions, please get in touch with [email protected].