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The journal Nature was founded in 1869 with the mission statement to: “help scientists communicate with each other and to communicate to wider audiences”. Prior to 1869 specialist journals existed but they were aimed at a very a select group of scientists. This is a short summary about getting published in Nature in general and Nature Immunology in particular.
The increasing specialization of science and the growth of the scientific community led to the launch of more specialist Nature Journals starting with Nature Genetics (1992) and most recently Nature Communications. Nature Immunology itself was launched in 2000 and quickly became one of the most highly cited research journals in the world (IF ~26). Nature also partners with a number of learned societies to publish their journals e.g. Mucosal Immunology, EMBO Journal, Immunology and Cell Biology.
All the Nature-branded research journals are highly selective and have full-time editorial staff with no Editorial board. Although there can be cooperation between the Nature journals they are all editorially independent. Nature Immunology is composed of the following team. Although we handle all kinds of manuscripts (e.g. we all handle T cells and innate immunity) as required we have loose areas of specialism depending on our background: Jamie Wilson- Chief Editor (infection), Laurie Dempsey- Senior Editor (B cells, trafficking, generation of diversity), Ioana Visan- Assistant Editor (development), Zoltan Fehervari- Associate Editor (immune regulation, tolerance), Adam Lipkin and Jennifer Fosmire handle the journal admin. and copyediting respectively.
Nature Immunology has a number of submission types: Presubmissions, Research/Resource Articles, Review/Perspective/Essay/Commentary/News and View (generally by invitation only), Correspondence, and Translational Immunology (a proposed new format). We aim to try to and turnaround articles (reject or send out to review) within 2-3days.
When submitting consider the following:
Cover letter: this is a key aspect of the submission. Should not be overlong (~1 side A4) and should clearly state why the article will appeal to a broad cross-section of the immunology community and why it is a significant advance. It’s helpful to suggest referees in the cover letter though they won’t necessarily be used. Referee exclusions will always be respected. Format: make sure the article fits Nature Immunology’s house-style, length etc. Appropriateness: is Nature Immunology a suitable forum for the article. Have we published this kind of work in the past?
Stats: ~75% of articles are rejected at the editorial stage and ~50% at the review stage. Accepted articles are normally go through 1 or 2 rounds of revision.
Things editors look for: Relevance (physiological & general), sufficient mechanism, sufficient novelty and insight.
Rejection: This happens a lot! Please bear in mind that it doesn’t mean it’s not a good study- there can be many reasons for rejection e.g. lacking mechanistic insight, too descriptive, data don’t support conclusions, not a significant enough advance, lack of sufficient novelty, too specialized.
Revising a manuscript: needs to have a clear point by point response to all the referee comments. Priorities for revision can also be discussed with the editor. Please track all changes in the revision- makes the editors and referees happy! Generally revisions will go back to referees if there has been any substantive experimental additions.
Transfers: All rejected articles in any Nature journal be transferred to another by clicking a link in the rejection letter. This will transfer across the referee and editorial comments (if there are any). Although Nature journals are editorially in dependent this can be an efficient way to have your article viewed at another journal. Very occasionally they are accepted by another journal without the need for re-review.
Appeals: These can occur in the case of serious errors made by the editors and/or referees. Please approach the handling editor to discuss the details. Although they are taken seriously by the editors they are considered a lower priority than new articles or those currently in house so consequently can take longer (weeks).
Acceptance: If you get this far- congratulations! The final article is edited for scientific clarity by the handling editor before being transferred to the copyeditor for housestyle/formatting changes to the figures. Are few other minor administrative issues also have to be completed by the authors at this stage (e.g. declaring conflicts of interest, license agreements).
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