PLoS主编：论文发表的十大简则

规则一：阅读很多论文，从成功的和失败的两方面汲取经验。

规则二：对您自己的论文越客观，最终的结果越好。

规则三：优秀的编者和审者会客观对待您的论文。

规则四：如果您英文写作不佳，提早补习，将受益终身。

规则五：学会与退稿为伴。

规则六：好的科学“元素”显而易见——新颖的研究主题，广泛的涉猎相关文献，好的数据，好的分析，包括强有力的统计学支持和发人深思讨论。好的科学报道其“元素”也显而易见——完美的结构、恰当的使用图表、适当的篇幅长度、为目标读者而写。切勿忽视这些显而易见的“元素”。

规则七：当有解决问题的思想火花迸发时，就开始撰稿。

规则八：在职业生涯之初就成为评阅人。

规则九：提早决定去哪里发表论文。

规则十：质量是一切。

Ten Simple Rules for Getting Published  

Philip E  Bourne

Philip E. Bourne is Editor-in-Chief of PLoS Computational Biology.  E-mail: bourne@sdsc.edu

The student council of the International Society for  Computational Biology asked me to present my thoughts on getting published in  the field of computational biology at the Intelligent Systems in Molecular  Biology conference held in Detroit in late June of 2005. Close to 200  bright young souls (and a few not so young) crammed into a small room for what  proved to be a wonderful interchange among a group of whom approximately  one-half had yet to publish their first paper. The advice I gave that day I have  modified and present as ten rules for getting  published.

Rule 1: Read  many papers, and learn from both the good and the bad work of  others.

It is never too early to become a critic. Journal clubs, where  you critique a paper as a group, are excellent for having this kind of dialogue.  Reading at least two papers a day in detail (not just in your area of research)  and thinking about their quality will also help. Being well read has another  potential major benefit—it facilitates a more objective view of one's own work.  It is too easy after many late nights spent in front of a computer screen and/or  laboratory bench to convince yourself that your work is the best invention since  sliced bread. More than likely it is not, and your mentor is prone to falling  into the same trap, hence rule 2.

Rule 2: The more  objective you can be about your work, the better that work will ultimately  become.

Alas, some scientists will never be objective about their own  work, and will never make the best scientists—learn objectivity early, the  editors and reviewers have.

Rule 3: Good  editors and reviewers will be objective about your  work.

The quality of the editorial board is an early indicator of the  review process. Look at the masthead of the journal in which you plan to  publish. Outstanding editors demand and get outstanding reviews. Put your energy  into improving the quality of the manuscript before submission. Ideally, the  reviews will improve your paper. But they will not get to imparting that advice  if there are fundamental flaws.

Rule 4: If you  do not write well in the English language, take lessons early; it will be  invaluable later.

This is not just about grammar, but more importantly  comprehension. The best papers are those in which complex ideas are expressed in  a way that those who are less than immersed in the field can understand. Have  you noticed that the most renowned scientists often give the most logical and  simply stated yet stimulating lectures? This extends to their written work as  well. Note that writing clearly is valuable, even if your ultimate career does  not hinge on producing good scientific papers in English language journals.  Submitted papers that are not clearly written in good English, unless the  science is truly outstanding, are often rejected or at best slow to publish  since they require extensive copyediting.  

Rule 5: Learn to  live with rejection.

A failure to be objective can make rejection harder to take, and  you will be rejected. Scientific careers are full of rejection, even for the  best scientists. The correct response to a paper being rejected or requiring  major revision is to listen to the reviewers and respond in an objective, not  subjective, manner. Reviews reflect how your paper is being judged—learn to live  with it. If reviewers are unanimous about the poor quality of the paper, move  on—in virtually all cases, they are right. If they request a major revision, do  it and address every point they raise both in your cover letter and through  obvious revisions to the text. Multiple rounds of revision are painful for all  those concerned and slow the publishing process.  

Rule 6: The  ingredients of good science are obvious—novelty of research topic, comprehensive  coverage of the relevant literature, good data, good analysis including strong  statistical support, and a thought-provoking discussion. The ingredients of good  science reporting are obvious—good organization, the appropriate use of tables  and figures, the right length, writing to the intended audience—do not ignore  the obvious.

Be objective about these ingredients when you review the first  draft, and do not rely on your mentor. Get a candid opinion by having the paper  read by colleagues without a vested interest in the work, including those not  directly involved in the topic area.  

Rule 7: Start  writing the paper the day you have the idea of what questions to  pursue.

Some would argue that this places too much emphasis on  publishing, but it could also be argued that it helps define scope and  facilitates hypothesis-driven science. The temptation of novice authors is to  try to include everything they know in a paper. Your thesis is/was your kitchen  sink. Your papers should be concise, and impart as much information as possible  in the least number of words. Be familiar with the guide to authors and follow  it, the editors and reviewers do. Maintain a good bibliographic database as you  go, and read the papers in it.

Rule 8: Become a  reviewer early in your  career.

Reviewing other papers will help you write better papers. To  start, work with your mentors; have them give you papers they are reviewing and  do the first cut at the review (most mentors will be happy to do this). Then, go  through the final review that gets sent in by your mentor, and where allowed, as  is true of this journal, look at the reviews others have written. This will  provide an important perspective on the quality of your reviews and, hopefully,  allow you to see your own work in a more objective way. You will also come to  understand the review process and the quality of reviews, which is an important  ingredient in deciding where to send your paper.  

Rule 9: Decide  early on where to try to publish your  paper.

This will define the form and level of detail and assumed novelty  of the work you are doing. Many journals have a presubmission enquiry system  available—use it. Even before the paper is written, get a sense of the novelty  of the work, and whether a specific journal will be interested.  

Rule 10: Quality  is everything.

It is better to publish one paper in a quality journal than  multiple papers in lesser journals. Increasingly, it is harder to hide the  impact of your papers; tools like Google Scholar and the ISI Web of Science are  being used by tenure committees and employers to define metrics for the quality  of your work. It used to be that just the journal name was used as a metric. In  the digital world, everyone knows if a paper has little impact. Try to publish  in journals that have high impact factors; chances are your paper will have high  impact, too, if accepted.

When you are long gone, your scientific legacy is, in large part,  the literature you left behind and the impact it represents. I hope these ten  simple rules can help you leave behind something future generations of  scientists will admire.

Citation: Bourne PE (2005). Ten simple rules for getting  published. PLoS Comput Biol 1(5):  e57.

Published online 2005 October 28.  doi: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.0010057.

Copyright : © 2005 Philip E. Bourne. This is  an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons  Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and  reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are properly  credited.