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them to use, as a plain language explanation of what this preprint was talking about. ‘The interesting thing is, the manuscript


went on to be published in Nature Immunology and it still got lots of attention from the same [Covid hoax] crowd, so having been peer reviewed doesn’t change the fact that people can take information and twist it or misunderstand complicated research.’ More broadly, this is part of making


clear to readers what preprints are and are not. ‘We have this disclaimer on our preprints that I think most of the preprint servers have, which says this is a preprint, it’s not been peer-reviewed by a journal (you want to be specific as there are other mechanisms for peer review).’ However, she added: ‘Scientists who


are finding preprints on servers that are specifically related to their field subject matter are the experts; these are the people who are in the best position to scrutinise a paper. We want them to look at it and, ideally, we want them to comment on it and review it formally.’ Pattinson also observed: ‘Preprint


archives are extremely careful about what they post and have professional editors looking at papers to make sure there aren’t going to be significant issues. I think perhaps that bit has got a bit lost. Overall, the risk of [dubious studies being shared as preprints] probably isn’t much higher than things getting published in journals and slipping through those channels.’ He does see another challenge, however:


how preprint servers can indicate more clearly if something has been peer-


reviewed. ‘At the moment, all preprints have the same disclaimer essentially – even papers where the reviews are posted clearly alongside. Ultimately, that is something we would like to see improve in the future.’


Looking to the future It is clear preprints are now solidly part of the scholarly communication process, but some challenges remain. One of these is the challenge of wider acceptance, which comes with support from research funders and decision-makers. As Owango explained, particularly


regarding preprints in Africa: ‘With time, we are looking at a situation whereby preprints are considered as a research output for promotions, and for somebody to graduate. For that to happen, you’re talking at a policy level. It’s convincing university education commissions: this is a new technology in academic publishing, this person has already identified or is in the process of identifying their journal and this output is already collecting citations and downloads.’ Regarding funders, Avissar-Whiting noted


that ‘some have really taken quite a strong position of requiring preprint deposition and most of the ones that aren’t requiring it now have some line in their policies about encouraging the use of preprints and preprint review mechanisms’. Pattinson agreed about funder support, noting that ‘funders love them… I think that will drive this output.’ Technology developments will also play a wider role in acceptance. Already, as Owango highlighted, the use of DOIs in preprint servers has provided permanence


An astrophysicist’s perspective


By Prof. Richard de Grijs, School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences, Macquarie University, Australia


In our field, we have become used to the arXiv preprint server, which has included an astrophysics section (astro-ph) since the 1990s. It has become a standard part of our publishing routine to submit our papers to arXiv upon acceptance – to the extent that, when a paper led by a collaborator doesn’t appear on arXiv for a few days after acceptance, we start to wonder why there is a delay. Some colleagues submit their papers to arXiv upon submission to a journal, or if the review process takes too long in their view (in which case they may pointedly include the submission date in the comments box!). I prefer to wait until acceptance; I have been burnt a (very) small number of times earlier


14 Research Information Spring 2022


in my career when it turned out that the referees’ reports required major revision. When collaborators ask whether they


have my approval to submit to arXiv prior to acceptance, I am usually very reluctant to agree. I might agree for papers in areas that are highly competitive, so there is a need to establish priority, or data papers that we know other groups may want to use before the whole review process is over. There are a few issues with using arXiv


preprints – fewer if they refer to accepted papers – but if you want to refer to a preprint uploaded before acceptance, it is important to make sure the results are still valid after acceptance. Most of the journals in our field actively add their publication information to the arXiv records where possible, although this may take some time. Another issue I have seen crop up from time to time is that arXiv’s management has


changed over the years to become more selective. There are quite a few anecdotes of people whose work was rejected by arXiv without clearly stated reasons, or whose papers were reclassified by arXiv staff without clear rationales or consultation with the authors. The system has become so large – and important to the community (if your paper isn’t on arXiv, some people won’t read it – ever) – that there is a need for more transparent processes. Finally, I should mention that arXiv has become even more important to colleagues in some cognate fields, like cosmology or particle physics. In those fields, some journals require authors to upload their new papers to arXiv and provide the number to the journal as their ‘submission’ to the journal. Other journals in those fields have become overlay journals, where they collect arXiv papers into issues.


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and made it easier to cite preprints. But there is more that can be done to use DOIs within preprint records. Avissar-Whiting recently conducted


research into preprints of papers that went on to be published and then retracted. The number of such examples is still very small, but she says it highlights the importance of knowing what happens with a paper downstream: ‘We’d want to be aware of these things so that we can link them backwards. CrossRef is really going to help with this because if one party creates the association, theoretically, information can flow in both directions.’ There is potential too in working on how


preprint data is structured, tagged and reused. One avenue being explored by some is the use of artificial intelligence for data mining preprints. Translation tools also open up new opportunities, as does the possibility of incorporating blockchain technologies. Pattinson notes that eLife wants to


explore ways to blur the boundaries between preprints and journal articles – for example, by improving the display rendering to make figures more useful, having the sorts of metadata that you would associate with the journal article. ‘It is an opportunity to do things better


and revise the system,’ he summed up. ‘All of the waste that happens in the current system, where everything is done behind closed doors and reviews are thrown in the bin every time a paper is rejected, we need that to go. We see preprints genuinely as [one of] the most exciting innovations in biomedical science for 20 years.’


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