Policies
General information
Fungal Genetics Reports (FGR) is a peer-reviewed journal that publishes notes, articles, commentaries, and conference proceedings on topics involving fungal biology. FGR is published in digital format, and it is archived for perpetual access through two major archiving services (CLOCKSS and Portico).
Commitment to Ethical Publishing
The editors of FGR strive to adhere to best practices in ethical research publishing as promoted by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE, https://publicationethics.org/). Prospective authors are encouraged to familiarize themselves with COPE’s ten core practices in ethical publishing before submitting a work to FGR or participating as a reviewer in the peer-review process. Typically, two peer-reviewers provide manuscript reviews. Reviewers of submitted articles must adhere to ethical review practices as promoted by COPE (https://publicationethics.org/node/19886).
The information below describes policies designed to promote ethical publishing by FGR.
Allegations of research misconduct on part of authors
The FGR editors are committed to investigating all allegations of research misconduct. The FGR editors reserve the right to retract works deemed likely to be associated with research misconduct according to guidelines promoted by the Committee on Publication Ethics. Allegations of misconduct should be sent directly to the editor-in-chief.
Allegations of unethical conduct by editors and editorial staff
The FGR editors are committed to ethical publishing and strive to offer authors, peer reviewers, and readers the opportunity to raise concerns of unethical behavior by the editors or editorial staff. Allegations of unethical behavior by any member of the editorial staff should be sent directly to the editor-in-chief (with a request for anonymity if desired). The editor-in-chief will work with the reporting party to determine if anonymity can be ensured before proceeding. Allegations of unethical behavior by the editor-in-chief should be addressed to an associate editor (with a request for anonymity if desired). The associate editor will bring the complaint to the current journal coordinator of New Prairie Press at Kansas State University’s Center for the Advancement of Digital Scholarship..
Authorship and contributorship
Corresponding authors are responsible for ensuring all authors consent to submission and publication. Failure to do so may result in retraction of the article. Additionally, all articles must describe the specific contributions of each author. The roles of non-author contributors, as defined by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICJME), should be described in an acknowledgments section. Gift authorships are unethical and are prohibited.
Competing Interests
Each author must report all competing interests within the article. Editors with potential conflicts of interest must recuse themselves from editorial decisions. Peer reviewers with conflicts of interest must decline the opportunity to review. If editors or reviewers discover that they have conflicts of interest with the article during the review process, they must immediately recuse themselves so that they can be replaced with alternates.
Data availability and experiment reproducibility
Research and methods articles must include sufficient information to allow readers to reproduce the reported experiments. Unique biological specimens must be made available in a strain repository such as the Fungal Genetics Stock Center. Datasets should be deposited in a public data repository. Instructions on how readers can obtain key specimens and datasets must be included in the article. Note that it is not necessary to deposit all strains, datasets, and resources in a repository, only those items that are likely to be useful to the scientific community (e.g., difficult to construct plasmids) and/or are critical to reproducing the reported results must be deposited (e.g., genome sequencing data, strains collected from nature).
Research involving humans and primates
Research using humans or primates as subjects is beyond the current scope of FGR and will not be considered for publication. FGR may consider research involving human or primate cell lines, assuming the authors have performed the research in an ethical manner under the guidance of an institutional research ethics committee.
Research involving non-primate animals
FGR will consider articles involving research on non-primate animals assuming the authors have 1) adhered to best practices in the ethical treatment of animals in research as promoted by the Committee on Animal Research and Ethics (CARE; https://www.apa.org/science/leadership/care) and 2) performed the research with approval and supervision of an institutional animal care and use committee.
Intellectual property
The publisher of FGR, New Prairie Press, adheres to the principles of open access publishing as outlined in the Bethesda Statement on Open Access Publishing (http://legacy.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/bethesda.htm).
Fungal Genetics Reports provides immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of information that leads to knowledge and progress. Work is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike (CC BY-SA). Articles published in FGR may be shared with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and attribution to Fungal Genetics Reports.
Post-publication discussions and corrections
The editors of FGR will consider publishing discussions on previously published articles. The discussion should be submitted as a “letter to the editor” or a commentary. The editors of FGR reserve the right to issue corrections and retractions to articles that are found to be significantly flawed or ethically compromised post publication.
Publication charges
FGR has no submission, processing, or publication charges.
Instructions to Authors
Submission Guidelines
FGR publishes four types of articles:
1. Research notes
2. Research articles
3. Commentaries and Letters (to the editor)
4. Conference Proceedings (with abstracts)
Research notes and research articles should be submitted by the corresponding author using FGR’s manuscript submission system: https://newprairiepress.org/cgi/submit.cgi?context=fgr.
Authors should prepare their submissions using the instructions below.
1. Research notes
Authors aiming to publish a short description of a research finding or methodological advancement should submit a research note. Authors should format the submission to fit on no more than two 8.5×11-inch pages with 1-inch margins. Authors may use any font type, font size, and line spacing for a research note, but the chosen format must be easily readable.
A research note should be concise. The information should not be divided into distinct sections. However, to ensure all FGR articles adhere to ethical principles, research notes must include statements on data availability, research ethics, competing interests, and author contributions. The first paragraph of the research note will serve as the abstract. References should be formatted in the style of Genetics.
2. Research articles
Authors aiming to publish significant research findings or methodological advancements should submit a research article.
For initial submission, FGR requires a double-spaced manuscript with line numbers and 1-inch margins on all sides of standard 8.5×11-inch document.
Authors should include a title page with title, author names, author affiliations, corresponding author contact information, and up to five key words.
The article must contain the following sections: Abstract, Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, Discussion, Data and Resource Availability, Competing Interests, Research Ethics (if applicable), Author Contributions, Acknowledgements, Literature Cited, Tables, Figures, and Supplementary materials (if needed). Specific information on what to include in these sections is described below:
The Abstract should summarize the work in 250 words or less.
The Introduction section should help readers understand the reason for the study and the hypotheses under examination.
The Material and Methods section should include a detailed description of the materials and methods used in the report.
The Results section should describe the specific work that was accomplished.
The Discussion section should review the findings from the Results and explain how they advance the current state of knowledge in the research area.
In the Data Resource and Availability section, authors should describe how readers can obtain unique biological specimens, datasets, or other resources described in the report. For additional information, see Data availability and experiment reproducibility.
In the Research Ethics section, which is applicable for studies involving human or primate cell lines, or whole animals, the authors should describe their attempts to adhere to best practices in research ethics. If research was performed on human or primate cell lines, authors should declare that the research was ethically performed under the guidance of an institutional research oversight committee and provide the institutional name of the committee. If research involved whole animals, authors should declare that the research was ethically performed under the guidance of an institutional animal care and use committee and name the committee.
In the Competing Interests section, authors should describe all potential conflicts of interest (COI). Potential COIs that are not listed before publication may result in a retraction or a correction of the article. The corresponding author is responsible for ensuring that each author approves the statement before submission.
In the Author Contributions section, the authors must provide a statement for the contributions of each author and each author’s consent to publish the article. For example, “D.D.P. designed experiments, analyzed data, wrote the manuscript, and approved the article for publication”.
In the Acknowledgements section, the authors should thank contributors and provide funding information.
Each table and figure in the article should be included on a separate page. Tables and figures must be formatted to fit within an 8.5 by 11-inch document with 1-inch margins on all sides. If necessary, tables and figures may span multiple pages. While there are no additional required formatting requirements, text within tables and figures must be legible.
3. Commentaries and Letters (to the editor)
For initial submission, Commentaries and Letters should be double-spaced with line numbers and 1-inch margins on all sides of standard 8.5×11-inch document.
Authors should include a title, author names, author affiliations, corresponding author contact information. Authors must provide a competing interest statement.
4. Conference Proceedings (with abstracts)
Proceedings from fungal biology conferences can be sent as a pdf file to the editor-in-chief via email. The editor-in-chief, in concert with at least one other editor, will decide if the proceedings are appropriate for publication by FGR.
Review Policies
All communications submitted to Fungal Genetics Reports will be subject to single-blind review and suitability for publication will be decided by the editors. Typically, two peer-reviewers provide manuscript reviews. Reviewers of submitted articles must adhere to ethical review practices as promoted by COPE (https://publicationethics.org/node/19886).
Open Access Policy
Fungal Genetics Reports provides immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of information that leads to knowledge and progress. Work is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike (CC BY-SA) that allows this work to be shared with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and attribution to Fungal Genetics Reports, for example:
Harrison, N., B. Cavinder, J.P. Townsend, and F. Trail (2013) "Optimized primers and other critical conditions for efficient fusion PCR to generate knockout vectors in filamentous fungi," Fungal Genetics Reports, 60 (1) 1. http://demo.npp.bepress.com/fgr/vol60/iss1/1/
Copyright
Authors retain copyright ownership.
Archival Policy
FGR is archived for perpetual access through New Prairie Press's participation in CLOCKSS (Controlled Lots of Copies Keep Stuff Safe) and Portico, managed through the Digital Commons Publishing platform. New Prairie Press also participates in LOCKSS (Lots of Copies Keep Stuff Safe).
General Terms and Conditions of Use
Users of the New Prairie Press website and/or software agree not to misuse the New Prairie Press service or software in any way. The failure of New Prairie Press to exercise or enforce any right or provision in the policies or the Submission Agreement does not constitute a waiver of such right or provision. If any term of the Submission Agreement or these policies is found to be invalid, the parties nevertheless agree that the court should endeavor to give effect to the parties' intentions as reflected in the provision, and the other provisions of the Submission Agreement and these policies remain in full force and effect. These policies and the Submission Agreement constitute the entire agreement between New Prairie Press and the Author(s) regarding submission of the Article.
