Frequently Asked Questions
What is Research Square?
Research Square is a multidisciplinary preprint platform developed and operated by a company of the same name. The platform allows researchers to share their work early, gain feedback, and improve a paper before submission to a journal.
Preprints are preliminary reports that have not undergone peer review. They should not be considered conclusive, used to inform clinical practice, or referenced by the media as validated information.
How do I know my work won't be stolen?
As soon as your DOI is issued, your work is time stamped and becomes a permanent part of the scholarly record.
Will posting a preprint on Research Square impact the editor's decision when I submit to a journal?
Many journals allow and even encourage posting a preprint prior to submission. A list of journal policies can be found on Wikipedia and SHERPA/RoMEO. Consult these lists and your target journal's author guidelines before submitting your preprint.
What are the benefits of posting early?
Posting your work early allows you to register your discovery prior to publication in a journal. A DOI timestamps your work, and once public, your preprint can be cited, commented on, and shared by you or others.
Most importantly, posting your work early means discoveries are shared more quickly, allowing others to build off your work and science to move more quickly. A commentary on the benefits of preprints in the life sciences can be found here: https://science.sciencemag.org/content/352/6288/899.
What does it cost to submit my manuscript to Research Square?
Submitting to Research Square is free.
Can I post my paper on another preprint server after posting to Research Square?
When you post to a preprint server you retain full copyright over your paper and are free to post it in as many places as you like. However, having more than one version in different places reduces the usage counts, dilutes metrics obtained here and on other sites and creates unnecessary redundancy in the scholarly record.
How are preprints on Research Square licensed?
Research Square preprints are published under a CC-BY 4.0 license, meaning the author retains full copyright for their work. Readers are able to reuse the content under the rules of the CC-BY license.
Why was my submission not approved for posting on Research Square?
When a preprint is submitted, it undergoes a series of checks to ensure it is suitable to be posted on the platform. These checks include:
- Is it in scope and is it an article type we accept?
- Does it represent the findings of an original scientific study?
- Is it in English and is the language of sufficient quality?
- Does it contain any findings that may pose a risk to health?
- Does it contain any claims that require peer review before being made public?
If we feel your paper does not pass all of these checks, we may decide not to post it, in which case you will receive an email informing you of our decision. Decisions to withhold posting cannot be appealed.
Will purchasing language editing services from AJE or other services from Research Square affect whether my manuscript is posted on Research Square?
While many of the language services and editorial services offered at AJE and Research Square will improve the quality of your paper, ultimately, whether a service has been purchased will have no bearing on whether your preprint is posted.
What is the relationship between AJE and Research Square?
AJE and Research Square are sister companies and part of Research Square Group founded by Shashi Mudunuri in 2004. The mission of Research Square Group is to make research communication faster, fairer, and more useful. AJE and Research Square do this by offering a variety of services aimed at helping authors prepare their work for publication and share it with the global community. As part of providing a comprehensive author experience, we proudly recommend the AJE and Research Square services to anyone who uses the Research Square preprint platform.
The use of these services in preparing your manuscript does not guarantee posting on Research Square.
What types of articles do you accept?
- Research Article - a full article of the kind that appears in academic journals. Research Articles usually take the form of Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, and Conclusions; however, we accept other formats as well.
- Systematic Review - a formal evaluation of the literature on a particular topic, including clearly defined inclusion/exclusion criteria, an exclusion flowchart, and a meta-analysis of available results.
- Method Article - a full description of a new method. A Method Article should include a write-up of the steps taken to validate the method, with results to support this validation.
- Short Report - a brief write up of a single experiment. This often takes the form of a single figure with brief accompanying text to explain how the figure was obtained.
- Case Report - a write-up of an individual clinical presentation. This is usually accompanied by a literature review to place in the context of current clinical understanding.
- Data Note - a single dataset accompanied by a brief write up of how the data were obtained.
We do not accept literature reviews, hypotheses, opinions, theories or commentaries.
How is Research Square different from other preprints?
Research Square features all the characteristics of a traditional preprint server but with some notable differences:
- Wherever possible, preprints are displayed in HTML. The full text is indexed and machine-readable so that it is more discoverable by search engines and easier for readers to consume.
- We provide full metrics on your preprint, including Altmetrics and Dimensions data.
- You can demonstrate to the community that your manuscript meets established standards in scientific reporting by purchasing a Methods Reporting Badge or a Statistics Reporting Badge. Badge icons are displayed on your preprint page for the badges you earn. Learn more about Research Square Badges.
- You can purchase editing services from AJE to improve your manuscript before submitting to a journal. Learn more about AJE editing services.
- A video can be added to the article page to communicate your research to a broader audience. Learn more about Research Square Videos.
- Readers can comment on a preprint using our custom-built commenting system or the hypothes.is annotation tool.
- Figures are rendered using a lightbox that allows for zooming and downloading.
Does Research Square have an Impact Factor?
No. Research Square is a preprint platform and is therefore not listed in the Web of Science. Articles can still be cited, however, and citations will be counted by Google Scholar and Crossref.
How do I submit a preprint?
Click Submit a preprint, create an account, and then follow the instructions to upload your manuscript and figures. After you submit your paper to Research Square, it will be checked by our editorial staff to ensure it meets our requirements for online posting. We'll email you when your paper is posted online and ready to be shared. At that time, you'll receive a DOI and a link to the public version of your preprint to share with others.
What are Research Square's editorial policies?
Read our full editorial policies here.
What is a DOI and why do I need one?
A Digital Object Identifier (DOI) is a persistent, unique string of characters associated with an online document, indicating that it has been published online and is part of the scholarly record. This means the work can be cited by other researchers in the knowledge that the cited article will be permanently available through the DOI link.
DOIs from Research Square are issued through Crossref, who have a specific DOI structure for preprints. This allows them to be linked to the final published journal article.
How do I cite my paper once it's been posted as a preprint?
Whichever reference style you use, the citation should make clear that the paper is a preprint and not yet part of the published literature. We suggest the following format:
AUTHOR. TITLE. DATE, PREPRINT (Version \#) available at Research Square DOI.Example:
Meybohm, P., Lindau, S., Treskatsch, S. et al. Liberal transfusion strategy to prevent mortality and anaemia-associated, ischaemic events in elderly non-cardiac surgical patients -- the study design of the LIBERAL-Trial. 20 December 2018, PREPRINT (Version 2) available at Research Square https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.2.55/v2
How do I submit a revised version of my preprint to Research Square?
To upload a revision, simply log into your account and select 'Edit Submission.'
How can I get others to comment on my preprint?
Once your paper is posted online, use the share icons in your author dashboard to share on social media or through email. You can reply to comments and engage with the community directly. You can also flag comments you find inappropriate. Read more about how to make the most of your preprint using social media here.
How can I comment on other preprints?
Comments allow the community to provide transparent feedback to authors about their preprint. Comments can include constructive feedback on the methods, conclusions, statistics, impact, or any other aspect of the work. Comments that are deemed to be inappropriate or promotional in nature may be moderated and removed.
Readers can also comment on specific words, sentences, or sections of the text by simply highlighting the text and selecting "annotate" using the hypothes.is annotation tool.
What is In Review?
In Review is a free preprint service that gives authors the option to have their paper posted online at the time of submission to select journals. Powered by Research Square and developed in partnership with Springer Nature, In Review also gives authors and readers access to the status of a manuscript via a peer review timeline while the paper is under review at the journal.
Click here for more information about In Review or view participating journals.
What is Research Square's long term content preservation strategy?
All content on Research Square is permanently archived in Portico, a not-for-profit organization committed to the long-term preservation of scholarly content.
What is the relationship between Research Square and Springer Nature?
Springer Nature is an investor in Research Square. Both companies have a long-standing relationship based on our shared commitment to providing high-quality services to global researchers. We began formally working together in 2008 through Research Square's sister company, AJE, and have continued to co-develop innovative products and services for the global research community. (For more about Springer Nature and AJE's relationship, see here). Most recently, our partnership led to the launch of In Review. This journal-integrated preprint service gives authors the option to post their paper as a preprint at the time of submission to a journal and track its status in real time through peer review. For more information about In Review, including a list of participating journals, see here.
A shared commitment to global researcher
Our partnership with Springer Nature allows us to support more researchers at various stages of the publishing lifecycle – from preprint to post-publication – and ultimately helps us accomplish our mission to make research square communication faster, fairer, and more useful.
Preprints
Following the launch of In Review in 2018, Research Square began accepting direct submissions to the platform in 2019. In Review is currently available on many Springer Nature journals with plans to include the service on more journals over time. The service is free to authors and all content is free to read and download.
I have a concern about one of the preprints on the platform. Who should I contact?
Please contact the editorial office at [email protected].