Talk:Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

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In most cases, you will have access without needing to ask. All articles published more than 6 months ago are available free--this is known as Delayed open access, as are about 30% of the more recent ones, where the author has paid a supplemental fee--this is known as Hybrid open accessDGG 20:06, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Regarding PNAS and peer review, please note the following:

PNAS Submission Guidelines The standard mode of transmitting manuscripts is for authors to submit them directly to PNAS. In a cover letter or in the online submission form, authors must recommend up to three appropriate Editorial Board members, three NAS members who are expert in the paper’s scientific area, and five qualified referees. A directory of Academy members and their research interests is available at http://nrc88.nas.edu/pnas%5Fsearch. The Editorial Board may choose an editor for the paper who is not on that list or may reject the paper without further review. The editor obtains reviews of the paper from at least two qualified referees, each from a different institution and not from the authors’ institutions. For direct submission papers, the Editorial Office will invite the referees, secure the reviews, and forward them to the editor for a decision. The Editorial Office is also responsible for securing revisions and subsequent reviews when necessary. The name of the editor, who may remain anonymous to the author until the paper is accepted, will be published in PNAS as editor of the article. In the journal, papers submitted directly are distinguished as ‘‘Edited by’’ the responsible editor, and have an additional identifying footnote.

In addition, an Academy member may ‘‘communicate’’ for others manuscripts that are within the member’s area of expertise. Before submission to PNAS, the member obtains reviews of the paper from at least two qualified referees, each from a different institution and not from the authors’ institutions. The names and contact information, including e-mails, of referees who reviewed the paper, along with the reviews and the authors’ response, must be included. Reviews must be submitted on the PNAS review form. The communicating member should include a brief statement endorsing publication in PNAS. In the journal, these papers are distinguished as ‘‘Communicated by’’ the responsible editor.

An Academy member may also submit his or her own manuscripts for publication. Members’ submissions must be accompanied by the name(s) and contact information, including e-mail(s), of knowledgeable colleague(s) who reviewed the paper, along with the review(s), the authors’ response, and a brief statement endorsing publication in PNAS. The review(s) must be on the PNAS review form and should not be from the authors’ own institution. The Academy member must be a corresponding author on the paper. In the journal, these papers are distinguished as ‘‘Contributed by’’ the responsible editor.

All manuscripts are evaluated by the Editorial Board. The Board may reject manuscripts without further review or may subject manuscripts to review and reject those that do not meet the standards of the journal. Manuscripts rejected by one member cannot be resubmitted through another member or through the direct submission system. When revisions are requested prior to final decision, revised papers must be received within 3 months or they will be treated as new submissions.

A date should be used in preference to "recently", otherwise the article will date quickly. If this is late 2002 or early 2003 (for example) then say so. (I know it's hard to get used to saying "recently", but using specific dates is one of the rules to consider and helps the articles become true encyclopedia articles). -- Lexor 08:15 21 May 2003 (UTC)

Yes, you make a good point. In fact, I hesitated before I used the "recently." Thing is, I'll have to do some research to get a date. I think the policy of identifying a paper's manner of submission was argued for and brought about in the late 80's, but I'm not positive. I'll see if I can find out. 168... 14:11 21 May 2003 (UTC)

Then again, perhaps it was closer to the mid-nineties. I may be fuzzy about things besides the date too. One early nineties article on the Web refers to a then recently abandoned policy of accepting without formal or tradtional peer review any article sponsored by three members, the 2nd two chosen by the first. It suggested abandonment of the policy was over a particular paper. Elsewhere on the Web there's mention of a policy brouhaha over publication by PNAS of a paper by HIV-deny-er Peter Duesberg in 1989. These may be one and the same cause. I didn't exactly state a cause, but I implied it was the issues I described. Perhaps it was both--political clamouring over Duesberg the proximal cause, the simmering issues I described being responsible for the readiness to a make a change in response. The controversy I described comes from my recollection of a talk I heard by the biochemist Howard Schachman, an Academy mover and shaker, as well as scuttlebutt. In this seeming exerpt from the Scientist (http://www.skepticfiles.org/science/930906ts.htm), one can read a disgruntled scientist alluding in 1993 to the widely opined dubiousness of papers in PNAS. " Until recently, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences did not mandate peer review. Quality presumably was maintained by examining an author's previous track record. However, this is no longer true for PNAS." 168... 15:29 21 May 2003 (UTC)

I notice this page is identical to http://www.enpsychlopedia.com/psypsych/PNAS. -- Apologise for having no registered name.

  • Actually that page notes that it took the article from Wikipedia, not the other way around: "This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences". (If you would like to edit this document, click on the Wikipedia article link above.)" --MPW 01:27, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] PNAS pictures PD?

Are pictures from PNAS in the public domain, like NASA pictures are? --Bender235 01:07, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

no. even for the material that is open access, the pictures may be protected. DGG 20:09, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] A few thoughts...

I've added a fact tag to the point about being widely read internationally. (In my experience (UK biomedicine) it's not a particularly commonly used journal, far less so than say, Science or the top American medical journals.)

Is it worth a discussion of why there's such a difference in ranking between impact factor and number of citations? Presumably at least part of the very high absolute number of citations is because of the large page count? Unfortunately, I don't have access to any sources that discuss this type of issue.

Also, is it worth stating that the 'communicated by' system was (I believe) formerly used, and trying to give some sense of how common this society-based method of peer review was among other academic journals? Espresso Addict 02:47, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

According to this study it looks like some think that PNAS's open access contributes to its number of citations. But that wouldn't account for what you're talking about. Impact factor is essentially dividing the number of citations by the number of articles, right? Therefore the discrepancy in citations and impact factor would be wholly attributable to size. But hmm... what do I know. Isn't this DGG's specialty?
On a more general note, I haven't figured out a good way to search for journals. All the places I know to search invariably return sources from the journal or about the journal's articles instead of sources about the journal itself. Does anyone know a clever way to get around this? --JayHenry 15:14, 2 October 2007 (UTC)
I believe so, though I don't know whether or not the two indexes are selecting their citations from the same pool of journals. And no, I've hit that problem with finding sources, without finding any solution. I've taken the opposite approach recently of selecting journals to work on where I've happened upon sources about the journal, mainly from the sponsoring society. Espresso Addict 08:09, 3 October 2007 (UTC)