[3dem] sharing em maps during peer-review process
Edward Egelman
egelman at virginia.edu
Sat May 2 08:44:30 PDT 2015
Hi,
The first problem is that authors need to invest great effort to
"anonymize" their paper. There can be no obvious citations to their own
work. Given that most of our work is part of long-term interest in
particular projects, this is not simple. Consider the Methods section,
where one cannot say that a sample was prepared as previously described.
So one writes a detailed methods description, but it would be obvious
that this is the same as in another publication. For a field as small as
cryo-EM, most of us would be able to correctly guess the origin of a
paper. So why then pretend that it is blind, when the authors will be
known? It also becomes impossible to establish conflicts of interest. I
have declined to review papers since I have recently collaborated with
the authors, etc. If the authors are not known, then these conflicts
will not be resolved.
Regards,
Ed
On 5/2/15 11:29 AM, Stefan Bohn wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> regarding double-blind review process:
>
> The community is expanding at great speed. I can not follow the
> argumentation, that just because we can search for scientists and
> their equipment online, we shouldnt have double-blind. Sure, often
> enough the experienced reviewer will be able to make the right guess -
> but it will remain a guess.
>
> Equipment: right now microscopes and awesome cameras are popping up
> everywhere - and often times these are shared among groups making it
> more difficult even to guess the names of all people involved,
> including their order, etc...
>
> Isn't double-blind a step forward? Why does a reviewer need to know
> the names of the authors? I never understood this, I find it
> distracting from the core idea of scientific evaluation. The work is
> supposed to be the center, not the names. Anonymity is not guaranteed,
> clearly - but is that the only reason to abolish double-blind?
>
> In an ideal world, we wouldnt need to think about this, as we would
> disregard the name and fame involved. But I agree with Sjors, that
> having the name of the reviewer public, may bias their review -
> consciously or unkowingly.
>
> What other caveats of double-blind could there be (besides having the
> trouble to search online)?
>
> Best,
> Stefan.
>
> On May 2, 2015 7:02 AM, "Edward Egelman" <egelman at virginia.edu
> <mailto:egelman at virginia.edu>> wrote:
>
> Hi,
> Thanks for pointing this out, since the submission date to these
> archives (EMDB and PDB) is quite clear. They already have a strict
> policy: no one has access prior to release!
> Regards,
> Ed
>
> On 5/2/15 9:57 AM, Hongwei Wang wrote:
>
> Dear all,
>
> I strongly support the openness of science as suggested by Ed,
> Eva, Gab,
> Sjors and many others on the mail list. I totally agree that
> having direct
> assessment of the 3D map and models and even a few raw
> micrographs by the
> reviewers will only make the story more solid. The ultimate
> publication will
> also benefit from this for test in the future.
>
> I would like to propose, for the worrisome of competition,
> that the
> community takes account of the map or model's valid deposition
> date on the
> databank server as a criteria to evaluate the novelty and
> originality of the
> work besides the paper's publishing date (receiving date and
> accepted date
> too). Of course, the databank server will need to set clear
> and strict rules
> on the validity of the deposition and probably set some new
> policy on who
> may access the deposited map or models before final release.
> Grant's
> bioarxiv idea may serve similar function as well.
>
> Best regards,
> Hongwei
>
> dear colleagues,
>
> i would be interested in experiences / suggestions / views
> of others
> in the field on the following issue that may be of
> interest to many
> of us:
> the editor of our manuscript forwarded the request of a
> peer-reviewer
> to access the cryo-em map of our beloved complex. this has
> never
> happened to us, but to our surprise the editor did not
> consider the
> request to be unusual.
> of course, we share the point that the map would be of
> great help in
> judging the interpretation of the data. however, we also
> feel very
> uncomfortable sending the condensed result of lengthy
> research to an
> anonymous colleague, who could theoretically make
> considerable misuse
> of it. nevertheless, the policy of the journal seems to
> let us little
> choice: "Supporting
> data must be made available to editors and peer-reviewers
> at the time
> of submission for the purposes of evaluating the manuscript.
> Peer-reviewers may be asked to comment on the terms of
> access to
> materials, methods and/or data sets".
> in any case we would be curious whether others indeed got
> similar
> requests and how they dealt with it. a good solution for
> (paranoid?)
> people like us could be a good web-based viewer that lets
> others view
> our map, but i would not know of such a tool.
>
> Thanks
>
> Friedrich
>
> --
> Dr. Friedrich Foerster
> Max-Planck Institut fuer Biochemie
> Am Klopferspitz 18
> D-82152 Martinsried
>
> Tel: +49 89 8578 2632 <tel:%2B49%2089%208578%202632>
> Fax: +49 89 8578 2641 <tel:%2B49%2089%208578%202641>
>
> www.biochem.mpg.de/foerster
> <http://www.biochem.mpg.de/foerster>
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>
> --
> Sjors Scheres
> MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology
> Francis Crick Avenue, Cambridge Biomedical Campus Cambridge
> CB2 0QH, U.K.
> tel: +44 (0)1223 267061 <tel:%2B44%20%280%291223%20267061>
> http://www2.mrc-lmb.cam.ac.uk/groups/scheres
>
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>
> --
> Edward H. Egelman, Ph.D.
> Professor
> Dept. of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics
> University of Virginia
>
> President
> Biophysical Society
>
> phone: 434-924-8210 <tel:434-924-8210>
> fax: 434-924-5069 <tel:434-924-5069>
> egelman at virginia.edu <mailto:egelman at virginia.edu>
> http://www.people.virginia.edu/~ehe2n
> <http://www.people.virginia.edu/%7Eehe2n>
>
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--
Edward H. Egelman, Ph.D.
Professor
Dept. of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics
University of Virginia
President
Biophysical Society
phone: 434-924-8210
fax: 434-924-5069
egelman at virginia.edu
http://www.people.virginia.edu/~ehe2n
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