International Journal of
Radiation Oncology biology
physics
www.redjournal.org
EDITORIAL
The Red Journal’s Outstanding Reviewers of 2013 Anthony L. Zietman, MD, FASTRO, Editor-in-Chief In an editorial last year, I described peer review as “the process whereby scholarly work and research papers are submitted to the impartial scrutiny of others expert in the field before that work can be published. Fresh eyes examine the research and frequently find errors in hypothesis, design, or analysis that may, after a great deal of immersion in the particular work, be invisible to the authors. The goal is improvement, not criticism (1).” Traditional blinded peer review is being challenged by those who argue that a more transparent process better suits our electronic age. Why ask a few experts to give their opinion before deciding to publish when you could simply publish all data and outsource the review process to the “crowd?” The crowd being, of course, the multitude of doctors and scientists connected through ether space. With the development of online-only journals and open data repositories, there can be little doubt that some element of “crowdsourcing” will be introduced to scientific publishing in the years to come. For the moment, however, peer review will remain the currency of academic publishing. To that end, we must make the process as valuable, respectful, and impartial as it can be. Whether the editorial teams that manage physics, biology, and the site-specific clinical categories ultimately choose to accept or reject a paper, the authors must feel that they have been treated respectfully and that their manuscripts have gained something from the process. We seek to provide timely and thorough review that either improves a manuscript to appear in our own pages or increases its chances of acceptance elsewhere. The Red Journal has a pool of more than 6000 reviewers whose expertise extends to every corner of our field. A very substantial minority of them have proved their value time and time again, becoming “go-to” reviewers for the editorial teams. We like to recognize the very best among them annually as a measure of our gratitude. Some of these reviewers will go on to become members of the editorial board in the years ahead, earning the elevation by the dedication they have shown,
Int J Radiation Oncol Biol Phys, Vol. 88, No. 5, pp. 984e985, 2014 0360-3016/$ - see front matter Ó 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijrobp.2014.01.035
and the time they have given, to the Red Journal and its authors. In 2013, the Red Journal handled 1897 new manuscripts and 692 revised papers. For those submissions, 2998 individual reviews were completed, returning decisions to authors in an average of 24.4 days (each paper, in addition, also receives a review from me, a senior editor, and at least one associate editor, although these “reviews” are not counted in that number). As well as evaluating the manuscripts, the editorial board also evaluates the reviews and gives the reviewers themselves a score. The 19 reviewers whom we have recognized as our most outstanding this past year are identified by these statistics. They include a wide spread of senior and early practitioners and career academics, and, in keeping with our desire to truly reflect the “international” aspect of our nature, they include many individuals outside the United States. Three of these top reviewers have recently ascended to become members of the editorial boarddDrs El Naqa, Breneman, and Sherddemonstrating the “escalator” nature of our new system. I also note the high preponderance of physicists among the recognized reviewers. This shows, first, that medical physicists are in high demand, being called upon to review not only physics papers but often clinical and biology papers as well. Second, under the leadership of Dr Eric Klein, the physics editorial group, more than any other editorial group, often sends papers back for second, third, and even fourth rounds of revisions, with the goal of publishing the very best possible product. This rigorous process demands a lot of the reviewers, but it is a challenge to which they have certainly risen. After studying the statistics, and following discussions with the senior editors, the journal staff and I would like to acknowledge the following individuals with Outstanding Reviewer Awards for 2013. The awardees will be recognized on the journal website as well as in the print journal, and, for those younger reviewers, a letter announcing the award will also be sent to a supervisor designated by the honoree.
Volume 88 Number 5 2014
Issam El Naqa, PhD, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada Varun Sehgal, PhD, University of California, Irvine, California Dandan Zheng, PhD, University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha, Nebraska John Breneman, MD, University of Cincinnati Medical Center, Cincinnati, Ohio David Jonathan Sher, MD, Rosetta Radiology, New York, New York Avraham Eisbruch, MD, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan Mirek Fatyga, PhD, Mayo Clinic, Scottsdale, Arizona Jasper Nijkamp, MSc, Netherlands Cancer Institute Anton van Leeuwenhoek Hospital, Amsterdam, The Netherlands Markus Alber, PhD, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark Beth Michelle Beadle, MD, PhD, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas Geoffrey D. Hugo, PhD, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, Virginia
Editorial
985
Katja M. Langen, PhD, MD Anderson Cancer Center, Orlando, Florida Karen J. Marcus, MD, Boston Children’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts Marco Schwarz, PhD, Provincial Agency for Proton Therapy, Trento, Italy Kang-Hyun Ahn, PhD, University of Illinois Hospital, Chicago, Illinois Luca Cozzi, PhD, Oncology Institute of Southern Switzerland, Bellinzona, Switzerland Paul L. Nguyen, MD, Dana-Farber/Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts Kyle Padgett, PhD, University of Miami, Miami, Florida Henning Willers, MD, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts
Reference 1. Zietman AL. The Red Journal’s Outstanding Reviewer Awards for 2012. Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys 2012;85:1-2.
Radiation Oncology biology
physics
www.redjournal.org
EDITORIAL
The Red Journal’s Outstanding Reviewers of 2013 Anthony L. Zietman, MD, FASTRO, Editor-in-Chief In an editorial last year, I described peer review as “the process whereby scholarly work and research papers are submitted to the impartial scrutiny of others expert in the field before that work can be published. Fresh eyes examine the research and frequently find errors in hypothesis, design, or analysis that may, after a great deal of immersion in the particular work, be invisible to the authors. The goal is improvement, not criticism (1).” Traditional blinded peer review is being challenged by those who argue that a more transparent process better suits our electronic age. Why ask a few experts to give their opinion before deciding to publish when you could simply publish all data and outsource the review process to the “crowd?” The crowd being, of course, the multitude of doctors and scientists connected through ether space. With the development of online-only journals and open data repositories, there can be little doubt that some element of “crowdsourcing” will be introduced to scientific publishing in the years to come. For the moment, however, peer review will remain the currency of academic publishing. To that end, we must make the process as valuable, respectful, and impartial as it can be. Whether the editorial teams that manage physics, biology, and the site-specific clinical categories ultimately choose to accept or reject a paper, the authors must feel that they have been treated respectfully and that their manuscripts have gained something from the process. We seek to provide timely and thorough review that either improves a manuscript to appear in our own pages or increases its chances of acceptance elsewhere. The Red Journal has a pool of more than 6000 reviewers whose expertise extends to every corner of our field. A very substantial minority of them have proved their value time and time again, becoming “go-to” reviewers for the editorial teams. We like to recognize the very best among them annually as a measure of our gratitude. Some of these reviewers will go on to become members of the editorial board in the years ahead, earning the elevation by the dedication they have shown,
Int J Radiation Oncol Biol Phys, Vol. 88, No. 5, pp. 984e985, 2014 0360-3016/$ - see front matter Ó 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijrobp.2014.01.035
and the time they have given, to the Red Journal and its authors. In 2013, the Red Journal handled 1897 new manuscripts and 692 revised papers. For those submissions, 2998 individual reviews were completed, returning decisions to authors in an average of 24.4 days (each paper, in addition, also receives a review from me, a senior editor, and at least one associate editor, although these “reviews” are not counted in that number). As well as evaluating the manuscripts, the editorial board also evaluates the reviews and gives the reviewers themselves a score. The 19 reviewers whom we have recognized as our most outstanding this past year are identified by these statistics. They include a wide spread of senior and early practitioners and career academics, and, in keeping with our desire to truly reflect the “international” aspect of our nature, they include many individuals outside the United States. Three of these top reviewers have recently ascended to become members of the editorial boarddDrs El Naqa, Breneman, and Sherddemonstrating the “escalator” nature of our new system. I also note the high preponderance of physicists among the recognized reviewers. This shows, first, that medical physicists are in high demand, being called upon to review not only physics papers but often clinical and biology papers as well. Second, under the leadership of Dr Eric Klein, the physics editorial group, more than any other editorial group, often sends papers back for second, third, and even fourth rounds of revisions, with the goal of publishing the very best possible product. This rigorous process demands a lot of the reviewers, but it is a challenge to which they have certainly risen. After studying the statistics, and following discussions with the senior editors, the journal staff and I would like to acknowledge the following individuals with Outstanding Reviewer Awards for 2013. The awardees will be recognized on the journal website as well as in the print journal, and, for those younger reviewers, a letter announcing the award will also be sent to a supervisor designated by the honoree.
Volume 88 Number 5 2014
Issam El Naqa, PhD, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada Varun Sehgal, PhD, University of California, Irvine, California Dandan Zheng, PhD, University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha, Nebraska John Breneman, MD, University of Cincinnati Medical Center, Cincinnati, Ohio David Jonathan Sher, MD, Rosetta Radiology, New York, New York Avraham Eisbruch, MD, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan Mirek Fatyga, PhD, Mayo Clinic, Scottsdale, Arizona Jasper Nijkamp, MSc, Netherlands Cancer Institute Anton van Leeuwenhoek Hospital, Amsterdam, The Netherlands Markus Alber, PhD, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark Beth Michelle Beadle, MD, PhD, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas Geoffrey D. Hugo, PhD, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, Virginia
Editorial
985
Katja M. Langen, PhD, MD Anderson Cancer Center, Orlando, Florida Karen J. Marcus, MD, Boston Children’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts Marco Schwarz, PhD, Provincial Agency for Proton Therapy, Trento, Italy Kang-Hyun Ahn, PhD, University of Illinois Hospital, Chicago, Illinois Luca Cozzi, PhD, Oncology Institute of Southern Switzerland, Bellinzona, Switzerland Paul L. Nguyen, MD, Dana-Farber/Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts Kyle Padgett, PhD, University of Miami, Miami, Florida Henning Willers, MD, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts
Reference 1. Zietman AL. The Red Journal’s Outstanding Reviewer Awards for 2012. Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys 2012;85:1-2.
