About PCI Ecology

What is PCI Ecology​?

PCI Ecology is a community of recommenders, playing the role of associate editors, who recommend unpublished articles based on peer reviews to make them complete, reliable, and citable articles, without the need for publication in ‘traditional’ journals. Evaluation and recommendation by PCI Ecology are free of charge. When recommenders decide to recommend an article, they write a recommendation text that is published along with all the editorial correspondence (reviews, recommender's decisions, authors’ replies) by PCI Ecology. The article itself is not published by PCI Ecology; it remains on the preprint server where it was posted by the authors. 

PCI Ecology is a community of the parent project Peer Community In, an original idea of Denis Bourguet, Benoit Facon, and Thomas Guillemaud.

PCI Ecology is not designed to be a free peer reviewing service for authors aiming to improve their articles before submission to a journal, although, of course, it remains possible to submit a recommended preprint to a traditional journal.

  • PCI Ecology is stimulating: it recommends remarkable articles.
  • PCI Ecology is free: there are no fees associated with the evaluation process, and no charge for access to the comments and recommendations. The website is freely accessible.
  • PCI Ecology is transparent: reviews and recommendations (for unpublished articles) and recommendations (for published articles) are freely available for consultation. Recommendations are signed by the recommenders. Reviews may also be signed if the reviewers agree to do so
  • PCI Ecology is not exclusive: an article may be recommended by different Peer Communities in X (a feature of particular interest for articles relating to multidisciplinary studies), and may even be published in a traditional journal (although this is not the goal of PCI Ecology).​


Managing Board of PCI Ecology​

Vasilis Dakos (Montpellier, Univ. Montpellier, France), representative of PCI Ecology
 
Julia Astegiano (Córdoba, IMBIV (CONICET-UNC), Argentina) 
Tim Coulson (Oxford, Univ. Oxford, UK) 
Anna Eklof (Linköping, Linköping University, Sweden) 
Dominique Gravel (Sherbrooke, Univ. Sherbrooke, Canada) 
François Massol (Lille, CIIL, Univ. Lille, France)
Ben Phillips (Parkville, Univ. Melbourne, Australia) 
Cyrille Violle (Montpellier, CEFE CNRS, France) 
 
To contact the Managing Board, please send a message to contact@ecology.peercommunityin.org

Editorial policy​

Scope​​​

PCI Ecology recommends preprints addressing questions in ecology about all types of organisms. We cover all fields of biology, provided that the context of the study and the key question addressed relate to ecology. The preprint must not be published or under consideration for evaluation elsewhere at the time of its submission to PCI Ecology. 

The preprints recommended may describe empirical or theoretical studies and be based on observations from experiments or nature or previously acquired data. They may also report the results of verbal, computer, or mathematical models. Studies of methodologies for ecology are also appreciated. Perspectives, reviews, and opinions, as well as comments on previously published articles are also welcome. 

​PCI Ecology recommends only preprints of high scientific quality that are methodologically and ethically sound. To this end, PCI Ecology: 

  • Requires data, computer codes and mathematical and statistical analysis scripts to be made available to reviewers and recommenders at the time of submission and to readers after recommendation. 
  • Welcomes reproductions of studies
  • Welcomes preprint submissions based on preregistrations (whether or not reviewed).
  • Welcomes preprints reporting negative results, provided that the questions addressed and the methodology are sound. 
  • Does not accept submissions of preprints presenting financial conflicts of interest. Other conflicts of interest must be minimal and declared. 
  • Ensures that, as far as possible, the recommenders and referees have no conflict of interest with the content or authors of the study being evaluated. 

PCI Ecology does not guarantee the evaluation or recommendation of all submitted preprints. Only preprints considered interesting by at least one competent recommender (equivalent to an associate editor in a classical journal) will be peer-reviewed. The interest of the preprint, as determined by the recommender, can relate to its context, the scientific question addressed, the methodology, or the results. PCI Ecology has a large number of recommenders, ensuring a considerable diversity of interests. The recommendations published by PCI Ecology are designed to draw the attention of the research community to the qualities of the article, including the subjective reasons for the recommender’s interest in it.​

Ethics​

Peer Community In is a member of and subscribes to the principles of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). In addition:

  • Financial conflicts of interest are forbidden, see the PCI code of conduct.
  • Authors should declare any potential non-financial conflict of interest.

Complaints and Integrity Policy and Procedure

Complaints and Integrity policy and​ procedure are described in the versioned document found at https://osf.io/erc6x. The version applicable to a complaint is the latest version of the document at the date of the complaint.


Inclusiveness and equity

PCI is attentive to equity and inclusion at all steps of the process of scientific article evaluation. PCI focuses on bringing more people underrepresented in academia among authors submitting to PCI, reviewers, recommenders, and Managing Board members working for PCI. Underrepresentation is linked to many factors, including career stage, gender, and geography.
 
Specific recommendations are made to reviewers, recommenders, and Managing Board members to increase equity and inclusiveness in each of their tasks. 
 
Tools to increase equity and inclusiveness:

  • Possibility to submit articles anonymously
  • Transparency in the evaluation of articles
  • Managing Board members take into account underrepresentation in academia when appointing new recommenders
  • Template messages to recommenders and reviewers include recommendations about equity and inclusiveness 
  • Possibility to review anonymously

PCI is a signatory of the Joint Statement of Principles of the Coalition for Diversity and Inclusion in Scholarly Communication (C4DISC)​​​​