Special Feature: Getting Published in Scientific Journals

No matter how big your scientific breakthrough, it won't do your career much good if you don't publish it in a scientific journal, preferably one with a high impact factor. Publication in peer-reviewed journals is how scientists communicate their results to the scientific community; it is also an enduring record of your small--or not-so-small--contribution to the vast pool of human knowledge.

From a career standpoint, however, what's most important about a scientific publication (along with the citations that follow, if the work is important) is its function as a proxy for scientific quality and attainment. Without good publications, you stand little chance of winning the fellowship, research grant, faculty job, or other scientific prize you're competing for.

"Without publishing, [it is as if] you haven't done anything, because scientific articles are the most important measure of scientific achievement," says Ana Marušić, editor-in-chief of the Croatian Medical Journal and president-elect of the Council of Science Editors . "We don't measure ourselves by how efficient and skilled we are in the lab but by the number and quality of articles we publish in scientific journals."

"The essence of a good paper is good science; that is the most important thing," Marušić says. But good science alone doesn't guarantee prompt publication in a good journal. Sometimes "people do great things, but they manage to destroy [them] by very poor presentation," she says. Presenting data in a clear and accurate manner and putting them into context require skills you can only learn from experience--or from people with experience. Scientific writing is "a very important skill ... but very seldom taught," Marušić says. We agree--and that's why we've decided to take on the challenge.

In Tips for Publishing in Scientific Journals ,ScienceDeputy Editor Katrina Kelner takes a peek into the publishing process and offers nuts-and-bolts advice on how to get your research into print.

Roberta Ness, a widely published epidemiologist and a less widely published author of children's books, lets us in on a secret common to both types of writing in Writing Science: The Story's the Thing .

Finally, Elisabeth Pain, our contributing editor for South and Western Europe, writes that the challenges of publishing for non-native English speakers go well beyond struggles with a foreign tongue.

DOI: 10.1126/science.caredit.a0700045