Richard studied Biochemistry at the University of Bristol, before moving to King’s College London to study for a PhD in Cell Biology. After graduating, he moved to the US for a postdoctoral fellowship in Channing Der’s lab at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he investigated the role of novel RHOA mutations in the development of gastric cancer. In 2019 Richard moved back to the UK and joined the PLOS Biology team in November 2020. He covers a range of topics for the journal, including molecular biology, genetics/genomics, structural biology, cancer.
The talk will give an overview of the processes that take place in a scientific journal, from submission of a study to the final decision, be it acceptance or rejection. This will include how editors make decisions on new manuscripts, how reviewers are selected and what is expected of them, as well as the habits of effective authors before submission and when preparing a revision. The talk will also give guidance on how to write the manuscript – importantly dos and don’ts of titles and abstracts-, as well as cover letters and rebuttals to reviewers, and will cover what is a useful presubmission enquiry, as well as when it makes sense to appeal a decision and how to do it. Lastly, we will cover basic concepts in Open Science, its effects on scientific advance, trust and reproducibility, and Open Science implementation