Supporting Blog for RAA

by Prof. Arnab Rai Choudhuri

Let us begin with a vital question: has RAA fulfilled the expectations we had and can it be called a successful journal? Countries like India and Korea find it difficult even to procure enough good papers to keep their national astronomy journals going. Against this background, it is remarkable that RAA is maintaining a monthly publications schedule with decent-sized issues every month. A few papers I looked at convinced me that the refereeing standard has been high, i.e. none of the papers I looked at seemed that it should have been rejected in a good international journal. Some of the authors I talked to seemed very happy with the speed and efficiency of the editorial handling process. So we should certainly congratulate the Editors-in-Chief and the editorial office staff for this very impressive start and for what RAA has achieved so far.

While RAA is an eloquent testimony for the very impressive quality and quantity of astronomical research from China, I have to confess that I am rather disappointed that RAA so far has not acquired the international character that I expected it to have. The responsibility for this falls, to a great extent, on the shoulders of the non-Chinese members of the Editorial Board like me. Evidently we have not been so successful as our Chinese colleagues in the Board in persuading astronomers of our countries to submit their papers to RAA. We had expected papers from the whole Asia-Pacific region. That has clearly not happened. The complete absence of papers from Korea, Japan, Australia and Russia is an issue which, in my opinion, should be one of the main items of discussion in the forthcoming Editorial Board meeting.

I can say a few words about my experience with Indian astronomers. So far 7 Indian papers have appeared in the 8 issues of RAA (i.e. approximately 1 paper per issue) and 4 Indian papers are listed amongst accepted papers. I know that a few Indian papers are now undergoing the refereeing process. While this is not at all a good record for a large country like India, it is better than the records of other countries in the Asia-Pacific region. I have been trying my best to persuade my Indian colleagues to submit some of their papers in RAA. As people can see that RAA is maintaining a regular publications schedule and is publishing high-quality papers, I hope that the inflow of papers from India will increase. However, I am often confronted with the question: “If RAA is a journal representing the whole Asia-Pacific region, then why there are no papers from Japan, Korea, Australia and Russia? If most of the papers are from China only, then was the change of name from ChJAA to RAA merely cosmetic?” If there were more papers from the other Asia-Pacific countries and RAA had more of an international character, I believe that more Indian astronomers would have submitted their papers to RAA. I only hope that the number of papers from India will not decrease because of people’s perception that RAA failed to become sufficiently international! So it is of utmost importance to analyze the reasons why papers are not coming from the various Asia-Pacific countries.

I think that the Editorial Board members from different countries should be asked frankly what they have so far done and what they plan to do to persuade astronomers in their countries to submit some of thir papers to RAA. If a particular member expresses inability to do much about it, then he should be asked if another colleague from his country in his place may be able to do better in attracting papers from that country. I know that this will be a rather rude and awkward question to ask. But we have to keep the well-being of RAA uppermost in our minds and should not shy away from raising awkward questions in the interest of RAA. For example, if the Editors-in-Chief feel that I have not done enough to attract papers from India, I shall be completely open to discuss the issue and shall myself propose the names of other Indian astronomers who can replace me if the Editors-in-Chief want to relieve me from the Editorial Board.

This brings us to another important consideration: the tenure of Editorial Board members. When the Editorial Board was constituted, this was not discussed at all. I think that it will be a good idea now to limit the term of an Editorial Board member to 2 (or at most 3) years. If an Editorial Board member is rendering a particularly valuable service to RAA, then the Editors-in-Chief may invite that member to be in the Editorial Board for one more term after his first term is over. Restricting the term of an Editorial Board member will give the Editors-in-Chief a graceful way of ending the association with a particular Editorial Board member with whom they may not be very happy.

Apart from attracting papers specifically from the Asia-Pacific region, we should also make a concerted effort of attracting papers from all over the world. With the current world-wide recession, research grants are becoming more competitive even in countries like the USA and I know that many American colleagues also now feel the pinch for coughing up page charges for ApJ. We should use this opportunity to aggressively promote RAA as an attractive alternative venue for publishing papers from all over the world. I suggest the following steps.

1. We should prepare a flyer giving the salient attractive features of RAA. This flyer may be distributed in the various IAU meetings and other meetings where there will large gatherings of astronomers. I can provide help in designing the flyer if my help is needed.

2. All the Editorial Board members should write personal letters to colleagues all over the world whom they know well, explaining the aims of RAA and urging them to submit papers to RAA.

3. Papers submitted to RAA may be sent out of the Asia-Pacific region for refereeing as much as possible. Then many astronomers around the world will come to know about the high standard of RAA and may think of submitting papers to RAA afterwards. In fact, many of the papers I handled as Scientific Editor were sent out to referees in North America or Europe. Most of the persons I requested were quite enthusiastic about refereeing for RAA and did a thorough job.

4. RAA has the system of asking an astronomer to write News and Views on each Letter paper. I noticed that most of these are written by Chinese astronomers. Since it does not take too much time to write News and Views, many eminent astronomers around the world may be willing to write News and Views, although they may not be in a position write papers for RAA. For example, the next issue of RAA will publish a Letter paper from my group on solar dynamo for which Prof. Axel Brandenburg, one of the world’s leading dynamo theorists, happily agreed to write the News and Views. RAA may follow the active policy of requesting eminent astronomers around the world to write News and Views.

Now that the production process of RAA seems completely streamlined due to the enormous efforts of many Chinese colleagues, the next most challenging job before us is to make RAA truly international. That is why I wrote at length about this issue. Now I point out a few other things.

Website of RAA

In the website of RAA, I think that what is called “About” should be called “Home” and what is called “Home” should be called “Latest issue”.

Invited reviews

It is written in the author guideline that “Reviews are by invitation only.” I personally feel that you should add a sentence after this: “However, an author interested in writing a review may submit a plan of the review to one of the Editors-in-Chief for consideration and possible invitation.”

Handling of a submitted paper

The OJS works beautifully for the first round of refereeing and is very user-friendly for all the three persons involved – the author, the Scientific Editor and the referee. I have only one small suggestion. When the Scientific Editor opens the e-mail to be sent to the referee, the title of the paper automatically appears in the e-mail. It will be nice if the names of the authors also automatically appear in the e-mail.

However, there are serious problems when an author tries to resubmit a paper after the first round of refereeing and things need to be improved in the OJS. I have encountered these problems both as author and as Scientific Editor. When we were trying to resubmit the revised paper from our group after the refereeing, we found that there were no clear instructions in the OJS how to upload the revised paper. Other authors also had complained to me about this. When a paper I was handling as Scientific Editor was resubmitted after revision, I again found that I received no automatic intimation (which I should have received) and I was unable to assign the paper back to the referee through the OJS. Eventually I sent the .pdf of the paper by e-mail to the referee. Most probably, these problems arose because the Scientific Editor selected the “Revisions Required” option in “record decision”. If the “Resubmit for Review” option is chosen, then perhaps these problems will not arise. However, things are extremely confusing right now for resubmission of a revised paper and something should be done immediately in the OJS to fix this. One possibility is to eliminate the “Revisions Required” option altogether to avoid this terrible confusion.