Free open access to liberate and
unleash neglected science
King-Hwa Ling 1,2,*,
Noraishah Mydin Abdul Aziz 3
and Norshariza Nordin 1,2
1 Department of
Biomedical Science, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Universiti Putra Malaysia, Selangor, Malaysia.
2 Genetics and
Regenerative Medicine Research Centre, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences,
Universiti Putra Malaysia, Selangor, Malaysia.
3 Department of
Parasitology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur,
Malaysia.
* Correspondence: lkh@upm.edu.my;
Tel.: +603-89472564
Published Online: 4 March
2018
DOI: https://doi.org/10.31117/neuroscirn.v1i1.4
Keywords:
journal
publishing; open access; neuroscience; neglected science
©2018
by Ling et al for use and distribution in accord with the Creative Commons Attribution
(CC BY-NC 4.0) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which
permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any
medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Open access has become a
choice for scientific publication. In many countries, open access publication
has been made compulsory for publicly funded studies. Since 2013, government-funded
research paper in United States must be made freely available within 12 months
of publication [1]. Such policy will ensure
maximum accessibility and circulation of published articles. While the
scientific community is benefited at large due to free access and distribution
of published materials, open access publication is never free due to the various
costs involved in the production, permanent archival and digitalisation of
scholarly articles. Someone must foot the costs for web hosting, online
marketing, database maintenance, copyediting, proofreading, indexing and
permanent archiving of every single accepted article. In many instances, the
submitting author will have to pay article processing charges, which range from
USD500 to USD5000 depending on the reputation of the journal [2].
Source of funding is largely research grants-derived that do not last forever.
With limited funds, authors are forced to prioritise their publications
depending on the availability of funding to pay for article processing charges.
With the harsh "publish or
perish" reality in the scientific community, numerous research remain
unpublished due to the current trend where only positive and comprehensive
studies are preferably considered by various established journals. Many single
experiment observations are important but do not find a place in the highly
cited high impact journals. In addition, most institutions do not provide
sufficient financial support for publication charges leading to a deadlock
situation where many small studies remain trapped within the laboratory
notebooks.
Neuroscience
Research Notes or NeurosciRN
aims to serve as the platform to accommodate these findings while maintaining
the fundamental purposes of hypothesis formation and testing in science
particularly in neuroscience. NeurosciRN is managed
and run by a group of dedicated scientist volunteers. The journal will serve as
a platform for neglected science; science that was deemed too small, incomplete
or bear no positive findings. NeurosciRN will serve
as a new home to neglected science as long as the
study was properly performed, and the data or story is adequately interpreted
or told. Nothing is too small for us. Only good science or bad science.
NeurosciRN will liberate and
uncover neglected science that scientists have spent substantial time, effort
and expenditure. Why keep them in the laboratory notebook when they could be
showcased and made known to everyone? Previously, funding has been the main
hurdle in preventing the publication of small findings and therefore we make it
possible by enabling everyone to access, read and submit to NeurosciRN
without any fees. As many would wonder and question the sustainability of this truly
free open access journal, we will try our best level to minimise the publishing
cost to suit its purpose. So much of volunteerism, we welcome any party or
individual to any monetary contribution or any of sort in helping us to uphold
this noble intention making NeurosciRN, truly a
journal from scientists to scientists.
Above all else, it is amazing
that we have managed to garner the support of so many distinguished scientists
from around the world to support NeurosciRN. We, the
founding editors of NeurosciRN hereby promise that
this journal will uphold the sacred tenets of good science, that we will screen
the manuscripts with the highest standards and we will not falter at making
decisions which should not be influenced neither by fear nor favour.