Focus and Scope

The Journal of Biological Methods (JBM) (ISSN 2326-9901) is a multidisciplinary and open-access journal committed to publishing peer-reviewed papers on cutting-edge and innovative biological techniques, methods and protocols. Manuscripts submitted for consideration are expected to describe original research on novel biotechnology, biological methods and experimental techniques, significant optimization and modification of existing methods (including when adapted to new models/biological systems or when applied to challenge scientific questions under a new angle), development of step-by-step protocols based on established methods and technologies, rigorous side-by-side comparisons of existing methods and reviews on technical aspects of a particular biological field. JBM covers all biological and biomedical sciences including, but not limited to, the following areas:

• Biochemistry
• Bioimaging and probe-imaging
• Bioinformatics
• Biomedical science
• Biophysics
• Biotechnology
• Cancer biology
• Cell biology
• Chemical biology
• Clinical sciences
• Computational biology
• Ecology
• Epigenetics
• Genetics and genomics
• Immunology
• Medical science
• Microbiology
• Model organism
• Modern research on Chinese materia medica and natural medicine
• Molecular biology
• Nanobiology
• Nanomedicine
• Nanotechnology
• Neuroscience
• Novel methods of tests, diagnosis and treatment
• Physiology
• Plant biology
• Signal transduction
• Stem cells
• Zoology

Peer Review Policy

JBM is committed to providing authors with fast, rigorous, constructive and fair reviews. JBM uses single blind peer review, where reviewers remain anonymous. The peer review process is made up of several stages.

Initial Quality Check

The journal staff perform an initial quality check to ensure minimum formatting requirements stated in Author Guidelines are met. At this stage, we also check for potential issues such as competing interest and incompliance with editorial policies and ethical standards.

Initial Assessment

Once the manuscripts have passed the quality check, they will be initially evaluated by the Editors-in-Chief or Deputy Editor to determine whether they should be sent out for review by external referees based on scientific merit and technical quality of the manuscripts. If the manuscripts are out of scope or fall short of scientific standards set by JBM, they may be rejected outright without being reviewed any further.

External Review

Manuscripts that successfully go through the initial assessment will be assigned to a subject expert in our team of Editors to oversee the review process. At least three external referees will be invited and assigned the manuscript based on their expertise. At submission, authors are encouraged to suggest editorial members and at least five potential reviewers who are qualified to provide an independent assessment of the manuscript. Authors should not suggest colleagues who work in the same institution as themselves or recent collaborators. In the cover letter, authors may also identify individuals who should be excluded as a reviewer and give the reason for the exclusion. External peer reviewers typically have 14 days to submit their reviews.

Submissions determined not to be reviewed by editors will be returned to authors and will in general not be considered again unless substantial revision has been made. Resubmitted papers will be considered as a new submission. For peer-reviewed papers, a decision of either acceptance, acceptance after revision, reconsideration after revision, or rejection will be made by editors based on the evaluation of referees. The handling editor sends a decision email to the corresponding author along with reviewers’ comments.

Revisions

If a manuscript has been determined to be acceptable pending major revision, the authors will have 30 days to revise their manuscript unless extension request is granted by the editor.

Acceptance

It is typical that multiple rounds of reviews may be needed for authors to address concerns raised by reviewers. When all issues have been satisfactorily addressed, the handling editor will issue an editorial accept and the manuscript is ready to move on to production phase.

Pre-submission inquiries are welcome but not required if authors would like to find out if their paper is suitable for publication in JBM before submitting a full manuscript for peer review.