[ASA] Call for nomination of referees for PASA

[John O'Byrne]

Call for nomination of referees for PASA
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Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia (PASA) is the ASA's flagship astronomical journal. PASA currently sits in the top quartile of astronomical journals with an increasing 2-year impact factor of 4.878.

Despite the journal's success in attracting and publishing high-quality papers, in the last 18 months PASA has experienced an increasing level of 'referee fatigue' which has manifested itself as either 1) an inability to find referees or 2) referees who have agreed to review a paper but are unable to review it in the time allotted. We are now seeing large numbers of referees decline to review papers, with many manuscripts now requiring over 5 attempts to secure a reviewer, and in several recent cases over 10 referees have had to be approached. Additionally, we have had cases of reviewers accepting manuscripts and requiring double or triple the standard time to review manuscripts. This is a dramatic change in the behaviour of reviewers and has serious impacts on the rate at which manuscripts progress through the journal, leading to increased processing times, and unmatched expectations for authors.

In order for papers to pass through PASA quickly we need people willing to act as referees and provide references in a timely manner. The current pool of mostly senior referees from which PASA is drawing from is no longer able to meet this requirement and thus we urgently need to expand the pool. We are therefore calling for nominations for new reviewers for PASA, particularly early career researchers, who are enthusiastic to help papers move quickly through peer review to publication. We are thus asking members of the community to nominate potential PASA reviewers (self nominations are also acceptable).

Potential reviewers should ideally have 2 first author paper accepted in one of the major refereed astronomical journals and co-authorship on several other refereed publications, with a good command of English. Nominations should only be sent for those willing to act as referees, so nominators are asked to first check with potential nominees that they would be willing to review for PASA.

Nominations specifying the following information should be sent to Melanie at peripetysci.com<mailto:Melanie at peripetysci.com> by 21 September 2019:

Name nominator:
Name nominee:
Title nominee:
Email nominee:
Areas of expertise/ topics suitable for review:

Nominations for members of under represented groups are particularly welcome. Note referees do not have to be members of the ASA, nor resident in Australia, so please consider as broadly as possible.

PASA is the ASA's journal and can only provide high-speed processing of manuscripts if it is supported by the community. Please help PASA by nominating suitable reviewers and at the same time provide an opportunity for ECRs to contribute to the success of the journal.

Note that nomination does not guarantee that papers will be assigned as this is a function of the topics for manuscripts received.

Best regards,

Professor Melanie Johnston-Hollitt
PASA, Editor-in-Chief










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"The standard you walk past is the standard you accept”
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ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR JOHN O’BYRNE
Associate Dean (Student Life), Faculty of Science
Secretary, Astronomical Society of Australia Inc.

Sydney Institute for Astronomy
School of Physics | Faculty of Science

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