NEXUS Open Research

AN OPEN ACCESS, POST PUBLICATION PEER REVIEW JOURNAL

Contents

1. Overview
2. Publishing Process
3. Aims and Scope
4. Publishing Model and Processes
   Pre-publication Checks · Peer Review · Reviewer Criteria · Review Outcomes · Living Articles · Indexing Threshold
5. Licenses
6. Citation Format
7. Indexing

Overview

Publishing Process

1. Submission — Manuscripts are submitted through a streamlined single-page system and tracked via the author's personal account.
2. Pre-publication Checks — The in-house editorial team verifies compliance with author guidelines, ethical standards, and data policies before any content is published.
3. Publication — Articles passing pre-publication checks are typeset and assigned a DOI, making them immediately viewable, citable, and indexed in Google Scholar.
4. Open Peer Review — Expert reviewers are formally invited post-publication. Their reports and identities are published alongside the article. Authors may respond and submit revised versions at any time.
5. Indexing — Articles meeting the peer review threshold are submitted to major bibliographic databases, with all versions and review reports deposited simultaneously.

1. Aims and Scope

NEXUS Open Research welcomes original research across all disciplines, including Natural Sciences, Engineering, Medical Sciences, Agricultural Sciences, Social Sciences, and Humanities. All submissions must be original and unpublished elsewhere.

The platform publishes on the basis of scientific soundness, not perceived novelty or impact. Confirmatory results, negative findings, and null studies are all eligible. A complete list of accepted article types is available in the Author Guidelines.

Three core principles guide the platform:

• Open Access — All articles are published under a CC BY license, free to all readers worldwide.
• Transparency — The full publication and peer review process is conducted openly and visibly.
• Reproducibility — Authors must provide detailed methods and freely accessible source data.

2. Publishing Model and Processes

Pre-publication Checks

Upon submission, each manuscript undergoes a rapid editorial review before being published online with the status Awaiting Peer Review. There is no Editor-in-Chief with authority to accept or reject manuscripts prior to peer review. The editorial team verifies author eligibility, compliance with scholarly and ethical standards, and suitability of the manuscript for expert assessment. Submissions that do not meet these requirements are returned to authors for revision.

Peer Review

Peer review takes place after initial publication, in accordance with NISO standard terminology, and is conducted under a fully open model:

Peer reviewers are invited and supported by the editorial team. They may consult existing reports and engage in discussion via the Comments section. Authors are encouraged — though not required — to respond publicly. Direct contact between authors and reviewers outside the platform is strictly prohibited. Each review report is assigned its own DOI and is independently citable.

Reviewer Eligibility Criteria

Authors may suggest or exclude reviewers but must not contact them directly. An algorithmic suggestion tool is available to identify potential reviewers based on publication history in the relevant field.

Review Outcomes

Reviewers assess scientific soundness, methodological adequacy, data availability, and whether conclusions are supported by the findings. They then assign one of three statuses:

• Approved — No or only minor changes needed. Design, methods, results, and conclusions are all sound.
• Approved with Reservations — Academic merit confirmed, but specific revisions — minor or substantial — are required.
• Not Approved — Fundamental flaws are present that seriously undermine the findings and conclusions.

The status, reviewer identity, and full report are displayed publicly on the article page. When a revised version is submitted, all previous reviewers are invited to re-evaluate the manuscript.

Living Articles and Revisions

Articles at NEXUS Open Research are living documents. Authors are strongly encouraged to submit revised versions in response to reviewer comments. All successive versions are publicly available and independently citable, with the most recent displayed by default. A concise summary of changes is provided at the beginning of each new version. Authors may publish updates at any time to reflect new developments relevant to the original findings.

Peer Review Status and Indexing Threshold

The peer review status of each article is prominently displayed at all stages. An article qualifies for external indexing once it has received:

• Two Approved statuses, or
• One Approved and two Approved with Reservations statuses from independent, invited reviewers.

Once this threshold is met, all versions and associated peer review reports are submitted to external databases and compatible repositories simultaneously.

3. Licenses

The specific version of the CC BY license applied to a given article is indicated below the abstract.

4. Citation Format

Each version of an article carries its own DOI and is independently citable. Because peer review status and article versions evolve over time, citations include the version number and current review status in square brackets after the title.

Citing an Article

Citing a Peer Review Report

Citing a Dataset

Each article includes a Data Availability Statement specifying the location of deposited data, its permanent repository identifier, and instructions for citation.

All articles are registered with the CrossMark Identification Service™, providing up-to-date information on the latest article version, new peer review reports, and any linked publications.

5. Indexing

All articles appear in Google Scholar immediately upon publication.