RSC Advances Blog

The role of Cover Letters

With insights from Professor Robert Baker, Trinity College Dublin

This week we are discussing the role of cover letters and the impact they have on your manuscript. Your cover letter is the first thing the handling Associate Editor and reviewers will read so it is important to provide a cover letter that explains the importance of your work.

Editorial prescreening (reject without peer review): Most journals (especially high profile / high impact) pre-screen manuscripts on the basis of scope, novelty, originality, and expected impact/relevance/significance of the work. The cover letter is the best opportunity to convince the editor to send your manuscript out for peer review. The cover letter should not be only a summary of the paper or copied over from the abstract/conclusions and should focus on what advance over literature has been made.

The cover letter should describe (in no more than 1 page) why your article is new and important, and how it fits into the journal.

Professor Robert James Baker is an Assistant Professor at the School of Chemistry, Trinity College Dublin and an Associate Editor as well as Editorial Board member of RSC Advances

Examples of ‘non-ideal’ cover letters:

1. ‘lazy and template’ cover letters:

Pay attention to detail… note recent submission “blunders” reported below:

“Dear Editor of RSC Advances,

We would like to submit our manuscript titled “XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX” for consideration in Journal of XYZ.”

2. Cover letter as a summary of the paper and not set in context of literature:

Dear Editor

We are hereby submitting the manuscript titled “XXX” to RSC Advances. This paper explains the first-time synthesis of XXXXXXXXXX using XXXXXXXXX method. In this work, XXXXXXXXXXXXX is calculated for the first time using XXXXXXXX theory and the value obtained is XXXXXXXXXX. The size of XXXXXXX from XXXXXXXXXX analysis is XXXnm. The material exhibits XXXXXXXXXXX. The imaging experiments showed XXXXXXXXXXXX. This work is original and has not been submitted elsewhere.  Please do contact us in case you need any other information.

Signed

The authors

3. Cover letter listing the past achievements of the authors

Dear Editor

Please find herewith enclosed a manuscript, entitled “XXXXXXXXXX” to be considered for the publication in RSC Advances. The above entitled manuscript is an original work and is not under consideration for publication elsewhere. All the authors are aware of the submission and agree for its publication. Suitability for publication in this journal may be justified as follows:

Our group has been dedicated to synthesizing XXXXXXXXXX for more than 25 years. We have published 150 scientific articles in Journal X, Journal Y, Journal Z etc. Our strong expertise underpins this manuscript.

Thanking You,

The Authors

4. Cover letter for a review and work not set in context of other reviews on this topic

Dear Editor,

We wish to submit an original research article entitled “XXXXXXXXXXX” for consideration by the journal of RSC Advances. We believe this manuscript is appropriate for publication in the journal because it covers the innovative strategies of XXXXXXXX in XXX, YYY, and ZZZ COVID-19. COVID-19 has become the worst pandemic disease of the current millennium, and XXXXXXXXX is a promising strategy that addresses this crisis. This article reviews the role of XXXX in three categories: (1) XXX, (2) YYY, and (3) ZZZ. Moreover, it intends to be a comprehensive and valuable review by covering notable and vital applications of XXX strategies for improving health and environmental sanitation. We also confirm that this work is original and has not been published elsewhere, nor is it currently under consideration for publication elsewhere.

Signed

The authors

An example of a ‘good’ cover letter:

Dear Editor,                                                                                                            02/06/2022

Insights into the solution structure of the hydrated uranyl ion from neutron scattering and EXAFS experiments

Samuel J. Edwards, Daniel T. Bowron, * and Robert J. Baker*

Recent events in Russia and Ukraine have forced politicians to confront the issues of energy security, which also lie at the heart of sustainable energy production. Nuclear power could supply energy during a national or international switch from fossil fuels to renewables whilst retaining the advantages of power generation not being so impacted by geopolitical forces, it has a problem with waste. Current thinking is to dispose of legacy, current and future waste in a geological repository for hundreds of thousands of years. How these radiotoxic, heterogeneous mixtures interact with the environment is therefore an important consideration but there are significant knowledge gaps in even the basic chemistry of the actinides. As water will be an inescapable part of the environment, the aqueous chemistry becomes very important to understand, but even simple questions like what the coordination number in solution has not been answered. Given that many countries are advanced in their disposal planning (e.g. Forsmark in Sweden and Onkalo in Finland), it becomes even more critical to understand these issues and to add evidence to back up safety cases for repositories.

In this contribution we report on the use of neutron diffraction in solution to give insight into the aqueous structure of the uranyl ion. Solution studies are generally conducted using EXAFS, but whilst bond lengths are consistent, EXAFS struggles to give reliable coordination numbers, due in part to the inherent assumptions made by this technique. We reasoned that by using a probe excellently suited for the light elements, namely neutron diffraction, then a clearer picture would emerge. The neutron data can be combined with the previously published EXAFS data to produce a model that covers both bulk and local diffraction that gives a coherent solution structure based on bond metrics, coordination numbers and stability constants. We also conclusively show that the -yl oxygen is not involved in hydrogen bonding to bulk water, something that has been inferred from solid state structures and vibrational spectroscopy by many authors, but not irrefutably shown in solution. It is worth noting that the stability constants are readily extracted from our data, and this is of much importance as it is difficult to measure these very small thermodynamic properties by more conventional means.

Putting our work into a broader context, this is the first example where neutron diffraction has been used on any actinide and, given the importance of aqueous chemistry in migration behaviour and selective Ln/An extractions, we believe that our manuscript has sufficient novelty, impact and applicability to a broad area in actinide coordination and environmental chemistry to be considered for publication in Chemical Communications.

All authors have contributed to this work and have agreed on the submitted version.

Yours sincerely,

The authors

To summarize, our top tips for a good cover letter include:

• Provide a succinct summary of your work that includes a statement of importance, this is your chance to ‘sell’ your work to the editor (and reviewers).
• Explain the impact on the community – why is the work important?
• Future potential – where does your work lead?
• Make sure you address the correct journal! This is a common mistake
• Do not copy and paste chunks of text from your abstract or introduction
• Always write BOTH for the expert (e.g. referee) AND for an interested reader working in an adjacent area. This is particularly applicable for the highest-impact journals where appeal to non-specialists is emphasized.

We hope that you find these insights from useful while writing your next paper!

Check out other publishing tips and tricks from our academic Associate Editors here.

RSC Advances looks forward to advancing the chemical sciences with you!

Would you read your own manuscript?

The importance of honesty and integrity in publishing.

This week’s advice is courtesy of Dr Fabienne Dumoulin, who discusses many reasons why manuscripts can be rejected without review. Fabienne reminds us of the principal purpose of publishing: collaboration and sharing to ensure advancement of the scientific community.

Meet the editor:

Dr Fabienne Dumoulin, Associate Editor and Editorial Board Member for RSC Advances, works in the Department of Biomedical Engineering of Acibadem Mehmet Ali Aydınlar University. Her research interests surround phthalocyanines, co photodynamic therapy, molecular materials, and nanomedicine.

Dr Fabienne Dumoulin, Acibadem Mehmet Ali Aydınlar University

1. What is the most common reason for rejecting a manuscript without review?

‘There are several reasons to pre-screen a manuscript and desk-reject it.

Very rarely, because the journal scope is rather large, a manuscript can be rejected because there really is no chemistry. A complete biological work on a molecule or material that is already published and without reference to the role of its structure wouldn’t fit in RSC Advances. This is rare, but it happens.

What is really crucial is the solidity of science. Are the characterizations complete and reliable? In line with the journal guidelines? Is the experimental part accurate? Copy-paste are often used during its preparation, but I’ve seen materials and methods sections citing characterization equipment that are not used in the description of the reported materials or molecules.

Declaring a paper as incremental and rejecting it on this basis is more subjective, but we can see some (a minority of) authors submitting manuscript with nearly the same figures because the same measurements are made, with the same organization of works, the molecules or materials being only slightly different from what is already available in the literature by the same authors. Here come the different between what is novel/new and what is scientifically interesting.

Even more subjective is the impact criteria. It is partially related to the incremental one! Simple example: if we know how a molecule with a hexyl chain behaves, no need to publish the same with an octyl chain if no significant difference(s) in the properties are observed. Or use of a different cell line? but nothing new? That would also prompt a desk-rejection.

Finally, we are trained on detecting paper milled manuscripts, and assisted by the fantastic editorial publishing team of the journal!‘

2. What is the best piece of advice you could give a submitting author?

‘Write and submit a paper you would like to read, as a reviewer and as a scientist!

Remember that beyond the need to publish dictated by annual performance evaluation and funding applications, the first purpose of scientific publication is to SHARE SCIENCE and SHARE SCIENTIFIC DATA to help the other actors of the field moving forward.

Like: I’ve tried this, it does work, or this works better, no need to repeat the experiment, rather use this information as it may prompt new topics/procedures/experiments/hypotheses, open new horizons, avoid reproducing dead ends.

Also, your manuscript must give a feeling of trust and confidence. Present solid characterization and experimental part. Spectra must be complete (always start the scale of your NMR spectra at zero please…), as must be the microphotographs of gels. When only a part of an electrophoresis gel is of interest for the discussion, it is fine to put only this part in the paper, but then present the whole picture in the supporting information for the sake of reliability (and refer to it in the caption of the manuscript figure!). Otherwise, it raises a red flag!

Figures must be well readable, without useless colors and effects.

Be rigorous, homogeneous, and coherent.

Be honest. You’ve submitted your paper to another journal? Specify it in the submission system if it is an RSC journal, in all cases in the cover letter. Explain why you believe it will fit well in RSC Advances despite this previous rejection.

And, please, please, please discuss your results. Unexpected observation? Mention it, explain why it is unexpected, why it is important, contextualize with the existing data and the expectations when you designed and conceived the works.‘

We hope that you find these insights from useful while writing your next paper!

Tune in next week for more Advancing with Advances!

You are welcome to send in any questions you have about peer-review or publishing to advances-rsc@rsc.org or post them on Twitter @RSCAdvances #AdvancingWithAdvances.

Don’t miss out on our previous tips on how to publish and not perish below:

Advancing with Advances (Part 1): featuring Professor Robert Baker (Trinity College Dublin)

Advancing with Advances (Part 2): featuring editorial insights from staff editors at RSC Advances

Advancing with Advances (Part 3): featuring Professor Brenno A.D. Neto (Universidade de Brasília, Brazil) Dr. Donna Arnold (University of Kent, UK), and Professor Nestor Mariano Correa (Universidad Nacional de Rio Cuarto, Argentina)

Advancing with Advances (Part 4): featuring Professor Megan O’Mara (Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology), Dr Giacomo Saielli (University of Padova, Italy), and Dr Pablo Denis (Universidad de la Republica Oriental del Uruguay)

Advancing with Advances (Part 5): featuring Professor Franck Dumeignil (University of Lille, France) Professor Xi Chen (Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China), and Professor Manojit Pal (Dr Reddy’s Institute of Life Sciences, India)

Advancing with Advances (Part 6): featuring Dr. Ranjit Koodali (Western Kentucky University, USA), Professor Luigi Vaccaro ( University of Perugia, Italy), and Professor Thierry Ollevier, (Université Laval, Québec Canada)

Advancing with Advances (Part 7): featuring Professor Steven McIntosh, Lehigh University, Pennsylvania, USA and Dr. Lubomír Rulíšek, Institute of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague

Advancing with Advances (Part 8): featuring Professor Leyong Wang, Nanjing University, China, and Professor Pucci, University of Pisa, Italy.