Aims and scope of journal
Sample issue
Editorial process
Editors and contact information
Relationship to other nature journals
Editorial and publishing policies
Impact factor
Editorial blogs
Abbreviation
ISSN and EISSN
Further editorial information
The guide for authors and the editorial policies, including the guide for referees, are available in PDF format.
AIMS AND SCOPE OF JOURNAL
Nature Cell Biology publishes papers of the highest quality from all areas of cell biology,
encouraging those that shed light on the molecular mechanisms responsible for fundamental cell biological processes.
The journal's scope is broad and includes the following areas (not listed in order of preference):
- Membrane traffic and protein sorting
- Cell adhesion and migration
- Signal transduction
- Proteolysis
- Apoptosis
- Organisation of the nucleus and nuclear transport
- Developmental biology
- Cell cycle and cell growth
- Cytoskeletal dynamics and molecular motor function
- Transcription and chromatin
- DNA replication and repair
- Cellular mechanisms of neurobiology, immunology and human disease (provided that the primary focus is on general processes of cell biology)
- Microbiology
- Plant cell biology
- Stem cells
Nature Cell Biology provides readers and authors with high visibility, emphasis on interdisciplinary communication, access to a broad readership, high standards of copy editing and production, rigorous peer review, rapid publication, and independence from academic societies and other vested interests.
SAMPLE ISSUE
Free online access to the November 2006 issue of Nature Cell Biology
(Volume 8, Number 11).
EDITORIAL PROCESS
Presubmission inquiries may be made via our online submission system before a manuscript is submitted, but they are not required. Editors can give the authors a rapid judgment of whether a particular paper is likely to be of interest, but cannot promise that the paper will be reviewed until they have received the entire manuscript as a regular submission.
The overview of the journal's manuscript decision process includes submission, editorial decision on whether the paper should be reviewed, peer review, decisions after review, revision, acceptance in principle, final submission and acceptance, proofs, advance online publication, and print publication. Before submitting a paper, authors should consult our editorial policies as well as technical tips for using our online submission system.
Please also consult our general guide for manuscript preparation and submission, which includes information on article formats, journal style, and figure preparation tips. Note that procedures for presubmission inquiries, initial submission, revision, and final submission are slightly different, so please consult the directions before proceeding to the online submission system.
Journals in the Nature family no longer take copyright on the primary research articles we publish. Instead we ask authors to sign a licence for us to publish their work. US government employees sign a different licence.
EDITORS AND CONTACT INFORMATION
Like the other Nature titles, Nature Cell Biology has no external editorial board.
Instead, all editorial decisions are made by a team of full-time professional editors. Information
about the scientific background of the editors may be found here.
A full list of journal staff appears on the masthead.
RELATIONSHIP TO OTHER NATURE JOURNALS
Nature Cell Biology is editorially independent; its editors make their own decisions,
independent of the other Nature journals. If a paper is rejected from one Nature journal, the
authors can use an automated manuscript transfer service to submit the paper to another Nature
journal via a link sent to them by the editor handling the manuscript. Authors should note that
referees' comments (including any confidential comments to the editor) and identities are
transferred to the editor of the second journal along with the manuscript. In that case, the journal
editors will take the previous reviews into account when making their decision, although in some
cases the editors may choose to take advice from additional or alternative referees. Alternatively,
authors may choose to request a fresh review, in which case they should not use the automated transfer
link, and the editors will evaluate the paper without reference to the previous review process.
More details are available on the manuscript transfer service and on the relationships between Nature titles.
EDITORIAL AND PUBLISHING POLICIES
Please see authors & referees @ npg for detailed information about author and referee services and publication policies at the Nature family of journals. These journals, including Nature Cell Biology, share a number of common policies including the following:
Licence agreement and author copyright
Embargo policy and press releases
Use of experimental animals and human subjects
Competing financial interests
Availability of materials and data
Digital image integrity and standards
Security concerns
Refutations, complaints and corrections
Duplicate publication
Confidentiality and pre-publicity
Plagiarism and fabrication
IMPACT FACTOR
The 2007 impact factor for Nature Cell Biology 17.623, according to the Thomson Reuters Journal Citation Reports.
The 2007 impact factor represents the aggregate number of citations in 2007 of papers published in 2005 and 2006, divided by the total number of papers published over this period. A more detailed explanation of impact factors appears on the
ISI web site.
Further information can be obtained from our Editorials in the
November 2002, August 2003 and October 2005 issues of Nature Cell Biology.
EDITORIAL BLOGS
We encourage community participation in all Nature journal blogs. Nautilus is a blog for authors and aspiring authors of Nature Publishing Group journals.
Peer-to-Peer is a blog for reviewers and is about peer review.
Other Nature Publishing Group blogs can be found on the blog index page.
ABBREVIATION
The correct abbreviation for abstracting and indexing purposes is Nat. Cell Biol.
ISSN AND EISSN
The international standard serial number (ISSN) for Nature Cell Biology is 1465-7392, and
the electronic international standard serial number (EISSN) is 1476-4679.
FURTHER EDITORIAL INFORMATION
Please see the following editorials for more information on various aspects of journal policy.
November 2002 'Microarray data standards'
Jan 2003 'The name game'
Jan 2003 'A new section for a new year'
Jan 2003 'Picture this'
March 2003 'Evolving NCB'
June 2003 'Whither RNAi?'
July 2003 'Editorial procedure reviewed'
August 2003 'Making Impact'
September 2003 'Molecular Biology, Cell Biology and NCB'
November 2003 'NCB geography/democracy'
December 2003 'Developing open access'
January 2004 'Value added'
April 2004 'Gel slicing and dicing: a recipe for disaster'
June 2004 'Nothing to declare?'
January 2005 'Journal transfer made easy'
March 2005 'Policy update'
November 2005 'Policy matters, policies that matter'
February 2006 'Beautification and fraud'
March 2006 'Appreciating data: warts, wrinkles and all'
May 2006 'Sharing science'
June 2006 'Reproducing data; Nothing to hide'
August 2006 'Agreeing to disagree'
The guide for authors and the editorial policies, including the guide for referees, are available in PDF format.
