Q: What should I do after my paper was ignored by Scientific Reports?
On January 30, I submitted my article to Scientific Reports to be considered in a special collection. I submitted it through the new system, where they state that within a maximum of 45 days, they shall provide a response from the reviewers. 40 days later, not yet receiving an update on the status, I wrote to the journal. The editor replied five days later stating that he would send my request to the person responsible. On March 20 (50 days after submitting my article), I received a reply stating that they were sorry because, after 50 days, my article had not bee[n accepted].
Firstly, a part toward the end of your question was incomplete. So, we have edited it based on our understanding of the situation. It seems your article has not been accepted by Scientific Reports. Without the missing part, it’s not entirely clear if it was desk rejected or rejected after the peer review. As you have mentioned “ignored,” it possibly means the former.
In either case, rejection is challenging to deal with. However, going by the contents and perhaps even the tone of your query, you seem to have taken it in your stride and are already contemplating the next steps. Resilience is a great sign in a researcher. Kudos!
Coming to your query, the article may have been rejected for the special collection (or Guest Edited Collection, as they call it) because it may have fallen outside the scope of the journal, as it says on their site. If so, and if they shared this with you when rejecting the manuscript (and as it also says on the site), you may consider submitting it as a regular submission, making any changes as needed.
If however that is not an option (in case they have not specifically asked for it), as you may know, you can submit to a similar journal, making any changes to the article based on any feedback from Scientific Reports.
Additionally, and if you are specifically looking to minimize desk rejection (not just for this article, but also for future articles), you may consider our new platform, PubSure. The AI-powered platform performs a check on your manuscript, enabling you to enhance its submission-readiness. Even better, by also having editors from various journals on the platform, it allows you to showcase your improved manuscript to several editors at the same time, one of whom may then select it for their journal. If interested, you may find out more about the platform here: PubSure
All the best for the next steps!
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This content belongs to the Journal submission & peer review Stage