Competition
for publication space and for editors’ attention is now very high, and
it is no longer sufficient to send a manuscript to a journal editor
along with a letter saying little more than “please find my manuscript
attached”. The cover letter is your opportunity to directly address the
editor of your target journal. It can be used to set your study apart
from others and directly explain to the editor why your findings are
important and why they should be published in their journal.
There
are a number of important components of a cover letter, all of which
should be included. These components are described in detail in Edanz
Cover Letter Template, which is shown on the following page and can be
downloaded from: www.liwenbianji.cn/coverletter. This template can be
used to develop your own cover letters by following the suggestions in
the comments and replacing the bracketed sentences with the types of
sentences explained. The format of this letter is applicable for most
if not all submissions, although additional sections may be required
for some types of paper; for example, information about deposition of
clinical trial data would most likely need to accompany a report of a
clinical trial, and information about the deposition of sequence data
into public databases would possibly need to be provided where such
data has been obtained.
As always, the target journal’s
instructions to authors should be consulted; these will most likely
outline the information that absolutely must be included in the cover
letter. Another source of this information is the journal’s submission
webpages. Although not all of the components listed below and described
in the cover letter template will be described as required on the
target journal’s webpages, all should be included in your letter,
because to do so will increase your chances of grabbing the editor’s
attention. The following principles apply to cover letter development:
•
Some journals have different editors for the different areas of
research the journal covers and you can choose the most appropriate one
based on area and occasionally also editor profiles. Address your
letter personally to the appropriate editor, e.g., “Dear Dr. Smith”. If
one cannot be readily identified, address your letter to the
editor-in-chief. • Begin by providing the title of your
manuscript, the section/publication type you would like to see it
published as, and the name of the journal you are submitting it to. •
You then need to provide a very brief background and rationale for your
study, explaining why you did what you did. This can be followed by a
brief description of the results. • The following paragraph is
very important. You will need to explain the significance of your
findings to the research community, and specifically to the readers of
your target journal. If you find it difficult to explain why the
readers of that journal would be interested in your findings, then you
may need to select a more appropriate journal. Editors will only send
papers to review that they think will be of interest to their readers.
Studying the ‘aims and scope’ of your chosen journal might help with
this.
• The last paragraph of the letter should contain any
statements or declarations required by the target journal. These
usually include declarations of any conflicts of interest, grant
support or other sources of funding, a statement that all authors have
read and approved the manuscript and a statement that the same
manuscript has not been submitted elsewhere. Confirmation of each
author’s qualification for authorship may also be required. • Finally, include details for correspondence and a polite farewell.