Dear Colleagues,

Life as we know it has been massively disrupted by COVID-19. Many of you in our author, editor, reviewer, and reader community are hibernating labs, transitioning to remote teaching, prioritizing family, and changing the way you work and interact with people. All of these efforts take time and energy, challenging our normal workflow under stressful circumstances.

Let us reassure you that we recognize that authors, editors, and reviewers may need some additional time to address journal assignments. While both Biophysical Journal and The Biophysicist editors remain committed to publishing quality science, we plan to be as flexible as possible while still meeting necessary deadlines. We do understand that you may be even busier than usual and are juggling many priorities.
 
To our authors: Many of you have manuscripts in various stages of peer review. We appreciate that you have chosen to publish with the Biophysical Society. Providing timely and helpful reviews continues to be what drives our peer review program; however, we do ask for your patience and flexibility in the event of unexpected delays during these difficult times. Also, if you require additional time to complete your manuscript revision, please notify your editor and the Editorial Office to request an extension as soon as you become aware of these circumstances. Further, if you have results that you’ve been waiting to write up, and you find you have the time, we encourage you to submit to our BPS journals.

To our editors and reviewers: Editors for both the Biophysical Journal and The Biophysicist are continuing their work on behalf of the journals. We value our reviewer community and know that they too are dealing with many uncertainties. The Editorial Office has reduced the number of reminders being sent to editors and reviewers from every two days to once a week. If as an editor or a reviewer, you need more time to complete an assignment, please let us know, because extensions will be granted as much as is reasonably possible while still serving our authors. If you are invited to review a manuscript, please accept so we can keep the science moving forward; editors will do what they can to work with your schedule. Finally, when considering asking for additional experimental data, we ask reviewers and editors to recognize that many authors no longer have access to their labs. Editors, please do not hesitate to communicate with your Associate Editor, and reviewers, likewise please communicate any delays or concerns with your editor. And as always, do not hesitate to contact the Editorial Office.
 
Consistent with our shared missions of advancing research outcomes, our BJ publishing partner Cell Press has shared the following resources.

1. In January, the Elsevier COVID-19 Information Center was established with the latest research and links to around 20,000 articles from across 2,500+ journals, available freely and easily, to help the global response.

2. Working with the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and the Wellcome Trust, Elsevier is making this important body of literature available from PubMed Central and other public repositories such as the WHO COVID database.

3. Author and editor support hubs to assist their activities:

Editor resilience center: a new support hub created to assist editorial activities as far as possible and provide info about the continuity of support services.

Author resilience center: a new support hub created to assist authors to continue their publishing activities as far as possible including articles and podcasts.

Also, don’t forget the BPS website, which includes additional articles and resources regarding COVID-19 and more.

The Society appreciates your continued efforts and dedication to our journals and we thank you for working through these uncertain times.

Please feel free to reach out to either one of us or to the Editorial Office if you have further questions.

Be well,

Jane Dyson, Biophysical Journal Editor-in-Chief
Sam Safran, The Biophysicist Editor-in-Chief