ITMO Authors

Preprints

2025-01-13 12:58
Preprint is a type of academic paper that is posted on specialized open access platforms prior to or together with publication in a scientific journal. These works are not peer reviewed, that is, they represent “preliminary” versions of future articles.
In the message below we describe some features of preliminary manuscript publications and the platforms where you can find them.

Why do preprints exist?

The process of having an article published can be lengthy , taking from several months to a year. Preprints provide scholars with an access to the current research in their field earlier.
The authors themselves are also interested in having their scientific work published as quickly as possible. Firstly, they “notify” their colleagues that they are doing research in a certain field. So even if the publication process is protracted, the palm for discovery will not escape them. Secondly, publishing a preprint allows receiving the relevant feedback to update the “final” version of the paper.
Since the beginning of the Covid pandemic, the demand for preprints has drastically increased. During the first 4 months of 2020, more than 16 thousand papers were published about coronavirus, almost half of them were preprints.

Preprint and article: what is the difference?

Preprints as a type of academic paper have the following features:
  • are not reviewed, although checked for plagiarism;
  • published in open access only;
  • may contain errors or typos, “raw” conclusions;
  • are not included in the list of the author’s papers for any academic achievement reports.
The fact that preprints are published on specialized moderated services means that the documents are authentic and relevant to the topic considered. However, the reliability of the information is not guaranteed, so they should be cautiously referred to in further research.
Preprints may be cited. These documents are separate scientific works and may have their own DOI, even if the changes from the research officially published later are minimal.

Where could I find preprints?

ArXiv.org was the first service to appear and is still the most popular. Most publishers are positive about posting preprints there.
Approximately half of all articles uploaded to ArXiv are related to various areas of Physics. However, with every year the number of papers in the field of Mathematics (now about a quarter) and Computer Science (now about a fifth) is growing. The remaining sciences account for a total of about 5%.
Articles are accepted only from the authors registered on the platform. Scholars provide papers under non-exclusive and irrevocable rights for distribution. After the article is published in a journal, a link to the peer-reviewed text appears on arXiv.org.
The article page on arXiv.org looks as follows:
Preprints is a Russian multidisciplinary service. The search for documents is done by title or keywords, as well as by topics. The latest published works are presented on the main page. The entire list of thematic rubrics is shown in the picture below.
To have your work published or to receive notifications about new preprints, you have to get registered on the platform.
Please note that preprints could be published before or together with the peer-reviewed article, but not after it has already been published in the journal!
Social Science Research Network (SSRN) is also a popular service for searching preprints. The platform was developed in 1994 and has been supported by Elsevier since 2016. You can refer to it free of charge.
In 2013, SSRN was recognized as the largest preprint repository. Initially, it contained only the documents on the social and humanitarian fields, however, today you can find articles on Engineering, Biology, Chemistry, Medicine, Computer Science and many other sciences there.
SSRN is also a platform for discussing the results of scientific research.
Each paper contains the personal information about the author, including their contacts and affiliation.

What is the attitude of the scientific community and publishing houses to preprints?

Most publishers support preprints, since this type of paper has a positive effect on scientific communication. The lack of expert assessment is compensated by the rapid publication and by making the information available. However, preprints can still not be considered as an equivalent of peer-reviewed articles.
Journals