PLoS One, from the PLoS family of journals that includes PLoS Biology, has become very popular among coral reef scientists.  (The leader is Bette Willis with 4 articles).  PloS One has been publishing cutting edge and influential articles about a variety of topics.  I love it because it is very fast and open access, meaning anybody, anywhere (with internet access) can read about your findings.  If you are doing science relevant to the public or management, it just makes sense not to have your results hidden behind a wall erected by corporate publishing houses that charge enormous fees to access their journals.  (even major research institutions like UNC are having a hard time paying the ever growing fees)

PLoS ONE is an international, peer-reviewed, open-access, online publication. PLoS ONE welcomes reports on primary research from any scientific discipline. It provides:

• Open-access—freely accessible online, authors retain copyright
• Fast publication times
• Peer review by expert, practicing researchers
• Post-publication tools to indicate quality and impact
• Community-based dialogue on articles
• Worldwide media coverage

PLoS ONE is published by the Public Library of Science (PLoS), a nonprofit organization.

Read more about the PLoS One mission here.

One of the most unique aspects of PLoS One is its criteria for accepting manuscripts.  “PLoS ONE features reports of original research from all disciplines within science and medicine. By not excluding papers on the basis of subject area,PLoS ONE facilitates the discovery of the connections between papers whether within or between disciplines.”

To be accepted for publication in PLoS ONE, research articles must satisfy the following criteria:

1. The study presents the results of primary scientific research.
2. Results reported have not been published elsewhere.
3. Experiments, statistics, and other analyses are performed to a high technical standard and are described in sufficient detail.
4. Conclusions are presented in an appropriate fashion and are supported by the data.
5. The article is presented in an intelligible fashion and is written in standard English.
6. The research meets all applicable standards for the ethics of experimentation and research integrity.
7. The article adheres to appropriate reporting guidelines (e.g. CONSORT, MIAME, STROBE, EQUATOR) and community standards for data availability.

Another is that it uses the Creative Commons Attribution License (CCAL) (read the human-readable summary or the full license legal code). “Under the CCAL, authors retain ownership of the copyright for their article, but authors allow anyone to download, reuse, reprint, modify, distribute, and/or copy articles in PLoS journals, so long as the original authors and source are cited. No permission is required from the authors or the publishers.” Open access articles have a well-documented citation advantage.

We often cover PLoS One papers about coral reef ecosystems, e.g., check out these posts:

Management effectiveness of the world’s marine fisheries

Caribbean reef fish decline: where have all the big fish gone?

Resilient ’super reefs’ a priority for conservation efforts

Doom and Boom on a Resilient Reef: Climate Change, Algal Overgrowth and Coral Recovery

Study identifies disease resistant coral genotypes

Rare corals may be smarter than previously thought

MPAs and climate change II: study finds no-take reserves do not increase reef resilience

Corals prove to be “nonconformist”

Kingman Atoll, MPAs and climate change

“Shipwrecks Wreak Havoc on Coral Reefs”

Shifting Baselines, Local Impacts, and Global Change on Coral Reefs – a note from Nancy Knowlton & Jeremy B. C. Jackson

A list of coral reef papers published in PLoS One:

• Published 22 Apr 2009Doom and Boom on a Resilient Reef: Climate Change, Algal Overgrowth and Coral RecoveryGuillermo Diaz-Pulido, Laurence J. McCook, Sophie Dove, Ray Berkelmans, George Roff, David I. Kline, Scarla Weeks, Richard D. Evans, David H. Williamson, Ove Hoegh-Guldberg
• Published 20 Aug 2008Phase Shift from a Coral to a Corallimorph-Dominated Reef Associated with a Shipwreck on Palmyra AtollThierry M. Work, Greta S. Aeby, James E. Maragos
• Published 27 Aug 2008Climate Warming, Marine Protected Areas and the Ocean-Scale Integrity of Coral Reef EcosystemsNicholas A. J. Graham, Tim R. McClanahan, M. Aaron MacNeil, Shaun K. Wilson, Nicholas V. C. Polunin, Simon Jennings, Pascale Chabanet, Susan Clark, Mark D. Spalding, Yves Letourneur, Lionel Bigot, René Galzin, Marcus C. Öhman, Kajsa C. Garpe, Alasdair J. Edwards, Charles R. C. Sheppard
• Published 18 Feb 2009Macroalgae Has No Effect on the Severity and Dynamics of Caribbean Yellow Band DiseaseIvana Vu, Gillian Smelick, Sam Harris, Sarah C. Lee, Ernesto Weil, Robert F. Whitehead, John F. Bruno
• Published 03 Jun 2009Coping with Commitment: Projected Thermal Stress on Coral Reefs under Different Future ScenariosSimon D. Donner
• Published 27 Feb 2008Baselines and Degradation of Coral Reefs in the Northern Line IslandsStuart A. Sandin, Jennifer E. Smith, Edward E. DeMartini, Elizabeth A. Dinsdale, Simon D. Donner, Alan M. Friedlander, Talina Konotchick, Machel Malay, James E. Maragos, David Obura, Olga Pantos, Gustav Paulay, Morgan Richie, Forest Rohwer, Robert E. Schroeder, Sheila Walsh, Jeremy B. C. Jackson, Nancy Knowlton, Enric Sala
• Published 08 Aug 2007Regional Decline of Coral Cover in the Indo-Pacific: Timing, Extent, and Subregional ComparisonsJohn F. Bruno, Elizabeth R. Selig
• Published 27 Feb 2008Microbial Ecology of Four Coral Atolls in the Northern Line IslandsElizabeth A. Dinsdale, Olga Pantos, Steven Smriga, Robert A. Edwards, Florent Angly, Linda Wegley, Mark Hatay, Dana Hall, Elysa Brown, Matthew Haynes, Lutz Krause, Enric Sala, Stuart A. Sandin, Rebecca Vega Thurber, Bette L. Willis, Farooq Azam, Nancy Knowlton, Forest Rohwer
• Published 18 Jun 2008Coral Pathogens Identified for White Syndrome (WS) Epizootics in the Indo-PacificMeir Sussman, Bette L. Willis, Steven Victor, David G. Bourne
• Published 13 May 2009The Effect of Adult Aggression on Habitat Selection by Settlers of Two Coral-Dwelling DamselfishesOfer Ben-Tzvi, Moshe Kiflawi, Omer Polak, Avigdor Abelson

• Published 16 Jul 2008Diversity and Evolution of Coral Fluorescent ProteinsNaila O. Alieva, Karen A. Konzen, Steven F. Field, Ella A. Meleshkevitch, Marguerite E. Hunt, Victor Beltran-Ramirez, David J. Miller, Jörg Wiedenmann, Anya Salih, Mikhail V. Matz
• Published 06 May 2009Fishery-Independent Data Reveal Negative Effect of Human Population Density on Caribbean Predatory Fish CommunitiesChristopher D. Stallings
• Published 14 Oct 2008Genetic Traces of Recent Long-Distance Dispersal in a Predominantly Self-Recruiting CoralMadeleine J. H. van Oppen, Adrian Lutz, Glenn De’ath, Lesa Peplow, Stuart Kininmonth
• Published 13 Nov 2008Natural Disease Resistance in Threatened Staghorn CoralsSteven V. Vollmer, David I. Kline
• Published 14 May 2008Macroalgal-Associated Dinoflagellates Belonging to the Genus Symbiodinium in Caribbean ReefsIsabel Porto, Camila Granados, Juan C. Restrepo, Juan A. Sánchez
• Published 13 Mar 2009Identification and Gene Expression Analysis of a Taxonomically Restricted Cysteine-Rich Protein Family in Reef-Building CoralsShinichi Sunagawa, Michael K. DeSalvo, Christian R. Voolstra, Alejandro Reyes-Bermudez, Mónica Medina
• Published 19 Feb 2009Vibrio Zinc-Metalloprotease Causes Photoinactivation of Coral Endosymbionts and Coral Tissue LesionsMeir Sussman, Jos C. Mieog, Jason Doyle, Steven Victor, Bette L. Willis, David G. Bourne
• Published 01 Apr 2009Spatio-Temporal Transmission Patterns of Black-Band Disease in a Coral CommunityAssaf Zvuloni, Yael Artzy-Randrup, Lewi Stone, Esti Kramarsky-Winter, Roy Barkan, Yossi Loya
• Published 24 Sep 2008Some Rare Indo-Pacific Coral Species Are Probable HybridsZoe T. Richards, Madeleine J. H. van Oppen, Carden C. Wallace, Bette L. Willis, David J. Miller
• Published 15 Jul 2009Reef Endemism, Host Specificity and Temporal Stability in Populations of Symbiotic Dinoflagellates from Two Ecologically Dominant Caribbean CoralsDaniel J. Thornhill, Yu Xiang, William K. Fitt, Scott R. Santos
  

• Published 02 Jul 2008Expulsion of Symbiotic Algae during Feeding by the Green Hydra – a Mechanism for Regulating Symbiont Density?Yelena Fishman, Eliahu Zlotkin, Daniel Sher
• Published 12 Sep 2007The p53 Tumor Suppressor-Like Protein nvp63 Mediates Selective Germ Cell Death in the Sea AnemoneNematostella vectensisSandra Pankow, Casimir Bamberger