LAUSR

If you are reading this editorial, it is highly likely that you have also read several peer-reviewed publications in the past few weeks. Reading the literature is part of the daily routine for most research scientists. What is rarely uppermost in our thoughts at such times is how these papers transitioned from being a good idea, or a logical extension of previous work, into the final, published product. However, one thing that most scientists do agree on is that much of what we read has been improved enormously by thoughtful and critical peer review. Peer reviewers make an invaluable contribution to manuscripts that are under consideration for publication by journals. This is especially true in the case of submissions that clearly have merit but are incomplete or poorly focused. A high-quality peer reviewer often helps turn these manuscripts into compelling publications that attract the attention of readers. Advances in science also require rigorous validation, and peer reviewers play a vital role in this process. Excellence in peer review is something that does not come naturally to most of us. It takes a lot of experience to be able to provide authors with succinct and balanced feedback that, if implemented, will significantly improve the quality of a manuscript. Good reviewers unerringly identify gaps and inconsistencies in manuscripts and offer constructive solutions for their resolution. As the reputations of these highly valued reviewers grow, they often find themselves receiving many more requests than they can reasonably be expected to handle, forcing editors to seek out alternate but equally competent reviewers. Building communities of dedicated, expert peer reviewers at all career stages is the key to solving this dilemma and to ensuring a pipeline of quality editorial board members. We, as editors of the ASBMB journals, are acutely aware of our dependence on the volunteer peer review community for ensuring that we publish quality science. Most manuscripts that are accepted for publication have had input from at least two peer reviewers. An insight into the scale of this effort can be obtained by considering that the three ASBMB journals—Journal