Skip to main content

About

Aims and scope

Virology Journal is an open access, peer reviewed journal that considers articles on all aspects of virology, including research on the viruses of animals, plants and microbes. The journal welcomes basic research as well as pre-clinical and clinical studies of novel diagnostic tools, vaccines and anti-viral therapies.

The Editorial policy of Virology Journal is to publish all research which is assessed by peer reviewers to be a coherent and sound addition to the scientific literature, and puts less emphasis on interest levels or perceived impact.

Virology Journal will feature articles on human, animal, plant, insect, bacterial, and fungal viruses. The journal will also publish articles on molecular aspects of the control and prevention of viral infections with vaccines and antiviral agents and on the use of viruses as gene therapy vectors, as well as research on other agents such as prions. The approaches and techniques used are expected to encompass many disciplines, including molecular genetics, molecular biology, biochemistry, biophysics, structural biology, cell biology, immunology, morphology, genetics and pathogenesis.

Why publish your article in Virology Journal?

  • Edited by leading virologists, our journal brings together all areas of virology research.
  • With more than 100,000 monthly accesses, we ensure exceptional visibility and community attention for your work.
  • We welcome basic research, as well as pre-clinical and clinical studies, and research on vaccines and anti-viral therapies.
  • We deliver high levels of author satisfaction, with 93% of our published authors reporting that they would definitely or probably publish with us again.

Policy on viral sequences

Virology Journal welcomes the submission of substantive sequences derived from new viruses, substantive sequences associated with important outbreaks in humans, animals or plants or those that contain important polymorphisms, such as clinically relevant mutations that affect drug resistance or changes in receptor binding or those that inform us about basic aspects of virus replication or disease, as well as next generation sequencing data such as viromes. However, the journal will not normally consider short sequences or sequences which are identical or highly related to those seen previously, nor will it publish sequences that are new only by definition of geographical location (e.g. the first description of a particular strain in a certain region), unless there is a clear public health implication of this finding. Such incremental reports can be submitted to our sister journal, Hereditas.

Article processing charges (APC)

Authors who publish open access in Virology Journal are required to pay an article processing charge (APC). The APC price will be determined from the date on which the article is accepted for publication.

The current APC, subject to VAT or local taxes where applicable, is: £2390.00/$3190.00/€2690.00

Visit our open access support portal and our Journal Pricing FAQs for further information.

Open access funding

Visit Springer Nature’s open access funding & support services for information about research funders and institutions that provide funding for APCs.

Springer Nature offers agreements that enable institutions to cover open access publishing costs. Learn more about our open access agreements to check your eligibility and discover whether this journal is included.

Springer Nature offers APC waivers and discounts for articles published in our fully open access journals whose corresponding authors are based in the world’s lowest income countries (see our APC waivers and discounts policy for further information). Requests for APC waivers and discounts from other authors will be considered on a case-by-case basis, and may be granted in cases of financial need (see our open access policies for journals for more information). All applications for discretionary APC waivers and discounts should be made at the point of manuscript submission; requests made during the review process or after acceptance are unable to be considered.

Open access

All articles published by Virology Journal are made freely and permanently accessible online immediately upon publication, without subscription charges or registration barriers. Further information about open access can be found here.

As authors of articles published in Virology Journal you are the copyright holders of your article and have granted to any third party, in advance and in perpetuity, the right to use, reproduce or disseminate your article, according to the BMC license agreement.

For those of you who are US government employees or are prevented from being copyright holders for similar reasons, BMC can accommodate non-standard copyright lines. Please contact us if further information is needed.

Indexing services

All articles published in Virology Journal are included in:

  • Agricola
  • Biological Abstracts
  • BIOSIS
  • CABI
  • CAS
  • Citebase
  • Current contents
  • DOAJ
  • Embase
  • EmBiology
  • Global Health
  • MEDLINE
  • OAIster
  • PubMed
  • PubMed Central
  • Science Citation Index Expanded
  • SCImago
  • Scopus
  • SOCOLAR
  • Zetoc

The full text of all articles is deposited in digital archives around the world to guarantee long-term digital preservation. You can also access all articles published by BioMed Central on SpringerLink.

Peer-review policy

Peer-review is the system used to assess the quality of a manuscript before it is published. Independent researchers in the relevant research area assess submitted manuscripts for originality, validity and significance to help editors determine whether the manuscript should be published in their journal. You can read more about the peer-review process here.

Virology Journal operates a single-blind peer-review system, where the reviewers are aware of the names and affiliations of the authors, but the reviewer reports provided to authors are anonymous.

The benefit of single-blind peer review is that it is the traditional model of peer review that many reviewers are comfortable with, and it facilitates a dispassionate critique of a manuscript.

Submitted manuscripts will generally be reviewed by two or more experts who will be asked to evaluate whether the manuscript is scientifically sound and coherent, whether it duplicates already published work, and whether or not the manuscript is sufficiently clear for publication. The Editors will reach a decision based on these reports and, where necessary, they will consult with members of the Editorial Board.

The Editorial policy of Virology Journal is to publish all research which is assessed by peer reviewers to be a coherent and sound addition to the scientific literature, and puts less emphasis on interest levels or perceived impact.

Editorial policies

All manuscripts submitted to Virology Journal should adhere to BioMed Central's editorial policies.

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Citing articles in Virology Journal

Articles in Virology Journal  should be cited in the same way as articles in a traditional journal. Because articles are not printed, they do not have page numbers; instead, they are given a unique article number.

Article citations follow this format:

Authors: Title. Virol J [year], [volume number]:[article number].

e.g. Roberts LD, Hassall DG, Winegar DA, Haselden JN, Nicholls AW, Griffin JL: Increased hepatic oxidative metabolism distinguishes the action of Peroxisome Proliferator-Activated Receptor delta from Peroxisome Proliferator-Activated Receptor gamma in the Ob/Ob mouse. Virol J 2009, 1:115.

refers to article 115 from Volume 1 of the journal.

Appeals and complaints

Authors who wish to appeal a rejection or make a complaint should follow the procedure outlined in the BMC Editorial Policies.

Benefits of publishing with BMC

High visibility

Virology Journal's open access policy allows maximum visibility of articles published in the journal as they are available to a wide, global audience. 

Speed of publication

Virology Journal offers a fast publication schedule whilst maintaining rigorous peer review; all articles must be submitted online, and peer review is managed fully electronically (articles are distributed in PDF form, which is automatically generated from the submitted files). Articles will be published with their final citation after acceptance, in both fully browsable web form, and as a formatted PDF.

Flexibility

Online publication in Virology Journal gives you the opportunity to publish large datasets, large numbers of color illustrations and moving pictures, to display data in a form that can be read directly by other software packages so as to allow readers to manipulate the data for themselves, and to create all relevant links (for example, to PubMed, to sequence and other databases, and to other articles).

Promotion and press coverage

Articles published in Virology Journal are included in article alerts and regular email updates. Some may be highlighted on Virology Journal’s pages and on the BMC homepage.

In addition, articles published in Virology Journal may be promoted by press releases to the general or scientific press. These activities increase the exposure and number of accesses for articles published in Virology Journal. A list of articles recently press-released by journals published by BMC is available here.

Copyright

As an author of an article published in Virology Journal you retain the copyright of your article and you are free to reproduce and disseminate your work (for further details, see the BMC license agreement).

For further information about the advantages of publishing in a journal from BMC, please click here.