--- name: ngeo-referee-strategy description: Use when choosing suggested and excluded referees for a Nature Geoscience submission and pre-empting the objections Earth-science referees are likely to raise. Plans referee handling; does not write the manuscript or the rebuttal. --- # Nature Geoscience Referee Strategy (ngeo-referee-strategy) ## When to trigger - The Editorial Manager form asks for suggested / excluded reviewers - You want to anticipate the objections a Nature Geoscience referee will raise and address them in advance - A prior manuscript was declined and you are rethinking who reviews it - You are coordinating the cover-letter referee section (see `ngeo-cover-letter`) ## How Nature Geoscience review works (durable shape) An in-house editor first triages on **broad interest and Earth-system importance**; only a minority of submissions are sent out. Those that pass go to referees (commonly two to three) who assess both **technical soundness** and **significance/breadth**. A referee can recommend rejection on **interest grounds even when the work is correct** — so your strategy must defend the science *and* the venue fit. Review is **single-blind by default**, with an **opt-in double-blind** route (choose it at submission and anonymise the manuscript accordingly). Resubmission and appeal routes exist (handled in `ngeo-revision`). ## Choosing suggested referees | Principle | Practice | |------------------------------------|------------------------------------------------------------------| | Competent on the method | Can actually judge your instruments, proxy, or model | | Spans the breadth claim | Include someone from the neighboring Earth-science field you claim to reach | | Covers the evidence type | If it is field + model, cover both the observational and modelling sides | | No conflict of interest | Not recent collaborators, advisors, or same-institution | | Constructive, not partisan | Known for fair, rigorous reports — not reflexive gate-keeping | | Grasps the significance | Will recognise why the result is broad, not just correct | Suggest a small set that *together* can vouch for correctness, the evidence, and breadth. Do not stack suggestions only with subfield insiders — editors may read that as evading the broad-interest test. Consider global diversity of expertise; Earth-system questions often need both a regional expert and a global-perspective referee. ## Choosing excluded referees - Exclude only with a brief, **professional, factual** rationale (a direct competitor with a conflict, a documented dispute). Editors discount emotional or vague objections. - Do not over-exclude; a long exclusion list signals defensiveness. Nature journals typically cap the number you may exclude. ## Worked example: a referee slate Suppose the Article reports a proxy-based ocean-circulation reconstruction whose headline consequence bears on climate sensitivity: 1. **Method judge** — a paleoceanographer who runs the same proxy and can interrogate the calibration and age model. 2. **Modelling witness** — a climate modeller who can assess the data–model comparison and the circulation inference. 3. **Breadth witness** — a climate-dynamics scientist who answers "why Nature Geoscience and not a paleo community journal," i.e. why it bears on a first-order question. The three-role logic transfers to any subfield: one referee for the measurement or model, one for the neighboring field you claim to reach, one independent senior figure. If you cannot name a credible breadth witness, that is diagnostic — revisit `ngeo-scope-fit`. ## Pre-empting the likely objections (do this in the manuscript, not just the letter) Anticipate the standard Nature Geoscience referee moves and disarm them in advance: - **"This is regional / not broad enough."** → Strengthen the broad-interest framing in the opening and cover letter (`ngeo-results-framing`, `ngeo-cover-letter`). - **"The model is not grounded in observations."** → Show the data–model validation in the main text (`ngeo-methods`). - **"Uncertainty is not quantified."** → State propagated uncertainty on the headline number (`ngeo-methods`). - **"Incremental over Ref. [X]."** → Make the qualitative Earth-system advance explicit; cite and differentiate. - **"Can't follow it without the Supplementary."** → Ensure the main text stands alone (`ngeo-supplementary`). - **"Over-claimed attribution/impact."** → Calibrate claims to evidence (`ngeo-writing-style`). ## Checklist - [ ] Suggested referees can judge correctness, the evidence type, AND breadth - [ ] At least one suggested referee represents the claimed neighboring field - [ ] Observational and modelling sides both covered if the study is mixed - [ ] No conflicts of interest among suggestions - [ ] Excluded referees (if any) have a brief, factual, professional rationale - [ ] The exclusion list is short (within any journal cap) - [ ] The manuscript already pre-empts the top objections (breadth, grounding, uncertainty) - [ ] Cover-letter referee section is consistent with the Editorial Manager form - [ ] Double-blind opt-in decision made and manuscript anonymised if chosen ## Anti-patterns - Suggesting only close-network insiders (reads as breadth evasion) - Excluding referees with emotional or unsubstantiated reasons - A long exclusion list that signals defensiveness - Suggesting a recent collaborator (conflict) as an "independent" referee - Ignoring the breadth or grounding objection and hoping the science alone carries it ## Output format ``` 【Suggested referees】N — cover correctness + evidence + breadth? yes / adjust 【Neighboring-field referee included】yes / add 【Obs + model sides covered】yes / n/a / add 【Conflicts checked】clean / fix 【Excluded referees】N (short) — factual rationale? yes / fix 【Top objections pre-empted】breadth / grounding / uncertainty / increment / stand-alone / over-claim 【Next】ngeo-submission (enter referees) → later ngeo-revision ``` > Referee counts, exclusion caps, and double-blind mechanics evolve — verify on the official Nature Geoscience author pages (Checked: 2026-07-16).