When PI says I have permission to submit

[ftp902]

This is my first time submitting to a journal and my PI told me that I have his permission to submit. Does this mean that I make an account for him as a corresponding author and submit it as if I were him? Is this pretty common?

As far as I know, corresponding author has the final say in submitting the manuscript and I am not entire sure what he meant when he said that. What I was going to do was to upload all the documents and change my PI's authorship to corresponding author, and he would be able to submit it.

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[SurfingDoctor]

Yes, if you and he/she worked on a manuscript together and have undergone revisions of draft and you asked them and they said "Go ahead and submit it", then that is a go ahead. This means you have established, the title, authors and author order, keywords, short title, abstract, introduction, methods, results and discussion and all according to the journal's specifications (whichever you and the PI have decided on to submit to). Generally, you can upload/enter all these prior to actually clicking the submit button, but make sure all these items are finalized between you and the PI before it goes to peer review (yes, usually the corresponding author accepts ultimate responsibility of the work), because this is your best chance to convince the reviewers and editor that your story is an important one to tell, and ultimately, be published.

 

[ftp902]

Thank you for your reply. If my PI wants me to submit and make an account for him and delegate all the work to me, does this mean that I can use a dummy email to make an account although emails that I actually put into title page will be .edu emails? Is this common as well?

I am even writing a cover page for him although I would put his name and affiliation at the bottom of the letter.

 

[SurfingDoctor]

No, you should not make a dummy account. It has been a while since I've submitted on someone elses behalf, but the account you make should be your own. Typically, anyone can make an account through electronic submission software. All the information you add should be true and accurate. However, if you upload the information but are not the corresponding author, usually the submission software will not let you fully submit the manuscript. The PI will have to go create an account (or use one they have) and access the manuscript submission themselves and click submit.

Yes, cover letters are addressed to the journal editor from the corresponding author.

 

[ftp902]

Thank you so much for your answer! Account is made by my PI for submission. Now waiting commences. Do you have any idea how many first-author paper is good for residency? The current journal I submitted has impact factor for 3.7+ and I am expecting to submit another one to JBJS (5+) hopefully before the summer ends. Also does it matter how many authors are on the paper? For the last paper submitted, I had 3 total including PI as the last person.

 

[SurfingDoctor]

Do you have any idea how many first-author paper is good for residency?

Depends on the residency tier and specialty I suppose, but I would say 1 paper is great. More than 1 is fantastic. Most PhD programs require only 1 to 2 papers first-author papers for graduation, so 1 to 2 for a non-PhD medical student is great. To speak to that, I have faculty colleagues that haven't had a single publication (though that is rare)

Also does it matter how many authors are on the paper?

At your stage, no. Your name on anything, middle author of 25 authors is fine. Down the line, yes. Personally, when I see more than 5 authors, I figure many of the people on the manuscript (beside the first and last author) either are contributing nothing or very little and the reason they are on there are for gift authorship or political reasons. Anyway, not relevant at your stage. I also wouldn't be concerned with impact factor at your stage. Even if it is published in the journal of Chinese Hamster Ovary Cells and the impact factor is o.1, it's still a paper. Of course, if it is Nature or New England Journal, then that would be really impressive, but no one should or would expect that. Most people will not look up impact factor and depending on what journals they read, may be completely unfamiliar with the journals you submit to. So in the end, a paper with your name on it is good enough. The journal should always be PubMed indexed though.