JoGG accepts submissions in the form of Brief Communications, Scientific Reports, Case Studies, and Review Articles. Letters to the Editor are also welcomed. See below for these and other types of submissions welcomed by the JoGG.

Authors are invited to communicate with the Editor prior to writing an article for feedback on its appropriateness for publication in JoGG. Please adhere to the guidelines below when submitting a manuscript.

JoGG may also include feature articles which are not peer-reviewed; these are generally an author’s opinions or experiences that the editorial staff or board have elected to include to inform the genetic genealogy community.  Usually authors will be invited to submit feature articles by the editor; however if you have a feature article you believe should be included in the JoGG we certainly invite you to contact the editor.

A submitted manuscript for peer review must be essentially unique, i.e., it must present information not published (or to be published later) elsewhere in substantially the same form in English or any other language. However, previously published data that is analyzed in a new or different way may also be appropriate for inclusion in JoGG.

Authors retain the original copyright to their material but license it to be published in the Journal pursuant to a Creative Commons license and articles can be shared under those terms. Complete PDFs of articles can be redistributed freely as “reprints”, and portions of a paper may be reproduced with proper attribution.

Templates for writing articles may be found under our Resources for Authors.  While it is not always required that authors adhere strictly to these templates, the JoGG reserves the right to ask that a manuscript be reformatted for publication.

Each submission should be emailed as an attachment to the JoGG editor by the corresponding author. The body of the email constitutes a cover letter. A return email will acknowledge receipt, and that date will be considered the date of submission to JoGG. The review process will begin immediately, and authors will receive information on the paper’s status as soon as it is available. “Early Edition” pre-prints of accepted articles may appear online as soon as the review process is completed.

The Editor or an Associate Editor (hereafter, editor) will evaluate each new submission. Those considered appropriate will be assigned to an editor, who will shepherd the manuscript through the review process. The editor will solicit two or more peer reviews, outline any revisions necessary, and make a final decision regarding publication. Authors are encouraged to suggest appropriate peer reviewers (with their contact information), with the understanding that these decisions are ultimately made by the Board.

The peer review process often yields many suggestions for improvement from the reviewers and the editor, and revisions to the manuscript are often necessary. Authors should not submit an article for review unless they are prepared to address in good faith these comments.  Authors are not required to accept every reviewer recommendation, but explanations are required when recommendations are declined. The Editor will decide whether the responses by the author have adequately addressed each suggestion and retains the right to refuse publication if one or more of the responses are deemed inadequate. The revised form of the manuscript should be as close to the final form as possible. The final version will be converted to pdf format and will be sent back to the author for approval.

Reviewers involved in the peer review process will be anonymous.