Dr Elisa De Ranieri

I have been working in scholarly publishing for over 10 years and I first became involved in EASE in 2021 when I joined its Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Committee. If I were to be elected as ordinary council member, I would surely continue my involvement on these topics as I feel strongly about improving EDI in both science and publishing. While I was the Editor in Chief for Nature Communications, the flagship gold OA journal from Springer Nature, I have worked to improve diversity and inclusion in peer review by setting up a mentoring programme for early career researchers to introduce them to peer review, as well as setting up an internal working group to tackle EDI issues within the journal.

I have also a keen interest in innovating peer review, and I am an advocate for increasing the transparency of the process, as well as its inclusivity. As part of my current and past roles I have supported the implementation of transparent peer review and peer review training programmes for editors. I have co-authored a paper published in 2018 in BMC Research Integrity and Peer Review studying differences in outcome by peer review model that might shed light on unconscious bias. This work was presented at the 8th Peer Review Congress. I hope to contribute to EASE’s strand of work on peer review with my experience at two of the leading publishers and coordinating projects to further EASE’s mission.

If elected, I will also contribute to the Italian regional chapter to devise and deliver initiatives and events dedicated to the needs of Italian researchers, editors and publishers. In 2021, I gave talks on publishing in high-impact publications for researchers at the University of Pisa, and I could deliver a similar curriculum for a broader set of attendees.

Last but not least, I would be excited to contribute my expertise in research integrity and editorial policy, and supporting the development of author and editor resources, as well as training sessions for editors, on these topics.

Career summary

My background is in electronic engineering and physics. After obtaining a PhD in physics from the University of Cambridge in 2010, I worked as a post-doctoral researcher at the Hitachi Cambridge Laboratory for 2 years before leaving academia to become an editor.

I joined Springer Nature in 2012 as an Assistant Editor for Nature Communications. In the following 9 years, I held several other roles, including Senior Editor for Nature Nanotechnology and then Nature Energy, handling manuscripts on applied physics. In 2016 I became the Head of Editorial Process and Data Analytics for all Nature journals, where I was responsible for providing data on journal performance, implementing editorial policy and improving editorial processes. Then, in 2019, I went back to Nature Communications as Editor in Chief, overseeing the journal strategy and operations, and managing a team of over 100 professional editors.

In 2021 I joined Cell Press (part of Elsevier) as Head of Research Integrity and Author Experience. In this role, I am responsible for supporting Cell Pres journals with the resolution of research integrity cases and the development of editorial policy. I also oversee the activities of Community Review (a new submission system for consideration at multiple Cell Press journals at once) and lead projects to improve the author experience, such as improving our workflows and messaging, and supporting authors transferring their papers. I also oversee projects aimed at improving peer review and making it more transparent.

Read my CV

Conflict of Interest declaration