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AOP Reports: A New Way of Publishing AOPs in Peer-Reviewed Scientific Journals
Citation:
Knapen, D., J. O'Brien, J. Lynch, E. Nelson, N. Delrue, A. Burton, AND Dan Villeneuve. AOP Reports: A New Way of Publishing AOPs in Peer-Reviewed Scientific Journals. SETAC North America 42nd Annual meeting, Portland, OR, November 14 - 18, 2021. https://doi.org/10.23645/epacomptox.17105798
Impact/Purpose:
Presentation to the SETAC North America 42nd Annual meeting November 2021. To more effectively use data from new approach methodologies (NAMs) in risk assessment and regulatory decision-making, it is important to be able to link measurements made at the molecular and cellular level to adverse outcomes of management concern. The adverse outcome pathway (AOP) framework is employed to assemble evidence for causal connections between perturbation of molecular and cellular pathways and human health or ecological hazards. Broader engagement of the scientific community in AOP development has been hindered by the perceived lack of incentives for investing time and effort in describing an AOP in the AOP-wiki. To address this, a novel partnership was developed between the OECD AOP program and several academic journals. This partnership allows for hybrid publication of an AOP developed in the AOP-Wiki with a companion journal article. This partnership provides incentives for AOP authors by providing the recognition that accompanies a peer-reviewed publication, benefits OECD by organizing peer review of AOPs deposited in the AOP-Wiki, and benefits the journals by promoting submission of high impact review-type articles to the journal. Results of this partnership are expected to stimulate and support the development of more high quality AOPs that EPA’s program offices and regions can apply in regulatory decision-making based on NAMs.
Description:
In 2012, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) launched the Adverse Outcome Pathway (AOP) Development Programme. The objective of this programme is to support and promote the development of AOPs by providing guidance and coaching for AOP developers, an OECD recognized technical review and endorsement process, and publication of AOPs in a dedicated OECD publication Series. Ultimately, the aim is to increase confidence in the quality and scientific credibility of AOPs that is required for the use of AOPs by regulators and risk assessors. The AOP Development Programme has grown significantly over the past decade. One of the challenges associated with that success is an increasing pressure on resources for managing and coordinating the rigorous scientific review process. At the same time, professional recognition for the significant scholarly investment required for formal AOP development and subsequent technical review has often been viewed as insufficient to warrant the effort of proceeding through technical review and endorsement, particularly for academics whose productivity is typically measured via publications in peer-reviewed journals. To mitigate these challenges, an initiative was taken to develop a strategy for cooperation between the OECD and scientific journals. In this model, journal organized scientific review of AOPs documented in the AOP-Wiki, accompanied by a narrative “AOP Report” journal article, can substitute for the OECD scientific review as long as reviews are conducted in a manner consistent with the principles outlined in the OECD guidance on the scientific review of AOPs. Amongst others, this implies an open review process in which the identity and comments of the reviewers are made publicly available. Upon acceptance, such AOPs can immediately be considered for OECD endorsement. Overall, this novel AOP publication strategy provides AOP authors with the career recognition associated with a peer-reviewed publication while supporting the OECD by engaging the journals’ editorial infrastructure to manage the scientific reviews. Two journals, Environmental Toxicology & Chemistry and Environmental and Molecular Mutagenesis, are currently pioneering this approach with the first AOP Reports being published in 2021. This AOP publication model is open and available to the entire scientific community involved in AOP development. The contents of this abstract neither constitute nor necessarily reflect US EPA policy.
URLs/Downloads:
DOI: AOP Reports: A New Way of Publishing AOPs in Peer-Reviewed Scientific Journals
KNAPEN SETAC-NA-AOP-REPORTS.PDF (PDF, NA pp, 1645.959 KB, about PDF)