The evolving role of preprints in the dissemination of COVID-19 research and their impact on the science communication landscape

Abstract

The world continues to face a life-threatening viral pandemic. The virus underlying the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19), Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), has caused over 98 million confirmed cases and 2.2 million deaths since January 2020. Although the most recent respiratory viral pandemic swept the globe only a decade ago, the way science operates and responds to current events has experienced a cultural shift in the interim. The scientific community has responded rapidly to the COVID-19 pandemic, releasing over 125,000 COVID-19–related scientific articles within 10 months of the first confirmed case, of which more than 30,000 were hosted by preprint servers. We focused our analysis on bioRxiv and medRxiv, 2 growing preprint servers for biomedical research, investigating the attributes of COVID-19 preprints, their access and usage rates, as well as characteristics of their propagation on online platforms. Our data provide evidence for increased scientific and public engagement with preprints related to COVID-19 (COVID-19 preprints are accessed more, cited more, and shared more on various online platforms than non-COVID-19 preprints), as well as changes in the use of preprints by journalists and policymakers. We also find evidence for changes in preprinting and publishing behaviour: COVID-19 preprints are shorter and reviewed faster. Our results highlight the unprecedented role of preprints and preprint servers in the dissemination of COVID-19 science and the impact of the pandemic on the scientific communication landscape.

Open science saves lives: lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic

“…3, arXiv preprints related to COVID-19 (n = 1, 462) were shared more often than preprints on other topics (n = 80, 786) submitted during the same period. A similar pattern has also been reported by Fraser et al [101]. The difference was more pronounced for mentions in the news: whereas 1,066 (1.3%) of non-COVID-19 preprints were mentioned in the news, 156 (10.7%) of COVID-19 preprints were.…”

“…These findings highlight the increasing trend in preprint sharing during the pandemic, raising concerns about the spread of potentially misleading and unverified data. However, Fraser et al [101] found that COVID-19 preprints were more commented (on preprint platforms) than non COVID-19 preprints. While this suggests a higher scrutiny for COVID-19 papers, it also illustrate how preprints may encourage scientific debate.…”

A bibliometric analysis of COVID-19 research in Africa

“…This is unsurprising as preprint articles represent a significant proportion of COVID-19 literature. 25 However, for articles that were peer reviewed and published in journals, we found that three African journals featured in the top 15 journals publishing COVID-19 articles in Africa: Pan African Medical Journal , South African Medical Journal and African Journal of Primary Health Care & Family Medicine . This is promising as availability of local journals where African researchers can publish their work can increase publication output.…”

Safe and effective two-in-one replicon-and-VLP minispike vaccine for COVID-19: Protection of mice after a single immunization

“…In contrast, the overwhelming amount of RBD-binding antibodies exhibits neutralizing activity [22,[32][33][34][35]. Of note, non-neutralizing antibody epitopes of SARS-CoV-1 and SARS--CoV-2 S proteins were found to enhance virus infection in vitro [36,37] and it was suggested that anti-S IgG from severely ill COVID-19 patients may promote hyper-inflammatory responses [38]. Focusing on the RBD immunogen in order to elicit potent neutralizing antibodies and to avoid unnecessary or potentially harmful non-neutralizing S antibodies is therefore advisable.…”

“…As residual pathogenicity of recombinant full length VSV is largely attributed to the glycoprotein G [45], one strategy to attenuate VSV vaccines is the replacement of the G gene by those of heterologous envelope proteins, as exemplified in the recently approved Ebola vaccine VSV-Zebov (Ervebo) [46]. Not surprisingly, G-deficient VSV expressing fully functional SARS-CoV-2 S proteins have rapidly been prepared and proposed as COVID-19 vaccine candidates [47][48][49][50][51]. Importantly, and in contrast to SARS-CoV-1, the authentic SARS-CoV-2 spike protein can readily mediate spread and amplification of S surrogate VSVs in cell culture, organoids, and animals [43,44,52].…”