ngeo-workflow

Nature Geoscience Workflow (ngeo-workflow)

Overview

This is the router. It does not do any one stage's work; it tells you which ngeo- skill to use at your current stage* and in what order.

Default assumption: unless the user says otherwise, the target is Nature Geoscience — a Nature Portfolio flagship that publishes Earth-system advances of broad, cross-disciplinary interest across the solid Earth, atmosphere, oceans, cryosphere, climate, and planetary science. The winning manuscript is not the most thorough regional case study; it is the one whose quantitative result changes how the wider Earth-science community understands a process. If the work is a solid but locally-scoped or specialist advance, its home is a community journal (JGR, GRL, Climate of the Past, EGU/AGU titles, or Nature Communications / Communications Earth & Environment), and ngeo-scope-fit will say so.

When to trigger

• User asks "what should I do next?" on an Earth-science manuscript
• User drops a draft and needs the current bottleneck diagnosed
• User is unsure whether the result is "Nature Geoscience-worthy" or belongs in a community journal
• The Article is over the 3,000-word limit and material must be re-partitioned into Methods / Supplementary
• User received a Nature Portfolio editor or referee decision and needs to switch into response mode

Routing table

Current symptom	Next skill
Unsure if the result is broad / important enough for Nat. Geosci.	ngeo-scope-fit
Result is real but the "why the whole field cares" is unclear	ngeo-results-framing
Methods sprawl into the main text; unsure what goes to online Methods	ngeo-methods
Figures too dense / lead figure does not show the Earth-system advance	ngeo-figures
Main text depends on Supplementary Information to be understood	ngeo-supplementary
Prose is wordy, jargon-heavy, or not accessible to non-specialists	ngeo-writing-style
Over the 3,000-word / display-item / reference limit	ngeo-length-management
Need a cover letter arguing broad interest to the diverse readership	ngeo-cover-letter
Ready to submit; need format / files / reporting-summary preflight	ngeo-submission
Choosing suggested/excluded referees; anticipating objections	ngeo-referee-strategy
Received referee reports or an editor decision; need to respond	ngeo-revision

Default order

1. ngeo-scope-fit — settle the broad-interest Earth-system gate first; redirect to a community journal if it fails
2. ngeo-results-framing — lock the single headline advance and its "Here we show" statement
3. ngeo-methods — build the online Methods section that grounds every quantitative claim in data or model diagnostics
4. ngeo-figures — design a lead figure that carries the Earth-system result and its uncertainty
5. ngeo-supplementary — partition extended data, model output, and derivations to SI; keep the main text self-contained
6. ngeo-writing-style — Nature house style, "accessible to non-specialists," calibrated claims
7. ngeo-length-management — fit the 3,000-word Article budget and 4–6 display-item ceiling (do this AFTER content is stable)
8. ngeo-cover-letter — argue broad interest to the in-house editor who triages before review
9. ngeo-submission — final preflight (Editorial Manager files, reporting summary, data/code availability)
10. ngeo-referee-strategy — suggested / excluded referees; pre-empt likely objections
11. ngeo-revision — after the referee reports arrive

ngeo-writing-style and ngeo-length-management are late polish stages. Do not trim to 3,000 words before the headline advance, Methods, and figures are stable, or you will cut the wrong material.

Decision heuristics

• "Reviewer 2 will say 'this is a regional study, why not JGR?'" → ngeo-scope-fit
• "I can state my measurement but not what it changes about the Earth system" → ngeo-results-framing
• "My Methods are three pages of instrument and model detail" → ngeo-methods
• "My lead figure is a six-panel map grid with a 12-line caption" → ngeo-figures
• "You can't read the main text without the Supplementary" → ngeo-supplementary
• "I'm 800 words over and have seven figures" → ngeo-length-management
• "The editor needs to see why this is cross-disciplinary" → ngeo-cover-letter
• "Submitting tonight; is the Reporting Summary done?" → ngeo-submission
• "Who should I suggest as a referee?" → ngeo-referee-strategy
• "Three referee reports just landed" → ngeo-revision

Manuscript status board

Readiness is a two-column question: is the content settled, and does it fit the Nature Article container? Fill this board before invoking ngeo-submission; any cell still marked OPEN routes you back to the named skill.

NATURE GEOSCIENCE STATUS BOARD             verdict   owner skill
=========================================  ========  =====================
GATE  broad Earth-system interest +        OPEN      ngeo-scope-fit
      quantitative advance (fails →
      retarget community journal)
CLAIM one headline advance, framed as      OPEN      ngeo-results-framing
      "Here we show ..." for the field
METH  online Methods grounds every claim   OPEN      ngeo-methods
      in data / model diagnostics + error
FIG   lead figure = the advance + its      OPEN      ngeo-figures
      uncertainty, map/section legible
SI    main text self-contained; SI holds   OPEN      ngeo-supplementary
      extended data / model output only
STYLE accessible to non-specialists,       OPEN      ngeo-writing-style
      claims calibrated to evidence
FIT   inside 3,000 words + 4-6 display      OPEN      ngeo-length-management
      items + ~50 refs
CASE  cover letter argues broad interest   OPEN      ngeo-cover-letter
DATA  data + code availability + Reporting  OPEN      ngeo-submission
      Summary complete
REFS  suggested / excluded referees named  OPEN      ngeo-referee-strategy
-----------------------------------------  --------  ---------------------
all rows CLOSED → ngeo-submission preflight → submit on Editorial Manager
referee reports arrive → ngeo-revision

Differences vs. community Earth-science journals

Nature Geoscience and community titles (JGR, GRL, Climate Dynamics, Communications Earth & Environment) share peer-review rigor but differ on the gate:

• Nature Geoscience: a broad, cross-disciplinary Earth-system advance, editor-triaged for general interest before review. A rigorous but regionally-scoped or incremental result is declined without review on interest grounds.
• Community journals: thorough, specialist-appropriate, archival; regional and incremental advances are welcome and length is generous.

If ngeo-scope-fit returns a "specialist / regional" verdict, retarget rather than fighting the broad-interest bar.

Anti-patterns

• Do not skip ngeo-scope-fit — Nature editors desk-reject the majority of submissions before review on interest grounds; a wrong-venue manuscript wastes a cycle
• Do not run ngeo-length-management before content is stable — you will cut load-bearing evidence or uncertainty
• Do not let the Supplementary Information become a dump the main text silently depends on
• Do not treat data/code availability and the Reporting Summary as afterthoughts — they gate acceptance, not just submission

Durable norms only. Verify current word/display-item/reference limits, content types, formats, and policies on the official Nature Geoscience author pages (Checked: 2026-07-16).