PLOS-UNC Water and Health 2024 Special Collection partnership

We are pleased to announce that PLOS and The Water Institute at UNC are again partnering to publish a special collection of articles in PLOS Water and PLOS Sustainability and Transformation from the 2024 UNC Water and Health Conference taking place October 14 – 18. The collection will feature papers from the research presented at the conference, across the breadth of WaSH research, to highlight challenges, share insights, and develop solutions for a more water-secure world.

If you are a verbal or poster presenter or have research related to a side event, we invite you to submit your research article to this special issue!

We are excited to announce several new features for this year’s special issue, edited by Jenna Davis (Stanford University), Ryan Cronk and Kaida Lang (UNC Water institute).

We welcome additional, thematically relevant research submissions.

This year’s Water and Health Conference received a record-breaking number of abstracts (nearly 700) for only 100 verbal presentations and 100 poster presentation slots. We want to recognize the high-quality science produced in the WaSH sector by inviting you to submit your research to the special collection, even if you are not presenting at this year’s conference. If your work fits thematically within the scope of the conference and the journal scope (see the “Journal information & scope” section below to assess fit), you are welcome to submit to the collection!

New article format: Essays

Essays are opinionated articles on a topic of interest to scientists and a broader audience, including the public. Unlike traditional review articles, which include a comprehensive account of a field, Essays take an imaginative approach to a provocative question with an engaging but rigorous investigation of the problem. Note: Before submitting to the journal, you must submit an Essay proposal to the special collection organizers. For more information on Essays, find out more here.

Opinion articles for the conference’s special collection will only be accepted by invitation. For more information, please visit here.

Why publish in the special collection?

There are many benefits of publishing as part of the collection! There will be special announcements of new publications sent in Water and Health Conference newsletters (which reach thousands of people), and the special collection will be highlighted at the 2025 conference. Published authors can publish a “Behind the Paper” interview-style feature on the PLOS Latitude Blog. There are APC waivers for LMIC authors (see “Publication fees” section below). Articles published in the collection will be available to all as soon as they pass peer review (i.e., they will not be held in embargo until the special collection is complete). Published contributions will be collated on a special webpage in the PLOS family of journals.

About PLOS Water:

PLOS Water focuses on research relevant to the study of water for people and planet. Our broad scope connects researchers across the hydrology, water resources, and water, sanitation and hygiene communities, amplifying a diverse set of voices to influence the global discourse around fresh water. We are committed to Open Science principles that allow all researchers who play a role in this global issue to freely share their research to inform positive, evidence-based action and address some of the most pressing water issues our planet faces. The journal is indexed in several major databases, including Scopus.

About PLOS S&T:

PLOS Sustainability and Transformation is a multidisciplinary Open Access journal publishing leading, original research that drives critical progress toward a more sustainable future. Our journal unites a diverse community of research and policy experts across natural and social sciences, technology and economics. We are especially interested in fields including agronomy, forestry, food and nutrition, terrestrial and marine ecology or ecosystems, microbiology, bio-based industries, circular bioeconomy, renewable energy, sustainable response to climate change, social sciences, and economics. We work alongside researchers to make their impactful work openly available to all people who depend on it and to empower them to take critical action in the face of global sustainability challenges.

About the UNC Water and Health Conference:

The annual UNC Water and Health Conference reflects the Water Institute’s commitment to improving public health by achieving universal access to safe drinking water, sanitation, and hygiene (WaSH) services that are safe, affordable, and sustainable. The conference provides a curated space where policymakers, practitioners, and researchers can gather to review the evidence, interrogate the science, and improve old and develop new approaches to expanding WaSH access and services.

How to Submit: 

Follow the journals’ general submission guidelines (PLOS Sustainability and Transformation / PLOS Water). To submit your research article to the collection please see the step-by-step guides for the respective journals (PLOS Sustainability and Transformation / PLOS Water) Please quote “UNC Water & Health 2024” in the Collections field when submitting your manuscript and mention the collection in your cover letter. Please submit your article before the 31^st March 2025.

For proposals to submit Essays, Opinion, or Narrative Review articles and more general questions on the Collection, please contact Ryan Cronk (rcronk@live.unc.edu).

For any other questions, we encourage you to get in touch with the editorial lead for the journal (PLOS S&T: Hannah Harwood – hharwood@plos.org; PLOS Water: Gui Wright – gwright@plos.org)

Publication Fees:

PLOS employs several business models to support equitable Open Access. All PLOS journals provide APC-alternative models for institutions to support their authors’ Open Access publication goals.

Publication in both PLOS Water and PLOS S&T is free for authors whose research is funded primarily by an institution in a Research4Life country (Group A or B).

PLOS Community Action Publishing (available for PLOS S&T) and PLOS Global Equity (available for PLOS Water) are both institutional partnership programs that allow affiliated authors to publish without cost in the respective journal. A list of institutional partners for both participating journals can be found here. Current fees for authors not covered under the above programs are available here. Authors unable to pay part or all of these fees and who can demonstrate financial need can apply to the PLOS Publication Fee Assistance (PFA) program at submission of their manuscript (see our FAQs for more details).