Agent Skills
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nature-cell-biology
GitHub用于评估细胞生物学手稿是否符合Nature Cell Biology期刊要求，涵盖定位、选题范围、证据标准及拒稿风险，辅助作者进行投稿决策与内容重构。
Trigger Scenarios
作者指定该期刊为目标投稿源
在多个顶级细胞学期刊间选择目标
需评估机制研究的显著性与框架
需了解拒稿触发条件及转投建议
Install
npx skills add brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills --skill nature-cell-biology -g -y
SKILL.md
Frontmatter
{
"name": "nature-cell-biology",
"description": "Use when targeting Nature Cell Biology or deciding whether a cell-biology manuscript fits this venue. Encodes the journal's fit, framing, method-and-evidence bar, house style, official-submission re-check, and desk-reject heuristics."
}
Nature Cell Biology (nature-cell-biology)
Journal positioning
Nature Cell Biology is the Nature Portfolio's flagship cell-biology journal, publishing mechanistic studies that deliver conceptual advances in how cells are organized, how they communicate and signal, how they maintain or break homeostasis, and how cell-biological processes underlie physiology and disease. The journal has a distinctively cell-biological identity — cytoskeletal dynamics, organelle biology, membrane trafficking, cell polarity, cell death, cell cycle, and intercellular signaling — that distinguishes it from Nature Genetics (genetics-centered) and the Cell Press developmental journals. Papers are expected to reveal a general cell-biological principle, not merely characterize a phenotype in one cell type. The readership is cell biologists broadly and adjacent biological disciplines.
This skill is a fit / venue-selection / re-framing tool. It does not replace the journal's current official submission guidelines. Before submitting, re-check the live author instructions on the Nature Portfolio site or submission system.
When to trigger
- The author names Nature Cell Biology as the target venue.
- A cell-biology study is choosing between Nature Cell Biology, Developmental Cell, Molecular Cell, and the Journal of Cell Biology.
- A mechanistic study of a cell-biological process in a disease or developmental context needs to assess its significance level and framing for this venue.
- The author needs Nature Cell Biology's desk-reject triggers and credible re-routing options.
Scope & topic fit
- Cytoskeletal regulation and cell mechanics: actin, microtubule, and intermediate-filament dynamics; motor proteins; cell migration and mechanical force generation — mechanistically defined.
- Organelle biology and membrane trafficking: ER, Golgi, lysosome, mitochondria, peroxisome, and autophagy — biogenesis, dynamics, and inter-organellar communication at the molecular level.
- Cell signaling and receptor biology: how extracellular signals are sensed, transduced, and integrated at the cell-biological level — not merely a pathway description.
- Cell cycle, cell division, and genome stability: mitosis, cytokinesis, checkpoint mechanisms, DNA damage response — cell-biological mechanism.
- Cell death mechanisms: apoptosis, necroptosis, pyroptosis, ferroptosis — molecular mechanism and cell-biological execution.
- Intercellular communication: exosomes, tunneling nanotubes, cell-cell junctions, paracrine signaling — when the cell-biological mechanism of communication is the advance.
- Cell-biological basis of cancer, neurodegeneration, or metabolic disease — when the cell-biological process, not the disease phenotype, is the primary advance.
Method & evidence bar
- Conceptual advance at the cell-biological level is the central criterion: the paper should change how the field thinks about a cell-biological process.
- High-quality imaging is a hallmark of this venue: live-cell imaging, super-resolution, cryo-ET, or quantitative fluorescence microscopy expected for cell-biological claims; image data must be quantified.
- Genetic dissection: knockout/knockin, RNAi/CRISPR, dominant-negative constructs, rescue experiments — orthogonal validation of the key mechanistic claim.
- Biochemical validation: co-immunoprecipitation, proximity labeling, structural data, or reconstitution assays supporting the molecular mechanism.
- In vivo relevance: animal model or human cell validation supports but does not always gate acceptance; a compelling cell-biological principle in cultured cells can suffice if the mechanism is general.
- Nature reporting summary required; source data for all quantitative figures; code/analysis scripts deposited.
Structure & house style
- Nature Portfolio format: unstructured abstract; main text with Methods section; Extended Data figures for additional mechanistic validation and controls; Supplementary Information for large data.
- Nature reporting summary required; any animal or human-subjects work must include appropriate ethics documentation.
- Titles should state the cell-biological mechanism or principle; they should be accessible to cell biologists not specialized in the specific organelle or process.
- The introduction defines the cell-biological question and its significance for understanding cell function or disease — not a recitation of molecular players already known.
- Results should progress: observe the cell-biological phenomenon, identify the molecular components, dissect mechanism, establish generality or in vivo relevance.
- Imaging data must include quantification (track statistics, fluorescence intensity profiles, colocalization coefficients); representative images alone are insufficient.
Official-submission checklist
- Before giving submission-ready advice, read
../../resources/source-basis.mdand../../resources/official-source-map.md; start from the official source anchors for this journal family, then cite the current journal-specific page you checked. - Search "Nature Cell Biology author information" on the Nature Portfolio site and follow the current version.
- Re-check article types (Article vs. Brief Communication), length and figure limits, and Extended Data policy.
- Confirm Nature reporting summary requirements and any microscopy-specific reporting standards (e.g., image acquisition parameters, quantification methods).
- Re-check animal ethics, human-subjects, and biosafety documentation where applicable.
- Verify data/code/imaging data deposition requirements (EMDB for cryo-EM, image repositories as applicable).
- Re-check competing-interests, funding, author-contribution, and AI-use disclosure requirements.
- Confirm preprint policy and open-access/APC options.
- If the live official instructions conflict with this skill, the official instructions win.
Pre-submission self-check
- One sentence stating the cell-biological principle established and why it is general — not tied to only one cell type or context.
- The mechanistic claim is supported by at least two orthogonal approaches (imaging + biochemistry, or genetics + imaging).
- Quantitative image analysis (not just representative panels) supports all major imaging-based claims.
- In vivo relevance or cross-cell-type generality is established or the argument for generality is explicit.
- Nature reporting summary, Extended Data, and data/code deposition are prepared.
- The framing positions the advance against the current cell-biological understanding, not against disease incidence.
Common desk-reject triggers
- A mechanistic study in which the cell biology is the context but the real advance is molecular (better for
molecular-cell) or developmental (better fordevelopmental-cell). - Purely phenotypic study: a protein is required for a cell-biological process, but the mechanism by which it acts is not addressed.
- Imaging paper with no quantification and no mechanistic follow-through; beautiful microscopy alone does not constitute a conceptual advance.
- Cell-biological study confined to one highly specialized cell type or organism with no argument for the generality of the mechanism.
- A disease or cancer study where the cell-biological mechanism is supporting context, not the primary advance — better suited to
cancer-cell,developmental-cell, ornature-genetics.
Re-routing decision
- Equal depth but mechanism is molecular/structural rather than cell-biological →
molecular-cell(ACS; molecular-to-structural level) ornature-structural-and-molecular-biology. - Strong cell biology in a developmental context →
developmental-cell(Cell Press; developmental biology breadth). - Genetics or gene-regulation advance using cell-biology tools →
nature-geneticsormolecular-cell. - Excellent cell-biology below Nature Cell Biology significance →
elife, Journal of Cell Biology, orcurrent-biology(current-biologyfor particularly novel or cross-disciplinary cell biology).
Output format
[Fit] High / Medium / Low (one-line reason)
[Target] Nature Cell Biology
[Topic tags] <2–3 closest topics>
[Method/evidence] <does the cell-biological mechanism + imaging rigor + generality clear the bar?>
[Top risk] <the single most likely reason for rejection>
[Official items to re-check] <article type / Extended Data / reporting summary / imaging quantification / data-code deposition>
[Re-route suggestion] <if not a fit, a better-matched venue>
Version History
- 1839142 Current 2026-07-05 13:02
