# Geomorphica: The most accessible journal for the geomorphology community

Alice Lefebvre, Rachel Bosch, Katy Burrows, Matthieu Giaime, Guillaume Goodwin, Larry Syu-Heng Lai, Melanie Stammler, Roberto Fernández

<figure><img src="image_1.png" /></figure>

## To cite this version:

Alice Lefebvre, Rachel Bosch, Katy Burrows, Matthieu Giaime, Guillaume Goodwin, et al., Geomorphica: The most accessible journal for the geomorphology community. Geomorphica, 2025, 1 (1), pp.54. 10.59236/geomorphica.v1i1.54. hal-05043226

HAL Id: hal-05043226

https://hal.science/hal-05043226v1

Submitted on 23 Apr 2025

HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access archive for the deposit and dissemination of scientific research documents, whether they are published or not. The documents may come from teaching and research institutions in France or abroad, or from public or private research centers.

L'archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, émanant des établissements d'enseignement et de recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires publics ou privés.

<figure><img src="image_2.png" /></figure>

Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
<figure><img src="image_3.png" /></figure>

# Geomorphica: The most accessible journal for the geomorphology community

Alice Lefebvre * ID¹, Rachel Bosch ID², Katy Burrows ID³, Matthieu Giaime ID⁴, Guillaume Goodwin ID⁵,
Larry Syu-Heng Lai ID⁶, Melanie Stammler ID⁷, Roberto Fernández ID⁸

¹MARUM, University of Bremen, Bremen, Germany, ²AECOM, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA, ³University of Milano-Bicocca, Milan, Italy, ⁴ASM UMR5140, Université de Montpellier Paul-Valéry, CNRS, MCC, Montpellier, France, ⁵FISH-PASS, Laillé, France, ⁶Bureau of Economic Geology, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas, USA, ⁷Department of Geography, University of Bonn, Bonn, Germany, ⁸Penn State University, University Park, PA, USA

**Author contributions:** Conceptualization: A. Lefebvre, R. Bosch, M. Giaime, G. Goodwin, L. S.-H. Lai, M. Stammler, R. Fernández. Initial writing: A. Lefebvre, R. Fernández. Figure drafting: A. Lefebvre, K. Burrows, M. Stammler, R. Fernández, L. S.-H. Lai. Review & editing: A. Lefebvre, R. Bosch, K. Burrows, M. Giaime, G. Goodwin, L. S.-H. Lai, M. Stammler, R. Fernández.

**Abstract** Geomorphica is a peer-reviewed diamond open access journal for the geosciences, which allows for free access and publication without any subscription fees or article processing charges, thereby enhancing inclusivity and removing obstacles in scientific communication. Geomorphica is both community-led and community-driven, dedicated to sharing new insights, data and promoting advancements in the field of geomorphology. It is hosted by Penn State University Libraries and receives support from the International Association of Geomorphologists. In the last two years, a team of over 30 volunteers has contributed to various aspects of journal development and management, including administration, editing, reviewing, typesetting, and visual branding.

Since its launch in June 2023, Geomorphica invites manuscript submissions on topics related to landscapes and landforms, near-surface processes of Earth and other planets, as well as the mechanisms, dynamics, and timescales associated with these processes. We encourage experts in these fields to join our reviewer database or reach out to the journal if they wish to volunteer. To mitigate bias, we have implemented a triple-anonymous review process, ensuring that authors, reviewers, and the associate editor making recommendations remain unknown to one another. The reports from reviewers and the responses from authors are made publicly accessible alongside the published articles, with reviewers having the option to maintain their anonymity. We invite feedback from the wider community to enhance Geomorphica continually and look forward to collaborative engagement with this initiative.

† *Non-english abstract available: Chinese, French, German, and Spanish abstracts are published online.*

Received:
March 03, 2025

Accepted:
April 04, 2025

Published:
April 22, 2025

Production Editor:
Ayobami Abegunrin

Editorial Advisees:
Maarten G. Kleinhans
Sara Benetti

*The work is licensed
under CC BY 4.0
International.*

# 1 Open access

## 1.1 Types of Open Access

Open access (OA) refers to a suite of publication models that allows readers to access the literature for free, without costs for the reader. It is opposed to traditional publishing models, also referred to as toll or subscription access, which require readers (or libraries/institutions) to pay for access to the publications. The most common OA approaches include green open access and gold open access (Guédon, 2004). Under the green OA model, articles are first published in a traditional subscription-based journal and can then be made open access by their authors, either as a postprint of the manuscript before formatting by the publisher, or as the published manuscript following an embargo period. In this model, the publisher generally has the rights of the published manuscript, and the manuscript has to be deposited by the authors in a publicly accessible repository, which requires extra work for the authors. Green open access versions are often harder to find, since they are not hosted by the publisher, they may be less accessible than the non-open access version when the manuscript is published before typesetting to publishing standards, or they will be accessible with a delay of often several years following the embargo period.

In the gold OA model, publications are freely accessible as soon as they are published and the authors generally retain the rights to their work. However, authors must pay article processing charges (APC) that may exceed $10,000 USD for their manuscript to be published. Gold open access may happen in fully open access journals, where only OA manuscripts are published, or in hybrid journals, who offer the choice to the authors to publish with the traditional toll access model, or as open access if the authors pay additional fees. Studies have shown that publishers make a significant profit thanks to APCs (Butler et al., 2023). Funding agencies in many countries are moving towards making open access a re-

<footnote>*Corresponding author: alefebvre@marum.de</footnote>
quirement for publicly funded research (Brainard and Kaiser, 2022, European Commission) and are providing options for institution-paid gold open access (e.g., DEAL in Germany) and open access publishing venues (e.g., Open Research Europe). However, many universities, research institutes, and other scientific agencies do not offer funding for authors to be able to publish gold OA. As a result, article processing charges are a barrier for many colleagues throughout the world who do not have dedicated funding for publishing gold open access. There is also, in some cases, a mistrust of gold OA as it is sometimes believed that authors simply pay to have their research published with poor or no peer-review, which is the case with so-called predatory publishers (Beall, 2012). Diamond open access refers to academic texts published with no fees to either reader or author. The key aspects of diamond open access scientific publishing are:

* Publication is free for the authors - no article processing charges.

* Access is free for readers - no individual or library/institutional subscriptions needed.

* Submissions are peer-reviewed - just like in the traditional toll access publishing landscape.

* Authors retain copyright over their work - through Creative Commons licensing.

Diamond OA journals are generally community-led and community-driven initiatives that rely on a diverse group of volunteers to handle each stage of the publication process and remove the need for a commercial publisher. It should be said that most scientists are already involved (most times without financial retribution) in the different publication stages of any kind of publishing as authors, reviewers, or editors and the only stages in which a publisher is typically involved include initial submission checks, copy-editing and typesetting after a manuscript is accepted for publication, dissemination and archiving. Under the diamond open access model, volunteers from within the community handle these stages, avoiding outsourcing costs and contributing to the overall quality of the process due to their familiarity with the topics.

Because literature published in open access journals can be read by everyone, publishing open access widens the use of research and increases the diversity of the communities that benefit from the research compared to publishing in toll access journals (Huang et al., 2024). It can also be argued that making research outputs available to everyone, irrespective of employment type, affiliation and whether they have the economical means to access the literature, is the moral way to publish. The diamond open access model allows to have peer-reviewed manuscripts published without costs for readers or authors, with articles available without restriction directly after publication in a professional formatting on the journal website, and which can be disseminated freely by the authors who retain the rights to their work.

## 1.2 Diamond Open Access in the Geosciences

Since 2017, new community-driven diamond open access journals in the geosciences were created and have inspired the conception of Geomorphica: Volcanica (Farquharson and Wadsworth, 2018), Seismica (Rowe et al., 2022), Tektonika (Fernández-Blanco et al., 2023) and Sedimentologika (Thomas et al., 2023). New community-driven Diamond OA journals in the Geosciences are still being created with Advances in Geochemistry and Cosmochemistry launching in January 2025, and Geodynamica (Maffei et al., 2024) planned to open for submission soon. Colleagues representing all of these journals share a virtual space called the Guild of Diamonds where we help each other through the different stages of the journals. Therefore, the open access model is not only embraced within each journal but also across journals through sharing of our experiences (e.g. from idea to launching and day-to-day operations) and resources (e.g. templates and code for the reviewer database) and networking, for example during conferences. The Guild of Diamonds fosters communication and support between our journals and is always open to share its knowledge with anyone interested.

When Volcanica launched in 2018, they listed and described the only essential costs of running a journal (Farquharson and Wadsworth, 2018). These include web hosting and archiving (approximately $125 USD per year at the time), subscription to a Digital Object Identifier (DOI) registration agency ($275 USD at the time), and subscription to an online archiving service ($232 USD at the time). The total required to run a community-led journal with volunteers contributing to all stages of the publication process and relying on an open source and free software for the management of peer-reviewed academic journals such as the Open Journal System (OJS), was less than $650 USD per year. Partnering with a host institution who can handle tasks such as web hosting and archiving, and DOI registration agency, can reduce these costs to $0 USD for the journal itself.

Diamond open access journals are run by volunteers who, without any payment for their time, handle the work that publishers usually provide for a fee, for example formal checks of the manuscript, typesetting and copy editing. This time-intensive workload is minimized for diamond open access journals by making use of shared templates and an efficient workflow, adapted to the different journals. Furthermore, diamond OA journals generally have agreements with various institutions in order to reduce their operation costs. For example, Volcanica works with Presses Universitaires de Strasbourg, Seismica with McGill Libraries, Tektonika with the University of Aberdeen, and Sedimentologika with the Université de Genève. Different journals have different approaches to secure some funding to pay for conference abstract fees for editorial board members to promote the journal and update the community at selected meetings, or to pay for specific web domains. These expenses are typically small in the context of the traditional publishing landscape.
<figure><img src="image_4.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 1** The timeline for Geomorphica's history.</figcaption></figure>

# 2 Geomorphica

## 2.1 Short History of the Journal

The conversations that made Geomorphica a reality sартed on social media (Fig. 1). In December 2020, Tektonika announced on X (formerly known as Twitter) that they were following the steps of Volcanica and Seismica and launching a diamond open access journal in the field of tectonics (https://x.com/WeAreTektonika/status/1338597268048519169). Dr. Evan Goldstein made a commentary post saying "*Really inspiring efforts ... I would be excited to see a similar geomorphology initiative.*" (https://x.com/ebgoldstein/status/1338856837978882049). This post led to a community poll on X about who would be interested in a diamond open access (free to publish, free to access, free to read) journal in geomorphology with 180 votes, where 62% of the participants answered positively and only 7% answered negatively (https://x.com/IceMeanders/status/1338863767338196993). Given the potential interest expressed by respondents, a short video was prepared for the Gilbert Club meeting that occurred in March 2021 and a survey was launched. During the coming weeks, more support was garnered and the idea of creating a diamond open access journal in geomorphology moved from informal conversations to preliminary planning stages. A core team formed and began to move things forward.

During 2022, the team continued to engage via social media to promote the initiative and recruit more volunteers in order to form different commissions in charge of creating the journal. A journal name survey and a logo competition were launched, and our name and logo were chosen thanks to the vote of several hundred participants. Discussion started with the International Association of Geomorphologists (IAG) about a funding agreement and with Penn State University Libraries about a hosting agreement. Once the agreements were signed, the website (https://journals.psu.edu/geomorphica) and the reviewer database (https://geomorphicaadmin.pythonanywhere.com/) were created. In June 2023, the journal opened for submission. The first manuscript was published in May 2024, and as of April 2025, we have handled 26 manuscripts, with 10 accepted

for publication, 12 in revision or under review, and 4 rejected.

## 2.2 Scope of Geomorphica

Geomorphica invites contributions that examine a wide range of geomorphological phenomena across diverse environments and climate zones. The journal encourages studies on morphodynamics, bio-geomorphology, and landscape evolution in contexts ranging from marine and coastal systems to aeolian, fluvial, hillslope, and mountainous terrains, encompassing temperate, glacial, arid, semi-arid, and tropical regions. We prioritize research that examines surface process dynamics, including erosion, sedimentation, karst development, tectonic activity, climate change, seismic and volcanic processes, wildfire impacts, weathering, soil formation, biological influences, and critical zone interactions. Contributions may address geomorphic phenomena across a wide range of spatial and temporal scales — from the behavior of individual particles to global morphology, and from microseconds to billions of years. Research exploring planetary morphology, with comparative studies of rocky and icy bodies in the solar system and their Earth analogs, is also welcome. Geomorphica places a strong emphasis on advanced methodologies, such as remote sensing, numerical modeling, laboratory experiments, and innovative techniques in mapping, dating, and theoretical analysis. Additionally, submissions that investigate the influence of human activities on landscapes, including hazard management, flood defenses, ecosystem restoration, water and sediment regulation, socio-morphological interactions, and geoheritage preservation are encouraged, especially those incorporating local, traditional and indigenous knowledge.

## 2.3 Publication Types

Geomorphica accepts a diverse range of manuscript types. Original research articles include advances in scientific knowledge or understanding. Synthesis articles integrate more than two earlier datasets or experiments to uncover new scientific insights, moving beyond straightforward extensions of previous studies by
<figure><img src="image_5.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 2** Geomorphica, a diamond open access journal, removing barriers in the publishing landscape.</figcaption></figure>

combining multiple field datasets, models, or experi-
mental approaches. Case studies and applied research
articles showcase innovative applications or adapta-
tions of existing knowledge to address specific geomor-
phological issues; while grounded in rigorous data and
analysis, these articles also encourage authors to high-
light broader implications that transcend localized find-
ings. The journal invites review articles that explore
scientific ideas, contentious topics, or novel concepts,
alongside opinion pieces and comments that provide
concise critiques of original research papers and ad-
dress specific points of discussion. Finally, short com-
munications articles cover topics of wide interest to the
geomorphological community, such as novel methods
(e.g., machine learning), deployment of instruments
producing innovative or extensive datasets, geomor-
phological maps with relevance beyond their imme-
diate areas, community science initiatives, indigenous
knowledge linked to geomorphological research, and
negative, inconclusive, or failed results that hold signif-
icance for advancing the field.

2.4 Our values

Geomorphica, like other diamond open access jour-
nals, is a completely accessible journal that removes
barriers to publish peer-reviewed scientific knowledge
and contributes to an equitable publishing landscape,
for all (Fig. 2). The team behind Geomorphica is ac-
tively and intentionally working to promote equity, di-
versity, and inclusion (EDI) in authoring, reviewing,
and editing (Table 1). We strive to publish research

from colleagues representing different types of institu-
tions such as academia, industry, government, and non-
governmental organisations throughout the world, en-
abling the creation of a publishing landscape where
access to knowledge and its dissemination have no
barriers and all those sectors can be interconnected
(Fig. 3). All researchers committed to advancing our un-
derstanding of terrestrial and planetary geomorphology
are welcome to read, review, and publish with us.

<figure><img src="image_6.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 3** Geomorphica links industry, academia, government, and NGOs in a barrier-free publishing landscape.</figcaption></figure>
<table><caption>**Table 1** Our values and commitments.</caption><thead><tr><td>Equity</td><td>Diversity</td><td>Inclusion</td></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>We are committed to removing unfair/uneven barriers to journal resources and publication opportunities, thus better enabling members from all communities across the world to share their work and advance scientific knowledge.</td><td>We respect and value the unique backgrounds, languages, cultures, experiences, and perspectives that everyone brings, and seek to foster a diverse community of authors, reviewers, editors, and readers.</td><td>We will proactively watch for and mitigate biases and stereotypes within team interactions and through all stages of publication to ensure that all authors, reviewers, and team members feel empowered to share their thoughts and constructively improve our work. More broadly, we seek to exemplify a culture of respect, compassion, and understanding in scientific reviewing and publishing.</td></tr></tbody></table>

## 2.5 Review Process: anonymous and transparent

In line with its values, Geomorphica promotes a fair, transparent, and anonymized evaluation process for submitted manuscripts. In order to reduce bias, an innovative triple-anonymous review process was developed, where the authors, reviewers, and the associate editor making the recommendation do not know the identities of each other.

Each submission to our journal is first handled by a managing editor who makes sure it has the right format, includes all required elements and that the main manuscript is anonymous (Fig. 4). After the initial quality check, two associate editors (AEs) are invited by the editor-in-chief (EiC) to handle the submission. The first associate editor (AE1) decides if the paper should go out for review based on scope and quality considerations, handles the review invitations and the communications with the reviewers and authors. After making sure that the reviews are anonymous and respectful, AE1 transfers the manuscript and reviews to a second associate editor (AE2) who assesses the manuscript anonymously based on their own assessment of the manuscript and the reviewers' comments. AE2s are assigned to a manuscript as an anonymous reviewer and therefore have no access within our system to the identities of the authors and the reviewers. Once AE2 has provided their assessment, AE1 records the recommendation on the review system to allow the editor-in-chief to make the final decision. All associate editors in our team may act as either AE1 or AE2 on any submission based on their expertise and availability.

Once the manuscript is published, the authors and editor names become public. The reviews and rebuttal letters are published alongside the manuscript for full transparency of the review process. Reviewers have the option to remain anonymous or to include their names on the published paper.

## 2.6 Our Team

Our team consists of over 30 volunteers, who are working in different teams (Fig. 5). The manuscript management team includes managing and production editors. They oversee the responsibilities typically managed by the publisher, especially the formal check of manuscripts and their typesetting into a published format once they have been accepted. The associate editors and editor-in-chief are responsible for the peer-review process. The communications team promotes

the journal and its values at conferences and on social media, and advertises new publications. The ethics team deals with all the legal and ethics aspects. The tech team oversees all technical aspects, including the website and the reviewer database. The EDI team oversees all aspects of the journal to continuously identify ways to increase representation and guarantee that our values (Table 1) are at the core of each aspect of our day-to-day activities. Mentors, who are senior scientists in geomorphology with extensive experience in the publishing world, provide precious advice when necessary. Regular exchange between the teams is maintained during the steering committee meetings and very regular contact.

We continuously monitor our team's diversity characteristics by voluntary survey (i.e. people self-identify). During our latest survey (January 2025), we observe an under-representation of Africa, Asia and Oceania in terms of geographical diversity (Fig. 6). We have not yet achieved gender parity, but our gender distribution represents roughly the binary gender distribution reported in the geosciences (ca. 30% women, 70% men). An important part of our team are early career researchers.

Since we started working on developing Geomorphica, some volunteers had to step down on their role or leave the team, especially for those who went to work outside of academia and could not have dedicated time for the journal activities during their working time. We have also been recruiting new volunteers, specifically targeting those geographic areas which are underrepresented in our current team, for example by sending calls for volunteering especially in those regions. We are currently specifically looking forward to welcoming new volunteers in the tech team. Further, we encourage all interested future volunteers that see their demographics to be under-represented in Figure 6 to get in touch with us for a potential role at Geomorphica.

## 2.7 Support

Geomorphica is hosted by Penn State University Libraries, who provide and maintain our Open Journal Systems (OJS) platform, registered our ISSN (International Standard Serial Number), maintain DOI (Digital Object Identifier) for journal articles, support website and journal content accessibility, and make sure our published manuscripts are appropriately preserved and indexed in Google Scholar and similar services. They have been an immense help, consistently available to answer our questions and examine any concerns we have, such as improving our
<figure><img src="image_7.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 4** Geomorphica's triple-anonymous review process. AE are associate editors and EiC is the Editor-in-Chief.</figcaption></figure>

accessibility efforts. Geomorphica also has a 3-year (2023-2025) Memorandum of Understanding with the International Association of Geomorphologists (IAG) (https://www geomorph org/iag-memorandum-of-understanding-with-geomorphica-2023-2025/), which we look forward to renewing and maintaining over the coming years. The cooperation with IAG during the term 2023 - 2025 included a financial support of up to 700€ per year as well as the use of IAG network of contacts throughout the world to help Geomorphica reach historically under-represented communities in the field of geomorphology.

The partnership with Penn State University Libraries to handle the hosting of the journal has removed most costs associated with the journal, such as the DOI and online archiving service subscriptions. Our only costs are associated with our custom website domain, email address, some cloud storage for all the material required to run and advertise the journal, and abstract submission fees to conferences such as the European and American Geosciences Union General Assemblies. These costs are covered by the financial support of IAG.

To ensure that the journal's financial management is carried out legally, we have founded the non-profit organization association Geomorphica registered in France ("association loi de 1901").

## 3 Reflecting on the process so far and looking forward

As Geomorphica has started its journey to serve the global geomorphology community, we openly acknowledge the challenges inherent in operating as a fully volunteer-led and independent journal. As a newly established publication unaffiliated with traditional publishers, we had to build our foundation from the ground up. This process, while time-intensive, has been made possible by the invaluable support of all our volunteers and partners such as the Guild of Diamonds, Penn State University Libraries and the International Association of Geomorphologists. Securing long-term financial and operational sustainability is essential for a durable journal development.

We are committed to broadening outreach through-
<figure><img src="image_8.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 5** Geomorphica's team structure and active steering committee members as of April 2025.</figcaption></figure>

out the world and to foster global participation and inclusivity within the geomorphology community. This means that we are actively looking for volunteers from varied backgrounds, trying to balance career stage, gender and geographical diversities. However, there are indications that the women publishing in geomorphological journals are mainly employed in Europe and North America, and that the global South is mainly represented by men lead authors in publications (Wohl, 2023). As a result, being able to maintain a balance of the different types of diversity simultaneously is a challenge, which we will keep on addressing. An important step to help in diversifying our team is to provide specific support for each volunteers, for example from our mentor team and through peer collaboration.

The journal relies on volunteers for all stages of the publication process and we encourage all our team members to balance their journal duties with professional and personal commitments. Some of our volunteers work in highly specialized roles, such as production editors, which require technical expertise and significant time investment, often requiring them to spend many hours of their time serving the journal through formatting the versions of the manuscripts that are published. However, this role is often not as well recognised as other roles, such as associate editors. We are truly grateful for the work of everyone at Geomorphica and want the community to be aware of this fact. We are not outsourcing any aspect of our operations. It is all done by people who have chosen to serve the community with a role in Geomorphica. That's why maintaining a diverse, motivated volunteer team is absolutely essential for ensuring the journal's continued functionality and growth.

The innovative triple-anonymous peer-review system that we have developed requires implementing standardized practices that safeguard reviewer and author anonymity while enabling the open sharing of data and code. It also adds steps to the reviewing system, which takes time and a careful communication between all the editors. However, it is an important step to reduce biases, which we are committed to do. Our independence from large commercial publisher and our community-based structure allows us to integrate innovative ideas directly and rapidly into the journal framework. Core values such as inclusivity, accessibility, and community engagement are embedded in our operations. Initiatives like promoting community science projects and incorporating indigenous knowledge reinforce our commitment to reflecting the variety of geomorphological research and practice. We are actively seeking contributors from diverse demographics worldwide to increase the representation of nationalities within our team. Simultaneously, we are expanding our voluntary reviewer database to include a broader pool of peer reviewers, ensuring a wider range of perspectives from the global geomorphology community.

The journal development was a significant time investment for the members involved from the early stages. However, the work involved with setting up the journal, finding sponsors and the development of the different commissions was rapidly spread over the growing team of volunteers. The first manuscripts also required some time investment until all the different
<figure><img src="image_9.png" /><figcaption>c. Continent of Employment</figcaption></figure>

<figure><img src="image_10.png" /><figcaption>b. Gender</figcaption></figure>

<figure><img src="image_11.png" /><figcaption>d. Career Stage</figcaption></figure>

<figure><img src="image_12.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 6** Geomorphica's volunteers by (a) continent of origin, (b) gender, (c) continent of employment, and (d) career stage (self-identification of 33 volunteers in January 2025).</figcaption></figure>

people involved with a manuscript (a managing editor, two associate editors, a production editor, a proof reader, the communications team, and the editor-in-chief) got used to the workflow. Now that the journal has been open for submission for nearly two years and that all volunteers have been involved with several of the papers submitted so far, papers are usually handled rapidly and within a timeframe resembling other peer-reviewed journals. Through these efforts, Geomorphica strives to address current challenges and establish itself as a pioneering model for independent and accessible scientific publishing, dedicated to advancing the field of geomorphology at a global scale.

## Acknowledgements

We thank the whole team for all the collaborative work (past and present members in alphabetic order): Ayobami Abegunrin, Jigjidsurengiin Batbaatar (Bataa), Sara Benetti, Filippo Brandolini, Caio Breda, Driss Chahid, Shawn Chartrand, Jaclyn Cockburn, Sjoukje de Lange, Helen Dias, Serina Diniega, Olutoyin Fashae, Victoria Fernandez, Rocío Luz Fernández, Kausik Ghosh, Bastian Grimm, Justin T. Higa, Pilar Jeanneret, Maarten Kleinhans, Nate Klema, Lynsey MacLeary, Guido Stefano Mariani, Yakup Nayazi, Mihai Niculita, Michael Nones, Fabiano Pupim, Daniel Schillereff, Rodrigo L. Soteres, Anatolii Tsyplenkov, Xun

Yang, Andrea Zerboni.

We are extremely thankful to the PSU Libraries team, especially Ally Laird, Jules Luck and Corey Wetherington for their very practical support, and to the IAG, especially former President Mauro Soldati, for their continued support.

## Land Recognition

Geomorphica is hosted by Penn State University Libraries. The Penn State University campuses are located on the original homelands of the Erie, Haudenosaunee (Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga, Oneida, Mohawk, and Tuscarora), Lenape (Delaware Nation, Delaware Tribe, Stockbridge-Munsee), Shawnee (Absentee, Eastern, Oklahoma), Susquehannock, and Wahzhazhe (Osage) Nations. As a land grant institution, Penn State acknowledges and honors the traditional caretakers of these lands and strives to understand and model their responsible stewardship. We also acknowledge the longer history of these lands and our place in that history.

## Data and Codes Availability

No original data were used for this introduction.
**Conflict of Interest Disclosure**

There are competing interests, financial or otherwise,
pertaining to any of the authors.

**Permission to Reproduce Material from
Copyrighted Sources**

The authors declare that no material from copyrighted
sources was reproduced in this manuscript.

**Declaration on Artificial Intelligence Use**

The authors declare that no artificial intelligence tool
was used to assist in or generate any part of the contents
in this manuscript.

**References**

Beall, J. Predatory publishers are corrupting open access. *Nature*, 489:179, 2012. doi: 10.1038/489179a.

Brainard, J. and Kaiser, J. U.S. to require free access to papers on all research it funds. *Science*, 377(6610):1026–1027, 2022. doi: 10.1126/science.ade6577.

Butler, L.-A., Matthias, L., Simard, M.-A., Mongeon, P., and Haustein, S. The oligopoly's shift to open access: How the big five academic publishers profit from article processing charges. *Quantitative Science Studies*, 4(4):778–799, 2023. doi: 10.1162/qss_a_00272.

Farquharson, J. I. and Wadsworth, F. B. Introducing Volcanica: The first diamond open-access journal for volcanology. *Volcanica*, 1 (1):i-ix, 2018. doi: 10.30909/vol.01.01.i-ix.

Fernández-Blanco, D., Lacassin, R., Gouiza, M., Perez-Diaz, L., Magee, C., McCarthy, D., Doré, T., Péron-Pinvidic, G., Kavanagh, J., Bond, C., and Schmitt, R. Tektonika: The Community-Led Diamond Open-Access Journal for Tectonics and Structural Geology. *Tektonika*, 1(1):I–XIII, 2023. doi: 10.55575/tektonika2023.1.1.5.

Guédon, J. The "Green" and "Gold" Roads to Open Access: The Case for Mixing and Matching. *Serials Review*, 30(4):315–328, 2004. doi: 10.1016/j.serrev.2004.09.005.

Huang, C., Neylon, C., Montgomery, L., et al. Open access research outputs receive more diverse citations. *Scientometrics*, 129: 825–845, 2024. doi: 10.1007/s11192-023-04894-0.

Maffei, S., van Zelst, I., Bethkenhagen, M., Duretz, T., Arnould, M., and Gouiza, M. Geodynamica: slinging Earth and (exo)planets' structure and dynamics into Diamond Open Access. In *Europa planet Science Congress 2024*, pages EPSC2024–1082, Berlin, Germany, 2024. doi: 10.5194/epsc2024-1082.

Rowe, C., Agius, M., Convers, J., Funning, G., Galasso, C., Hicks, S., Huynh, T., Lange, J., Lecocq, T., Mark, H., Okuwaki, R., Ragon, T., Rychert, C., Teplitzky, S., and van den Ende, M. The launch of Seismica: a seismic shift in publishing. *Seismica*, 1(1), 2022. doi: 10.26443/seismica.v1i1.255.

Thomas, C., Privat, A. M.-L. J., Vaucher, R., Spychala, Y., Zuchuat, V., Marchegiano, M., Poyatos-Moré, M., Kane, I., and Chiarella, D. Sedimentologika: a community-driven diamond open access journal in sedimentology. *Sedimentologika*, 1(1), 2023. doi: 10.57035/journals/sdk.2023.e11.1015.

Wohl, E. Introduction to the Women in Geomorphology special issue. *Earth Surface Processes and Landforms*, 48(6):1095–1102, 2023. doi: 10.1002/esp.5587.

The article *Geomorphica: The most accessible journal for the geomorphology community* © 2025 by Lefebvre et al. is licensed under a [Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) License](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).