Fossil Record – the palaeontological journal of the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin Constanze Bickelmann1, Stefanie Paß1, Florian Witzmann1, Xenia van Edig2, Jana Hoﬀmann1, and Johannes Müller1 1Museum für Naturkunde – Leibniz-Institut für Evolutions- und Biodiversitätsforschung Invalidenstrasse 43, 10115 Berlin 2Copernicus Publications (Copernicus GmbH), Bahnhofsallee 1e, 37081 Göttingen The Journal Fossil Record is one of three journals issued by the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin (Fig. 1). It handles palaeontological science, spanning such ﬁelds as taxonomy and systematics, biostratigraphy and biogeochemistry, palaeoecology, evolution and earth history. All taxonomic groups are covered, including vertebrates, invertebrates, plants, and microfossils. Fossil Record was founded in 1998 under the name „Mitteilungen aus dem Museum für Naturkunde in Berlin, Geowissenschaftliche Reihe“ by Prof. Hans-Peter Schultze. In 2009, the journal became ISI-listed. Since 2014, simultaneously with publication by Copernicus Publications, it has been open access, and increased its impact factor up to 1,250 in 2016. As an online open-access journal, Fossil Record closes the gap between the requirements of scientists, funders, and libraries for open access to scientiﬁc publications. Besides enjoying better visibility, scientiﬁc papers are thus much more widely distributed and available for scientiﬁc databases. We welcome international contributions dealing with fossil specimens and collections, as well as research on pa- laeobiological processes and patterns using common and innovative analytical methods. Fossil Record enjoys an internationally good reputation, resulting in submission of excellent manuscripts from all over the world (Fig. 2). We oﬀer a peer-review process with at least two independent reviews. Since 2006, Fossil Record has appea- red with two issues each year. In addition, special issues are printed on chief editors’ demand. Advantageously, comprehensive manuscripts such as (doctoral) monographs are also printed (Fig. 3). We provide opportunity for high quality illustrations (Fig. 4). Article processing charges (APCs) covering costs for the review process, ty- pe-setting, web publication and long term archiving upon publication are currently not requested from authors, instead covered by the Museum für Naturkunde. However, diﬀerent models for author contributions are current- ly evaluated and may be introduced at a later stage. Manuscripts can be uploaded on the Fossil Record website (https://www.fossil-record.net/). The Editor The Museum für Naturkunde is an integrated research museum and since 2009, the museum has been a member of the Leibniz Association, which is a non-proﬁt organization combining and promoting world-renowned research institutions. The Museum für Naturkunde conducts excellent research in biology and earth sciences. Speciﬁcally, we study the geo- logical and biological evolution and diversity of life, and transfer this knowledge to the international scientiﬁc community as well as the public. To date, our collections, comprising over 30 million zoological, palaeontological, geological and mi- neralogical specimens, are of unique cultural, historical, and scientiﬁc value inextricably linked to our research (Fig. 5). In order to provide as much free access to knowledge as possible we aim to develop an open-access strategy, oﬀering open-access advisory services to our researchers. This process is part of the science programme “Digital World and Infor- mation Science”, which combines information and communication technology, biodiversity informatics, and library and information sciences at the museum. The Publisher Copernicus Publications is a German open-access publisher based in Göttingen. It has been a partner of scientists and socie- ties since 1988 and launched its ﬁrst open-access journal in 2001. Since 2004, all journals have been open access. With a clear focus on in-house services, Copernicus Publications promot