In April, the US National Academy of Sciences elected 105 new members to its ranks. Academy membership is one the most prestigious honours for a scientist, and it comes with a tangible perk: members can submit up to four papers per year to the body’s high-profile journal, the venerable Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), through the ‘contributed’ publication track. This unusual process allows authors to choose who will review their paper and how to respond to those reviewers’ comments.