Like in many aspects of life, there remains an undercurrent of sex bias against women in the STEM fields. And this bias has a negative impact on not only women but men too — and those who don’t fit within a binary category.

Nature journals are now taking a leap for sex and gender equity with new reporting requirements, and it’s a welcome step in the right direction.

I work in the field of bioengineering, and researchers such as myself understand first hand the damage that can be done when sex and gender are not properly accounted for — and reported on — in research.

Come June, researchers who submit papers to a subset of the Nature Portfolio journals (see details here) will need to describe whether, and how, sex and gender are considered in study design.