Editor's Report for 2003 and January to June, 2004
http://www.100md.com
分子生物学进展 2004年第12期
June 2004
Molecular Biology and Evolution is the journal of the Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution, SMBE. The journal and the society were founded by Walter Fitch and Masatoshi Nei, both of whom decisively shaped the field of molecular evolution from its incipience. Their contributions to the society, the journal, and the field are now acknowledged in MBE: their names are printed in the masthead of every issue to honor the Founding Editors.
Simon Easteal's five-year term as editor ended in December 2003. He did a herculean job. When Simon took office, the handling of manuscripts at MBE involved shipping, stacking, and storing several tons of paper per year. At the end of his term, MBE had safely navigated the dramatic—but vital—transition into the age of electronic publishing. The move to electronic publishing was accompanied by the move to Oxford University Press as the journal's new publisher starting in January 2003. The journal is owned by SMBE, which arranges with the publisher to produce the journal. The journal's fate is thus in the hands of scientists—the members of SMBE—all of whom owe Simon Easteal enduring thanks for his service and for managing MBE's stable transition into the era of electronic publishing.
Manuscript submissions to MBE are up and the acceptance rate is down. Prior to the move to electronic submission, MBE was typically receiving 350–450 manucripts per year (378 in the 12 months ending June 2000, 455 in the following 12 months, and 465 in the 12 months ending June 2002). In 2003 (January 1 to December 31) MBE received 645 manuscripts, an increase of roughly 50%. MBE published 239 papers (2361 pages) in 2003, corresponding to a rejection rate of 63%. This trend is continuing. As of June 16 we have received 319 manuscripts in 2004 and published 117 papers (1164 pages), including the June issue, pushing the acceptance rate below 35%.
The move to electronic publishing reflects a change in the way that scientists and libraries are approaching the publication process. Institutional subscriptions dipped in 2003 (536) over 2002 (593), accompanied by an increase of institutional online-only access through consortial subscriptions at OUP encompassing 882 additional institutional sites. This trend becomes all the more evident when one recalls that MBE had five online-only institutional subscriptions in 2001 and 15 in 2002 (see Mol. Biol. Evol. 19:2353–2354, 2002). Increased access to MBE through consortial arrangements is an issue that SMBE will need to follow carefully in the coming years. With more institutions and libraries moving to online access, thereby increasing the journal's availability to readers, the number of personal subscriptions fell sharply from 937 (2002) to 523 (2003). The decline in personal subscriptions is by no means specific to MBE; it is affecting other journals, too, yet the lack of Web-based subscription procedures in 2003 may have played a role as well. The decline seems to have leveled off with 468 personal subscriptions registered as of June 1, 2004. But SMBE will need to follow this matter closely and implement measures to increase the number of personal subscriptions. Through OUP's arrangement with developing countries, 256 institutions in such regions of the world received MBE online free of charge in 2003, with an increase to 361 as of June 2004, accompanied by 187 reduced-rate online subscriptions in developing countries thus far in 2004, dramatically up from 17 in 2003.
The trend towards increased online-only access is becoming an issue for all major journals. Many, including PNAS (PNAS 101:8509, 2004), are experimenting with a system called Open Access, which boils down to a pay-to-publish model in which authors assume increased publication charges for producing the journal, whereby free access to papers published in this mannner is available to everyone on the Web. Though SMBE has not formulated a policy on Open Access as yet, the SMBE Council is paying close attention to this development. These are turbulent times for the scientific publishing process, but MBE is well-positioned for the future.
While institutional subscription models and publication modes are changing, MBE has maintained its scientific standing at the forefront of the field. The most common way to assess a journal's success or standing is through a statistic called the impact factor. The impact factor of journal Y for a given year X is the average number of times that a paper appearing in journal Y is cited in any journal during the preceeding two-year period (the year that the paper appeared, X – 2, plus the subsequent year, X – 1). As with all statistics, some caution is warranted in the interpretation of impact factors, but they are widely used by publishers, societies, editors, librarians, and authors to compare the influence that journals are having on scientific progress. During the ten years of editorship under Barry Hall and Simon Easteal, MBE's impact factor remained stably above that of all other journals in the field of molecular evolution (Fig. 1).
FIG. 1. MBE's impact factor in relation to other journals in the field since 1994.
With the increased rejection rate, there has been an increase in the number of decisions that have been lamented or contested at MBE. There may be cases in which authors may recognize well-justified and strongly substantiated scientific grounds to request an appeal of the decision that has been handed down on a manuscript. In that event, authors are entitled to submit such an appeal to the editor, in which issues or arguments of a scientific nature—and scientific nature only—are tersely brought to the fore that might warrant the reconsideration of a decision. In any case, the chances of a successful appeal are extremely slight. During his five years of service to the journal, Simon Easteal reversed only one decision, attesting to the outstanding quality of work delivered by the associate editors at MBE.
Starting in January 2004, ten new associate editors joined the board and seven stepped down. Incoming were Robin Bush, T. Martin Embley, Takashi Gojobori, Laura Katz, Peter Lockhart, Lisa Matisoo-Smith, Lauren McIntyre, Billie Swalla, Arndt von Haeseler, and Jennifer Wernegreen. I am grateful for their hard work thus far and look forward to their continued service during the coming term. Keith Crandall, Tony Dean, Adam Eyre-Walker, Axel Meyer, Stephen Palumbi, David Rand, and Wolfgang Stephan, who stepped down, made valuable contributions to the journal through many years of hard work, for which Simon, SMBE, and I are deeply grateful.
Timeliness of handling and publication is increasingly important to authors. MBE is committed to rapid handling of manuscripts. In 2003, the average manuscript handling time from submission to decision was 36 days, which has decreased to 28 days for the first 6 months of 2004. Manuscripts to appear in MBE are available on the journal's Advance Access Web site on average within 1.5 weeks of acceptance. The time from acceptance to publication in print averaged 12 weeks in 2003, partly due to the unavoidable delays incurred during the change of publisher. That time has now been reduced to less ten weeks in the first half of 2004, and with the publication of a larger July issue to reduce backlog we should reach the desired value of eight weeks from acceptance to print by the end of the year. The transition from Version 1 to Version 3 of ScholarOne's Manuscript Central, the journal's Web-based manuscript sumbission and handling system, occurred during the spring of 2004. It was a time that all of us on the editorial board will remember. Thanks to the persistence, expertise, and overtime duty of Liz Raffaele at the editorial office, the transition was a success and went very smoothly for authors.
It is of interest to know what scientific topics are hot at MBE. In Table 1, I have listed the abstracts that received the most hits at the Web site and the papers that were most often downloaded as PDFs over the 12 months ending July 2004. The titles provide an indication of what sorts of evolutionary topics have the attention of those who access our journal through the Web. Table 2 provides a summary of those MBE papers from 2002 and 2003 that are receiving the highest number of citations. These are the ones that are having immediate impact; their titles provide an impression of some of the hot topics in the field. It should be gratifying to members of SMBE to see that the scientific content of the journal covers the full breadth of molecular evolution: methods, markers, molecules, and biology. Note that some of the journal's most highly accessed papers appeared almost 20 years ago. The journal's committment to the publication of new methods should be a mainstay for the future as well.
Table 1 Current top-accessed papers at MBE
Table 2 Current top-cited papers from 2002 and 2003 at MBE
Starting in 2004, MBE has a new category of papers called Letters. These must have an abstract, are to be short and to the point, and must present results. The first criterion is important for our electronic readership. The last criterion allows for hefty debate of controversial topics, while ensuring that the pages of MBE are not devoted to arguments alone. Letters are being received regularly, I hope that readers will find them to be an interesting addition to the journal, as they present an opportunity to air issues of importance to all evolutionary biologists.
MBE works because of the effort invested by its associate editors and its referees. Finding suitable referees, keeping them on time, getting good reviews, and making clear-cut recommendations and decisions is not as easy as it might sound. Referees thus play a major role in forging the quality of papers that appear in MBE. In the words of a gray eminence with good advice: The review process is not an opportunity, it is a responsibility. As a quantitative guideline, for every paper that one publishes as communicating author, one should be preparing two referee reports for the scientific system. As a qualitative guideline, referee reports should address the written word, mention strengths as well as weaknesses, arrive at a clear recommendation to the associate editor, and be worded in such a manner that—regardless of verdict—they could be read aloud to the authors face to face, were it needed. The job of referees is to advise the associate editor fairly; the job of the associate editor is to decide.
Many things have changed at MBE in the last 18 months, but one constant has ensured our survival: Liz Raffaele at the editorial office. Liz ran the office during Simon Easteal's full term and—fortunately for us all—has stayed on. Alongside the scientific quality of papers that appear in the journal, Liz's experience, efficiency, and initiative are MBE's steadiest keel.(William Martin)
Molecular Biology and Evolution is the journal of the Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution, SMBE. The journal and the society were founded by Walter Fitch and Masatoshi Nei, both of whom decisively shaped the field of molecular evolution from its incipience. Their contributions to the society, the journal, and the field are now acknowledged in MBE: their names are printed in the masthead of every issue to honor the Founding Editors.
Simon Easteal's five-year term as editor ended in December 2003. He did a herculean job. When Simon took office, the handling of manuscripts at MBE involved shipping, stacking, and storing several tons of paper per year. At the end of his term, MBE had safely navigated the dramatic—but vital—transition into the age of electronic publishing. The move to electronic publishing was accompanied by the move to Oxford University Press as the journal's new publisher starting in January 2003. The journal is owned by SMBE, which arranges with the publisher to produce the journal. The journal's fate is thus in the hands of scientists—the members of SMBE—all of whom owe Simon Easteal enduring thanks for his service and for managing MBE's stable transition into the era of electronic publishing.
Manuscript submissions to MBE are up and the acceptance rate is down. Prior to the move to electronic submission, MBE was typically receiving 350–450 manucripts per year (378 in the 12 months ending June 2000, 455 in the following 12 months, and 465 in the 12 months ending June 2002). In 2003 (January 1 to December 31) MBE received 645 manuscripts, an increase of roughly 50%. MBE published 239 papers (2361 pages) in 2003, corresponding to a rejection rate of 63%. This trend is continuing. As of June 16 we have received 319 manuscripts in 2004 and published 117 papers (1164 pages), including the June issue, pushing the acceptance rate below 35%.
The move to electronic publishing reflects a change in the way that scientists and libraries are approaching the publication process. Institutional subscriptions dipped in 2003 (536) over 2002 (593), accompanied by an increase of institutional online-only access through consortial subscriptions at OUP encompassing 882 additional institutional sites. This trend becomes all the more evident when one recalls that MBE had five online-only institutional subscriptions in 2001 and 15 in 2002 (see Mol. Biol. Evol. 19:2353–2354, 2002). Increased access to MBE through consortial arrangements is an issue that SMBE will need to follow carefully in the coming years. With more institutions and libraries moving to online access, thereby increasing the journal's availability to readers, the number of personal subscriptions fell sharply from 937 (2002) to 523 (2003). The decline in personal subscriptions is by no means specific to MBE; it is affecting other journals, too, yet the lack of Web-based subscription procedures in 2003 may have played a role as well. The decline seems to have leveled off with 468 personal subscriptions registered as of June 1, 2004. But SMBE will need to follow this matter closely and implement measures to increase the number of personal subscriptions. Through OUP's arrangement with developing countries, 256 institutions in such regions of the world received MBE online free of charge in 2003, with an increase to 361 as of June 2004, accompanied by 187 reduced-rate online subscriptions in developing countries thus far in 2004, dramatically up from 17 in 2003.
The trend towards increased online-only access is becoming an issue for all major journals. Many, including PNAS (PNAS 101:8509, 2004), are experimenting with a system called Open Access, which boils down to a pay-to-publish model in which authors assume increased publication charges for producing the journal, whereby free access to papers published in this mannner is available to everyone on the Web. Though SMBE has not formulated a policy on Open Access as yet, the SMBE Council is paying close attention to this development. These are turbulent times for the scientific publishing process, but MBE is well-positioned for the future.
While institutional subscription models and publication modes are changing, MBE has maintained its scientific standing at the forefront of the field. The most common way to assess a journal's success or standing is through a statistic called the impact factor. The impact factor of journal Y for a given year X is the average number of times that a paper appearing in journal Y is cited in any journal during the preceeding two-year period (the year that the paper appeared, X – 2, plus the subsequent year, X – 1). As with all statistics, some caution is warranted in the interpretation of impact factors, but they are widely used by publishers, societies, editors, librarians, and authors to compare the influence that journals are having on scientific progress. During the ten years of editorship under Barry Hall and Simon Easteal, MBE's impact factor remained stably above that of all other journals in the field of molecular evolution (Fig. 1).
FIG. 1. MBE's impact factor in relation to other journals in the field since 1994.
With the increased rejection rate, there has been an increase in the number of decisions that have been lamented or contested at MBE. There may be cases in which authors may recognize well-justified and strongly substantiated scientific grounds to request an appeal of the decision that has been handed down on a manuscript. In that event, authors are entitled to submit such an appeal to the editor, in which issues or arguments of a scientific nature—and scientific nature only—are tersely brought to the fore that might warrant the reconsideration of a decision. In any case, the chances of a successful appeal are extremely slight. During his five years of service to the journal, Simon Easteal reversed only one decision, attesting to the outstanding quality of work delivered by the associate editors at MBE.
Starting in January 2004, ten new associate editors joined the board and seven stepped down. Incoming were Robin Bush, T. Martin Embley, Takashi Gojobori, Laura Katz, Peter Lockhart, Lisa Matisoo-Smith, Lauren McIntyre, Billie Swalla, Arndt von Haeseler, and Jennifer Wernegreen. I am grateful for their hard work thus far and look forward to their continued service during the coming term. Keith Crandall, Tony Dean, Adam Eyre-Walker, Axel Meyer, Stephen Palumbi, David Rand, and Wolfgang Stephan, who stepped down, made valuable contributions to the journal through many years of hard work, for which Simon, SMBE, and I are deeply grateful.
Timeliness of handling and publication is increasingly important to authors. MBE is committed to rapid handling of manuscripts. In 2003, the average manuscript handling time from submission to decision was 36 days, which has decreased to 28 days for the first 6 months of 2004. Manuscripts to appear in MBE are available on the journal's Advance Access Web site on average within 1.5 weeks of acceptance. The time from acceptance to publication in print averaged 12 weeks in 2003, partly due to the unavoidable delays incurred during the change of publisher. That time has now been reduced to less ten weeks in the first half of 2004, and with the publication of a larger July issue to reduce backlog we should reach the desired value of eight weeks from acceptance to print by the end of the year. The transition from Version 1 to Version 3 of ScholarOne's Manuscript Central, the journal's Web-based manuscript sumbission and handling system, occurred during the spring of 2004. It was a time that all of us on the editorial board will remember. Thanks to the persistence, expertise, and overtime duty of Liz Raffaele at the editorial office, the transition was a success and went very smoothly for authors.
It is of interest to know what scientific topics are hot at MBE. In Table 1, I have listed the abstracts that received the most hits at the Web site and the papers that were most often downloaded as PDFs over the 12 months ending July 2004. The titles provide an indication of what sorts of evolutionary topics have the attention of those who access our journal through the Web. Table 2 provides a summary of those MBE papers from 2002 and 2003 that are receiving the highest number of citations. These are the ones that are having immediate impact; their titles provide an impression of some of the hot topics in the field. It should be gratifying to members of SMBE to see that the scientific content of the journal covers the full breadth of molecular evolution: methods, markers, molecules, and biology. Note that some of the journal's most highly accessed papers appeared almost 20 years ago. The journal's committment to the publication of new methods should be a mainstay for the future as well.
Table 1 Current top-accessed papers at MBE
Table 2 Current top-cited papers from 2002 and 2003 at MBE
Starting in 2004, MBE has a new category of papers called Letters. These must have an abstract, are to be short and to the point, and must present results. The first criterion is important for our electronic readership. The last criterion allows for hefty debate of controversial topics, while ensuring that the pages of MBE are not devoted to arguments alone. Letters are being received regularly, I hope that readers will find them to be an interesting addition to the journal, as they present an opportunity to air issues of importance to all evolutionary biologists.
MBE works because of the effort invested by its associate editors and its referees. Finding suitable referees, keeping them on time, getting good reviews, and making clear-cut recommendations and decisions is not as easy as it might sound. Referees thus play a major role in forging the quality of papers that appear in MBE. In the words of a gray eminence with good advice: The review process is not an opportunity, it is a responsibility. As a quantitative guideline, for every paper that one publishes as communicating author, one should be preparing two referee reports for the scientific system. As a qualitative guideline, referee reports should address the written word, mention strengths as well as weaknesses, arrive at a clear recommendation to the associate editor, and be worded in such a manner that—regardless of verdict—they could be read aloud to the authors face to face, were it needed. The job of referees is to advise the associate editor fairly; the job of the associate editor is to decide.
Many things have changed at MBE in the last 18 months, but one constant has ensured our survival: Liz Raffaele at the editorial office. Liz ran the office during Simon Easteal's full term and—fortunately for us all—has stayed on. Alongside the scientific quality of papers that appear in the journal, Liz's experience, efficiency, and initiative are MBE's steadiest keel.(William Martin)