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5 Good Reasons to Celebrate

2007; Wiley; Volume: 7; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1002/mabi.200600288

1616-5195

Mara Staffilani,

Genetics, Bioinformatics, and Biomedical Research

The year 2007 will be remembered as a milestone in the history of our publisher John Wiley & Sons and the Macromolecular Journals, and there are at least 5 reasons to celebrate it. 200 Years of Success – When in 1807 Charles Wiley opened a small print shop in New York, it was hardly predictable that this would be the birth of one of the worldwide leading publishers in science, technology and medicine. Charles started by printing law books, and within a few years he expanded the spectrum of topics covered. By keeping up with the fast changes of a society led by the industrial revolution, the company grew, and by the early 1900s it became a leading publisher in science and technology. In the following years John Wiley & Sons further strengthened its position by expanding into new and international markets, acquiring smaller companies and a number of new journals. It was the acquisition of the Macromolecular Journals in 1998 that finally made it a leading publisher also in polymer science. The ability of John Wiley & Sons to promptly and successfully respond to the fast changes of an ever developing society has been the most important ingredient for its success over the past 200 years. Growing Fast – This unique combination of long tradition and profound experience with continuous innovation has also played a key role in the success of the Macromolecular Journals. Founded back in 1943 by the Nobel prize winner Hermann Staudinger, Makromolekulare Chemie (now Macromolecular Chemistry & Physics) has grown into the well known and successful family of the Macromolecular Journals. In 2001, Macromolecular Bioscience was launched to cover the new and fascinating field at the intersection of polymer and life sciences. The field is active more than ever and attracts more and more scientists. Its fast development and the ability of Macromolecular Bioscience to keep up with its trends are nicely documented by the rapid increase in journal usage (in 2006 the number of accessed articles was almost 4-times the number recorded in 2003) and total citations. As shown in Figure 1, the total citations received by Macromolecular Bioscience in 2005 were more than 5-times those reported for 2002 by the Institute of Scientific Indexing. These positive achievements are reflected in the increased journal Impact Factor that reached a value of 1.891 last year. Thus, Macromolecular Bioscience climbed up and established itself among the top 5 biomaterials, and among the top 10 polymer, journals publishing original results. Total cites of Macromolecular Bioscience per year (data from the Institute of Scientific Indexing). A highlight of the past year is the publication of a topical issue covering the different aspects of glycomaterials – from synthetic methods to the physical chemical investigations to biomedical applications. Guest-edited by Nicola Tirelli (Manchester, UK), this issue was particularly well received – many contributions are listed among the top 10 most accessed articles published in 2006 (see papers by Mooney, Seeberger, Rinaudo, Paradossi and Turnbull in Table 1). I would like to thank Nicola for his excellent work and the authors for contributing high quality papers. Most accessed were also contributions on drug and non-viral gene delivery systems (Pun, Schacht, Lee) and tissue engineering (Ciardelli, Supaphol), see Table 1. The development of polymer materials for biomedical applications is currently one of the most challenging and exciting fields in polymer science. Macromolecular Bioscience will therefore dedicate, this year, a special issue to the interactions at the interface between cells and macromolecular materials (guest-edited by Diego Mantovani, Quebec, Canada) and one to the bioapplications of branched macromolecular structures (guest-edited by Nicola Tirelli). The latter will be complemented by a special issue covering synthetic aspects and physico-chemical behaviour of hyperbranched polymers that will be published in Macromolecular Chemistry & Physics (guest-edited by Holger Frey, Mainz, Germany). Finally, the exciting field of biomimetics and bioinspired materials will be addressed in a third special issue of Macromolecular Bioscience (guest-edited by Volker Schädler and Marc Fricke, Strasbourg, France). New Members – As a part of the continuous development of the Macromolecular Journals to keep up with the changes in polymer science, the Executive Advisory Board (EAB) of the Macromolecular Journals has been expanded. We are pleased and honored that David L. Kaplan (Tufts University, Medford, USA), Thomas P. Russell (University of Massachusetts, Amherst, USA), Anthony J. Ryan (University of Sheffield, UK), and Chi Wu (The Chinese University of Hong Kong, China) have accepted to join the journals EAB. Thomas Russell, Director of the Materials Research Science and Engineering Center at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and Anthony Ryan, Director of the Polymer Centre, Sheffield, will support us in the field of polymer physical chemistry, a scientific area which we wish to strengthen in the Macromolecular journals. Chi Wu will support us in both polymer synthesis and polymer physics, and we are happy to welcome him as the first EAB Member from China. The Macromolecular Journals (and especially Macromolecular Bioscience) will benefit from David Kaplan's expertise in natural biomaterials. We look forward to cooperating with the expanded Executive Advisory Board for the further success and development of the Macromolecular Journals. We also welcome Wolfgang P. Meier (University of Basel, Switzerland) who has joined last year the International Advisory Board of Macromolecular Bioscience. Wolfgang has already been very active during the past months as an ambassador of the journal and we look forward to a ongoing fruitful cooperation. New Journal – Beside the new Advisory Boards the Macromolecular Journals have further reasons to celebrate. The most important one is the launch of Macromolecular Reaction Engineering. The new sister journal will extend the scope of the already well-established Macromolecular Journals by providing a forum for discussion and dissemination of emerging technologies and scientific advancements in the area of reaction engineering applied to polymerization reactors. We are confident that the increasing interest of the research and industrial community in this field will lead to a successful and established journal. New Content, New Layout – Running under the headings of Talents and Trends, Macromolecular Chemistry & Physics now publishes two new sections aimed at highlighting the work of young outstanding scientists and the most important contemporary developments in all fields of polymer science. Moreover, a series of Essays will offer polymer research institutes the opportunity to feature their research fields and main activities. Finally, as you may have already noticed going through the lines of this editorial, the Macromolecular Journals now have new and more appealing layout of articles and journal covers (Figure 2). We hope you will enjoy the new content and new layout. The new cover layout of the Macromolecular Journals. All the positive results achieved last year by Macromolecular Bioscience would not have been possible without the excellent contributions from the authors, the invaluable help of the referees and the continuous support of the Board Members. We would like to thank you all and look forward to celebrating with you this year!