Happy New Year from Organic & Biomolecular Chemistry
In our first Editorial as OBC Editorial Board Chair and Editor we would like to wish all our readers a happy New Year.High quality and impact
2010 has been another great year for OBC. Not only has the amount of quality content published in the journal increased again but the ISI® impact factor rose to its highest ever level at 3.76†. Indeed this is the fifth straight year that OBC's impact factor has seen a significant increase.
OBC's Editorial Board and team are committed to a rigorous, fair and transparent peer review process to ensure that the journal's high level of quality is maintained, and we would like to thank all our referees for their continuing support in helping us achieve this.
OBC Accepted Manuscripts
2010 saw the introduction of Accepted Manuscripts to OBC, giving our authors the opportunity to have their research results made available to the community as soon as possible. This free service allows our authors to have their results published, in citable form, shortly after acceptance. All OBC articles continue to receive the high quality editing and formatting service from RSC Publishing's professional team of technical editors. In a fast moving field such as organic chemistry we believe that this service will be of great benefit to our authors and readers.Board changes in 2010
The end of 2010 saw the retirement from the board of Jay Siegel as the Chair of OBC. Jay was a member of the inaugural OBC Editorial Board when the journal launched in 2003 and became Chair in 2007. Over the past four years Jay has overseen the journal's significant growth in high quality content. The Editorial Board and team would like to thank Jay for his stewardship of the journal during his time as Chair.We are delighted to announce that Jeffrey Bode is the new Editorial Board Chair for OBC. Jeffrey, who moved to ETH Zurich in Switzerland in 2010, has been a member of the OBC Editorial Board since 2009. We would like to wish Jeffrey well in his new role. In 2010 we were joined by two new Editorial Board members: Professor Pauline Chiu (University of Hong Kong, China) and Professor Stephen Kent (University of Chicago, US). We would like to welcome both Pauline and Stephen to the Board.
OBC Lecture Award
Professor Michael Burkart from the University of California, San Diego, delivered a great OBC award lecture at the RSC's Directing Biosynthesis conference in Durham, UK in September. Professor Burkart, whose lecture was entitled Modular Thinking – Explorations in Activity and Function, has published a number of articles in OBC and he authored the very first article to appear in the journal back in 2003 (DOI: 10.1039/b210173d).High quality articles
2010 again saw great work from across all areas of organic chemistry published in OBC. Our top cited review was ‘Glycosidase inhibition: assessing mimicry of the transition state’ by Tracey Gloster and Gideon Davies (DOI: 10.1039/b915870g) while the top cited research article was ‘Asymmetric Michael addition reaction of 3-substituted-N-Boc oxindoles to activated terminal alkenes catalyzed by a bifunctional tertiary-amine thiourea catalyst’ by Sanzhong Luo et al. (DOI: 10.1039/b918644a). Our hot articles ranged from organocatalysis [see ‘In water, on water, and by water: mimicking nature's aldolases with organocatalysis and water’ by Carlos Barbas III et al. (DOI: 10.1039/c004970k)] to the synthesis of DNA base pairs [see ‘Toward a designed genetic system with biochemical function: polymerase synthesis of single and multiple size-expanded DNA base pairs’ by Eric Kool et al. (DOI: 10.1039/c002766a)]. Thank you to all our authors who published in the journal in 2010.Web theme issues
OBC published four web theme issues in 2010, focusing on enabling technologies in organic synthesis, biocatalysis, protein labelling and chemical proteomics, and chemical biology. Web themes are a great platform for publishing the latest research on a particular topic, and because articles are collected together online rather than in a single issue there is no delay to publication. Look out for more web themes in OBC in 2011. Topics will include fluorine chemistry and free radicals.OBC team at conferences
In 2010 the OBC Editorial team attended number of international conferences, and our Editorial Board members represented the journal at many others. Travelling to conferences offers great opportunities for the OBC team to meet the top scientists in the area, see the latest research developments and discuss the journal with our authors, referees and readers. Look out for members of the OBC team at conferences throughout 2011.OBC is also keen to support young organic chemists by providing student poster prizes at selected conferences throughout the year. If you are organising a conference in 2011 and would like us to consider supporting it with an OBC poster prize then please contact us
We hope that you enjoy reading this first issue of 2011.
Professor Jeffrey Bode
Chair, Editorial Board
Dr Richard Kelly
Editor
RSC Publishing news
Quality and growth continues
It's quality that really matters at RSC Publishing. And the 2009 Journal Citation Reports ® proved that our quality is better than ever as our average impact factor (IF) rose from 4.9 to 5.4. It's an impressive figure, especially when compared with the average for a chemistry journal of 2.4.But we don't rely on just one or two titles to boost our average. It's our entire collection that counts: of the top 20 journals in the multidisciplinary chemistry category, 25% are from RSC Publishing; and 90% of our titles have an IF over 3.
Our list of titles continues to grow: Food & Function and Catalysis Science & Technology are the latest titles to join our expanding portfolio. Plus, the number of articles we've published has increased by 74% in the last 2 years alone. We remain committed to providing a world-class publishing service to our authors, and delivering cutting-edge chemical science to readers throughout the world.
The IF and article growth figures provide a clear indication that more researchers than ever before are recognising journals from the RSC as a key resource to access the very best research.
2011 Books
With steady front-list growth and cutting-edge content, delivering excellence and authority, the RSC is one of the world's leading chemical science print and online book publishers.Nearly 1000 eBooks equating to one third of a million pages, the RSC eBook Collection delivers outstanding online research and opinion in a multitude of areas of the chemical sciences. Nine new RSC eBook Subject Collections offer additional flexibility.
With over 90 new print titles planned for 2011, including: second editions of seminal texts; and new RSC Polymer Chemistry and RSC Metallobiology series launching, our contribution to chemistry collections worldwide is diverse, topical and high impact. Expect another first class collection of best selling chemical science titles in 2011.
NEW RSC Publishing Platform
Access one million journal articles and book chapters in one simple integrated search.The new RSC Publishing Platform has been developed in consultation with the international scientific and librarian community. Together we have identified the best and most valued interface and features that connects you with the highest quality scientific research. With one single search box, easily access our books, journals and databases for students, academics, researchers, scientists and professionals.
Free online access
Free online access is available to all our newest journals, and more – all you need to do is register for an RSC Publishing personal account. Then, when you are logged in, you will be able to access all our free content. Currently this includes:• All content of our newest journals for the first 2 volumes
• Any articles that are part of a special free access promotion (eg ‘hot’ papers, web theme issues, etc)
• All journal content published more than two years ago (dating back to 1997)
• A sample chapter from each book in the RSC eBook Collection
With your username and password you can access the free content any time, any place – all you need is internet access. Register at www.rsc.org/personalregistration.
If your institution is a current customer with IP registered, you will be able to access all free content. Other institutions can apply for free online access to our newest journals using our online form: www.rsc.org/freeaccess.
ChemSpider
Have you heard about the RSC's award winning chemical structure and text based search engine – ChemSpider? It's FREE!ChemSpider provides access to:
• Millions of chemical structures
• An abundance of additional property information
• Tools to upload, curate and use the data
• A multitude of other online services like the RSC Publishing Platform
ChemSpider is one of the richest single sources of structure-based chemistry information.
Visit www.chemspider.com (for mobile devices: cs.m.chemspider.com)
RSC 2011 conferences and events
As a learned society host more than 300 international conferences and events, the following have been outlined as areas you may find of interest. Visit www.rsc.org/ConferencesAndEvents to view the complete schedule of events for 2011.Antibiotics: Where now? II
London, UK, 20 January
6th International Symposium on Macrocyclic and Supramolecular Chemistry (6-ISMSC)
Brighton, UK, 3–7 July
22nd International Symposium: Synthesis in Organic Chemistry
Cambridge, UK, 11–14 July
Challenges in Chemical Biology (ISACS5)
Manchester, UK, 26–29 July
Challenges in Organic Materials & Supramolecular Chemistry (ISACS6)
Beijing, China, 2–5 September
International Year of Chemistry 2011
IUPAC (in conjunction with the UN and UNESCO) have proclaimed 2011 as the International Year of Chemistry (IYC), the goals of which are: to increase the public appreciation of chemistry in meeting world needs; to encourage interest in chemistry among young people; and to generate enthusiasm for the creative future of chemistry.The RSC will be leading the way in IYC 2011, supporting this important initiative through a series of events and activities.
Footnote |
| † Thomson ISI Impact factor for 2009 |
| This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2011 |