The two flagship biology journals of BioMed Central, BMC Biology and Journal of Biology, are combined today to become a single title with all the best features of both. The combined journal will be called BMC Biology, reflecting the strong relationship with the subject-specific BMC-series journals, but will include high-profile commissioned content that to date has appeared only in Journal of Biology.
The new BMC Biology will publish research and methodology articles of special importance and broad interest across all areas of biology and biomedical sciences, importing from Journal of Biology the re-review opt-out experiment introduced last year to answer the widespread frustration of researchers with current peer review procedures.
The fused journal will be edited by Miranda Robertson, who explains in an inaugural editorial how the journal will reflect and build on the strengths of both parent publications.
BMC Biology is already listed in Web of Science, tracked by ISI and ranked within the top 2% of all journals listed in Scopus (212 of 17,124). The journal has close to 50,000 registrants and research published in the journal regularly features in the scientific and mainstream press. Highly-cited articles often received upwards of 50 citations and highly-accessed articles receive over 15,000 unique downloads from the journal website.
The journal fusion is marked by a special collection of articles, which introduces a new feature – Video Q&A articles with prominent scientists that provide a platform for leading researchers to express a personal perspective on a variety of scientific topics. The first Video Q&A features Martin Raff from University College London, who explains, as a grandfather and a neuroscientist, his interest in what goes wrong in autism, and how he thinks genomic and stem cell technology may lead to answers.
Also published today are the first of a series of ‘Hope of progress’ articles on biology relevant to clinical problems, including reviews on biology-based cancer therapy and on vaccine adjuvants.
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