APS Journal Impact
The Journal Impact Factors made a strong showing again in 2002, with four of our journals (PRV, AJP-Renal, Physiological Genomics, and AJP-Cell) ranking in the top 10 Physiology journals. Physi-ological Genomics jumped from 3.352 to 4.667 in one year.
The Publications Committee requested that the APS Council write a letter to the leadership of ISI, asking them to develop measures of journal quality alternative to the Impact Factor, especially those that take longevity of articles into account. A letter was sent from the APS President, Barbara Horwitz.
Reports—New Type of High-Impact Article. A new category of papers called "Reports," developed to encourage the submission of high-impact articles, replaced "Rapid Communications" in 2002. Papers submitted to this category are designed to present the best original scientific research having broad significance, but are not designed to be short versions of regular full-length papers. Manuscripts judged lacking in originality, scientific importance, and broad interest are declined even if the experimental work is technically sound. These articles include a short abstract and introductory paragraph, and are limited to no more than three printed journal pages (~2,500 words). From January 1 to June 1, 2003, 69 "Reports" have been submitted and 26 have been published across all the journals.
Improving citations. Digital Object Identifiers (DOIs), the standard for tracking information on the Web, began appearing on all articles in 2002. Links to other journals in ISI's Web of Science were made to articles in our reference lists online. Also, the length of all article titles was extended to 160 characters to allow authors to write more descriptive titles and the length of all abstracts was extended to that allowed by Medline (250 words).
Publication Efficiency
Articles in Press. All original research journals, including Journal of Neurophysiology in July 2002, started publishing Articles in PresS, which allows online publication of manuscripts within a week of their acceptance. It was decided at the Spring 2003 Council Meeting to discontinue the still-popular APStracts feature on the Web, because Articles in PresS meets the same need with better functionality. Starting in 2004, users will be redirected to Articles in PresS from the APStracts page.
S-Proof. S-proofs remain a popular feature that helps speed production of individual articles. The authors receive an Email directing them to a secure site that allows them to view and download a pdf of their paper. They mark up the paper and return it to us via express mail. An upgraded version of the software was implemented in March 2003.
Financial Stability and Increased Accessibility
Subscription Prices. Subscription prices for 2004 were set with the same pricing model as last year, which unbundles prices so that subscribers can choose print only, print plus online, or online only. The Committee and Council approved a price increase of 8.5%, with increases in page charges to $70 per page and color charges to be increased to $300 from $250 per figure for non-members. We will charge authors $150 ($250 for PRV articles) for "toll-free links," which allow authors to put a link on their own web sites to their articles on the HW site. Visitors to the authors' web sites who click on the link can get to that author's article for free.
Open Access. The Committee also suggested and the Council approved that we employ an author-based payment option starting July 1 for Physiological Genomics, giving authors the following choice: paying $1,500 for published articles with open access to the public immediately upon publication; or paying nothing, with the article being published under subscription access.
Legacy Content. The first phase of Legacy Content, going back to 1986, was put online in 2002, and the second phase, to 1966, is almost complete. The Legacy Content, which will go back to 1898 by the end of 2004, is being sold as a product with a one-time price of $1,500 until the end of 2003. The price will increase to $2,000 in 2004.
Archiving. APS continues to be involved in two archiving initiatives developed at HighWire. LOCKSS is an archiving system that uses multiple electronic copies of the content to automatically back up and refresh any corrupted online content. It has received a grant from the Mellon Foundation, and has been spun off from HighWire. APS has volunteered to be one of the sites that monitors a cache of this system, and we are in the process of setting that up right now. The other archiving initiative is a prototype of a very large archive of digital content. Unlike LOCKSS, the content is protected by being hidden; this system is designed to preserve static copies of the content for a very long time.
Reducing Member Costs
APS members started receiving free online access to all journals in 2002. APS members continue to take increased advantage of the free color policy. In 2002, $315,000 of free color was given to members, up from $225,750 in 2001.
Innovative Use of Electronic Publications
Supplemental Material. Eighty-four data supplements total have been published as of June 1, 2003. Fifty percent of these were published in Physiological Genomics.
HighWire Portal. HighWire has redesigned their home page to be a portal to all the journal content on their site, called the HighWire Library of the Sciences and Medicine. It is the largest online collection of high impact science journals. An article appears in almost every issue of The Physiologist describing the features of the portal to readers.
Classic Articles Collection. As an outgrowth of the Legacy Content project, a Task Force was formed to develop a list of classic physiology articles from the APS original research journals. Chaired by Hershel Raff of the Publications Committee, the other members of the Task Force are Christian Bauer, Dale Benos, Alfred Fishman, Gerhard Giebisch, Susan Hamilton, Eve Marder, Bodil M. Schmidt-Nielsen, Gary Sieck, Stanley Schultz, Daniel C. Tosteson, and John West. A review of the list of articles is being done by the journal Editors, the History Book subcommittee, and the History of Physiology interest group. These articles will be made free online, and will be accompanied by editorials describing their significance. The goal is to have the collection finished in 2004, when all of the legacy content is online.
Bundling Review Articles. It is now possible to go to the journal home page and link to a table of contents of all review articles in that journal across time, and a list of review articles across all the APS journals (except NIPS and PRV).
STKE and SAGE. APS continues to participate in AAAS's Knowledge Environments, allowing APS journal content to be part of the Signal Transduction Knowledge Environment (STKE) and giving our members the same AAAS membership discount to its subscriptions. APS also allows our journal content to be linked to the new Science of Aging Knowledge Environment (SAGE) at a pay-per-view price for non-subscribers.
Translational Research
Call for Papers. A Call for Papers on Translational Physiology has run since the June 2001 issues of all the APS research journals. The papers will be published as they are accepted under a special heading in the Journal it was submitted to. Across all the journals, 71 papers were submitted and 20 papers were published under the Translational Research heading in 2002. From January 1 to June 1, 2003, 35 have been submitted and 24 have been published.
"Physiology in Medicine" (PIM). An agreement was made in 2001 to publish the "Physiology in Medicine" series in Annals of Internal Medicine, with D. Ausiello as the Editor of the series, and Benos serving as Deputy Editor. So far, articles have been published on April 15 and June 17, 2003. We have posted pdfs of the Annals PIM articles on our web site (http://www.the-aps.org/publications/journals/pim/index.htm). The articles are freely accessible to all.
Other Items of Significance
Editor Appointments
Marshall Montrose will become Editor of AJP-GI, Allen Cowley will become Editor of Physiological Genomics, and Walter Boron will become Editor of News in Physiological Sciences in July 2003. The Editor of AJP-Endocrinology will be evaluated at the Fall 2003 meeting of the Publications Committee.
Ethical Issues. All of the following changes have been implemented as of the July issues of the journals:
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Conflict of Interest. A check box has been added to the online submission form, for authors who need to be more explicit regarding disclosure. If the author checks the box, they will be sent a conflict of interest form to fill out.
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Editor-in-Chief Submitting Article to their own Journal. Language has been added to the Information for Authors explaining that the Editor is blinded to the process. Language will be added to the Reviewer instructions and invitation letter discouraging reviewer conflicts (eg, recent collaboration with the author).
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Personal Communication. A statement has been added to the Information for Authors that citation of Personal Communications should be discouraged, and if used, the author must have a letter granting permission from the communicant in his or her files to send to APS if requested.
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Bioterrorism Policy. It was decided that rather than adopt a formal policy such as that adopted by PNAS and other journals, the Committee would raise the awareness of the Editors to the danger of allowing potential bioterrorism information to be published. If there is doubt, the Editor should contact the Publications Committee chair through the Director of Publications.
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Retraction Policy. If a published article is retracted due to fraud or other reason, a Retraction statement will be published as a corrigenda, and the article will be tagged online as Retracted.
Dale Benos, Chair
Council Actions