Editorial

In the course of Lab on a Chip's opening editorial, (Lab Chip, 2001, 1, 1N), it was commented upon that four years of research had been undertaken, to identify the various disciplines for which miniaturisation held great promise. Key areas that quickly came to light included environmental monitoring and defence: the development of analytical systems for use in defence against biological and chemical weapons. Considerable funding for miniaturisation research is associated already with what are now very prescient concerns. Of course, by the nature of the work, we may not expect to find results of defence-related studies translating readily into papers published within any scientific journal. Yet one thing is clear. In an ever more volatile world, as evidenced by the reaction to anthrax-laced letters in the United States last year, authorities, the public, and the scientific community itself, look to new technology as an integral solution to the need for safe, reliable and effective monitoring of hazards in all their environments.

Just as the financial stock of such companies as Cepheid dramatically rose in the aftermath of the anthrax letters, in part perhaps because of its technology's suitability for the identification of micro-organisms by means of PCR, inevitably, so will rise the general "stock" of lab on a chip research. Inevitably, that is, so long as this "new" science continues to demonstrate it’s inherent analytical advantages: speed, throughput, cost-efficiency, and so forth.

Whatever the short-term future may hold for lab on a chip funding—and thus where its applications most effectively will take flight—it is clear from the breadth and level of submissions being received by Lab on a Chip that we work in a field whose time at last has come.

RSC Publishing Developments

Journal Publishing at the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) continues to evolve. The launch of the electronic manuscript submission system has been hugely successful with approximately 40% of material being submitted by this route. Where appropriate, papers submitted using this file upload facility are being sent to referees electronically reducing postal delays and publication times.

Readers will be pleased to hear that all material published in RSC journals more than two years ago is now available free of charge (in electronic form) to subscribers and non-subscribers alike. We are also pleased to announce that access to the abstracts of papers appearing on the web version of Lab on a Chip (and all other RSC journals) are now available free of charge. These new RSC policies are intended to give the relevant communities greater access to the scientific research published in RSC journals.

There are two new facilities that will become available in 2002 that will be of great use to some of our readers. These include a new Reference Linking Facility for users of RSC journals online. Value-added features provided by links from the references in online articles are to include access to the full-text of the cited article.

At launch, the Reference Linking facilities will be:

 free access to the Chemical Abstracts Service abstract for the reference via ChemPort (www.chemport.org) links to the full text of the reference, where available online, on the publisher's server (a subscription or pay-per-view may be required to access the article)  a mechanism to purchase a printed copy of the cited article via the RSC Library and Information Centre's Document Delivery Service

Future enhancements will include links to other resources.

The second quarter of 2002 will see the launch of an RSC chemical biology web site. This is a joint venture between RSC Publishing and the Chemical Biology Forum. The intention is to provide a valuable resource for the chemical biology community, a major component of which will be a virtual journal, bringing together links to all the RSC’s published material in chemical biology. This will of course include much of the bio-related material found in Lab on a Chip. So by publishing your bio-related research and applications work in the journal it will be easily accessible by both the miniaturization and chemical biology communities.

As stated earlier, scientific publishing is a rapidly changing field and we encourage feedback on new developments and suggestion for improvement. If you have any ideas for new themes or any other feedback for the journal, the Editorial Board is always keen to hear your views so please send them to E-mail: loc@rsc.org.

International Symposium on Microchemistry and Microsystems (ISMM 2001)

This symposium, convened at Kanagawa Science Park in Kawasaki, Japan on September 16–18, 2001, covered aspects of microscale techniques in analytical chemistry, biochemistry, chemical engineering, mechanical engineering, and electro-communications.

ISMM 2001 was an official symposium of The University of Tokyo. It was sponsored by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology and cosponsored by Kanagawa Academy of Science and Technology and the Japanese Analytical Instruments Manufacturer Association, and Micromachine Center. Microscale techniques will undoubtedly become very important in future basic sciences and industrial technologies. To realize these microchemical technologies, it is very important to study chemical natures in liquid microspace and develop various technologies for chemical processing and analytical methods. In particular, collaboration between microchemistry and microsystems including microfluidics and MEMS is essential.

However, there is little opportunity for scientists and engineers of these different fields to meet together. So, the purpose of ISMM was to offer an opportunity for mutual exchange of the state-of-the-art science and technology in these wide ranging fields. This symposium was well attended and there was active discussion and information exchange in the invited lecture sessions, poster sessions, and the social programs. The scientific program boasted a variety of international speakers as well as keynote lectures and poster presentations. Selected papers from ISMM 2001 are published in this issue of Lab on a Chip. The organization committee would like to express our gratitude to RSC and the Editorial Board of Lab on a Chip.

Takehiko Kitamori

ISMM 2001 Chairman

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