Metallomics: integrating research related to biometals—a journal for an emerging community

Welcome to the first issue of Metallomics: Integrated Biometal Science.

The study of metals in biological systems is an increasingly important area of research. Metallomics is a newly emerging scientific field that is receiving great attention as a new frontier in the study of trace elements in the life sciences. It is a global discipline encompassing many areas including biology, chemistry, geology, medicine, physics, and pharmacy.

As this field brings together researchers from such diverse areas, we anticipate that Metallomics will help to bridge the gap between researchers from different backgrounds so that ideas can be shared and the field progresses to the benefit of all. Our journal will serve as a focus for the community of metallomics researchers to come together and gain new perspectives and insights. It is our aim to reflect the interests of the emerging community and to support you as your community grows.

We would like to acknowledge the work of those whose vision has led to the establishment of this field, including Bob Willams (R. J. P. Williams, Coord. Chem. Rev., 2001, 216–217; 583–595), Hiroki Haraguchi (H. Haraguchi, J. Anal. At. Spectrom., 2004, 19, 5–14) and Joanna Szpunar (J. Szpunar, Anal. Bioanal. Chem., 2003, 378, 55–56), and to all those who continue to contribute to the emergence of metallomics, without whom we would not be launching this exciting new journal.

All content free to access

In a move which benefits all of our authors and readers, online access to Metallomics is completely free for the first two years, enabling you to read about the most recent developments in the field. During 2009 and 2010, the current issue of the journal will be freely available to everyone online, without the need for any registration. To access previous issues, RSC Publishing is using an approach that allows free institutional access to content during 2009 and 2010 following a simple registration process. This model, which was adopted in response to feedback from scientists, librarians and other information specialists, has proved highly successful for RSC Publishing’s new journal Energy& Environmental Science, launched in July 2008. Access is managed by institution and IP address. To register, visit our website and complete the registration form at http://www.rsc.org/Publishing/Journals/MT/Free_access_registration.asp

A range of article types

Metallomics will publish urgent Communications and full Research Papers as well as invited Critical, Tutorial and Mini Reviews. All articles are subject to rigorous peer review and accepted articles are published online first as fully citable Advance Articles as soon as they are ready.

You can submit your article through our online submission system ReSourCe, http://www.rsc.org/resource or by e-mail attachment to E-mail: metallomics@rsc.org; . Our instructions for authors are available from our website http://www.rsc.org/authorguidelines and if you are interested in writing a review article for the journal please contact the Editorial Office at the e-mail address above.

Browsing and alerting services

The Metallomics homepage contains the contents list for the current issue, delivering the content you want to see as soon as you arrive at the site. Graphical abstracts are included as standard, allowing you to easily browse content. A prominent and easy-to-use search box also makes finding published research much more intuitive.

RSS feeds for Metallomics also include graphical abstracts, enabling at-a-glance identification of relevant articles. To get the latest articles delivered straight to your screen, sign up at http://www.rsc.org/rss—or you can sign up for e-mail contents alerts at http://www.rsc.org/ej_alert.

You can keep up to date with the latest research appearing in Metallomics by adding our Google gadgets to your desktop. We’ve got a great RSC journal gadget† that delivers journal RSS feeds straight to your Google desktop and a journal search gadget‡ that allows you to search articles appearing in RSC Journals directly from your desktop.

Colour policy

We are happy to print figures in colour, free of charge, where the use of colour enhances the scientific understanding of the figure. In addition, for the online version of the journal, colour is provided at no cost in both the pdf and html versions.

Citing

When you cite Metallomics articles in future manuscripts please note that the correct journal citation is Metallomics.

Metallomics around the Web

Metallomics is fortunate to have the enthusiastic backing of a supportive community and we’re excited to offer our readers new ways to engage with our journal on the wider Web.

If you want news, opinions or to contribute to discussion about Metallomics and the science we publish, look out for our blog or submit a post http://prospect.rsc.org/blogs/metallomics/

To find our more about how you can engage with Metallomics around the Web, bookmark the homepage at http://www.rsc.org/metallomics

And most importantly…

On behalf of our Editorial and Advisory Board members, we hope you enjoy reading Metallomics and we hope that you will submit some of your best work for publication in it. We welcome your comments and suggestions about our journal, please contact us at E-mail: metallomics@rsc.org. You can read biographies of all of our Editorial and Advisory Board members in this issue.

We also encourage you to attend the International Symposium on Metallomics 2009, to be held in Cincinnati this coming June. This follows the very successful meeting in Nagoya in 2007 and promises to be a very enjoyable meeting. Further details are available from the website http://www.uc.edu/plasmachem/iswm/index.htm.

News from RSC Publishing

RSC’s hot prospect

The competition is hotting up as other leading scientific publishers announce plans to follow RSC’s lead and apply semantic technologies to add value to journal articles. Three years on from launch, award winning RSC Prospect – the service we use to structure the science within Metallomics and other RSC Journal html articles – is setting the standard offering new ways to discover, use, understand and analyse research articles that weren’t previously possible. For the latest innovations and news visit http://www.projectprospect.org

RSC books

The RSC eBook Collection has become a world-class electronic resource with licenses being signed to leading institutions across the globe. New content continues to be uploaded regularly and this comprehensive resource now includes over 800 quality titles. Electronic book publications are uploaded within days of print publication, effortlessly disseminating extensive, high-quality, scientific content direct to scientists, libraries, students, teachers and researchers around the world. Please visit http://www.rsc.org/eBooks for further information or to visit the RSC eBook Collection.

Over 80 new print books will be published in 2009 as our list continues to grow in size and importance in the international market. Keep up-to-date with all the latest cutting edge titles being published by the RSC by visiting http://www.rsc.org/ej_alert and subscribing to our eAlerts. We send regular information on discount offers, print books and new electronic content throughout the year.

Same great ReSourCe—just better!

During 2009 we will release a new version of ReSourCe, our system for online manuscript submission and peer review (http://www.rsc.org/resource). Already popular with authors and referees, we’ve listened to your feedback and made further improvements to our service. We’re keen to build on your experience of ReSourCe, so if you would you like to help us shape the next release by taking part in beta-testing or by supplying your comments and suggestions please contact E-mail: resourcesupport@rsc.org.

More papers and greater impact

As we look forward to 2009, RSC Publishing is working with more authors than ever before—2008 saw the number of authors published in RSC Journals increase by 30%. Meanwhile titles from across the collection recorded impressive rises in impact factors, and the latest immediacy indices confirm the relevance and topicality of research published by the RSC.

RSC Publishing is committed to providing a world-class publishing service and global visibility to its authors and with the number of citations increasing, immediacy and impact factors rising, it is clear to see that RSC Publishing is recognised by researchers throughout the world as a key resource to publish and read the very best research.

Your RSC subscriptions and free content

We know that it can be difficult to keep track of online resources that are available to you. So, we’ve introduced a special web page to help you to find out exactly what RSC content you can access. This new page is called Your RSC Subscriptions (http://www.rsc.org/Publishing/your_access.asp) and it lists all products for which your organisation has a current subscription, plus other content which may be available to you, such as the RSC Journals Archive and the RSC eBook collection.

You can also find out about RSC content that is available free—including: research articles that are free for a limited time; news articles in magazines; and free chapters from the RSC eBook Collection. Visit www.rsc.org/Publishing/freeRSCcontent.asp

Food: the RSC theme for 2009

In 2009, the theme for RSC public engagement activities will be food; looking at all aspects of the supply chain from field to fork and eventually to waste disposal and recycling. Planned activities include the launch of a major report into securing a sustainable food supply; the publication of a new edition of the ground-breaking book Kitchen Chemistry; lectures and events at the new Chemistry Centre at Burlington House—the world’s foremost venue for showcasing chemistry; and Chemistry Week 2009 (7th–15th November), when practicing scientists and science teachers will engage in a week-long festival for the chemical sciences. Please get in touch with us (E-mail: food@rsc.org) if you would like to be involved.

Joseph A. Caruso, Chair, Editorial Board

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Niamh O’Connor, Editor

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Footnotes

† RSC Journal RSS feeds Google gadget http://www.google.com/ig/adde?moduleurl=hosting.gmodules.com/ig/gadgets/file/115321514350875010675/rsc_journals.xml&source=imag

‡ RSC Journals search Google gadget http://www.google.com/ig/adde?moduleurl=hosting.gmodules.com/ig/gadgets/file/115321514350875010675/rsc_ajax_search.xml&source=imag

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