Editorial pubs.acs.org/accounts
50 Years of Accounts “Accounts of Chemical Research publishes concise, critical reviews of research areas currently under active investigation. Most articles are written by scientists personally contributing to the area reviewed. Reviews need not be comprehensive. Indeed, they may be concerned in large part with work in the author’s own laboratory, providing that relevant contributions by other investigators are mentioned sufficiently to place the author’s research in perspective.” This brief description on the masthead page of Volume 1, Issue 1, is as true today as it was 49 years ago. Founding editor Joseph Bunnett envisioned a forum for short descriptions of a research project summarizing and analyzing a series of papers from the author’s laboratory. An Account is more than a review article, and less than one, too. It describes the project design and thought process behind the author’s approach and critically evaluates the outcome, setting it in the context of research from other laboratories. At the same time, it is less than a comprehensive review, a fact that concerns peer reviewers who ask for ever more citations to be added to manuscripts. Accounts provide easy access to a research topic, making them a favorite among young investigators trying to learn new areas as well as more senior ones trying to keep up with the everexpanding literature. Editor Bunnett’s concept of an Account was far ahead of its time. In 1968, there was no other article type like this. In recent years, many journals have adopted “perspectives” and “tutorial reviews,” both of which have features in common with Accounts, and now there is great competition among journals to attract the very best authors. This style of article is popular with both editors and authors; cultivating the best authors enhances the stature of the journal at the same time that publishing an invited article gives kudos to the author. I like to think of an Account as a seminar-in-print; a great seminar presents an important problem, gives a brief background, outlines a novel approach, evaluates the results, and points to the futureso, too, does a great Account. In this scenario, editors, authors, and readers are all beneficiaries. Issue 1 of Volume 1 included only four articles authored by William S. Johnson (Nonenzymatic biogenic-like olef inic cyclizations), Mostafa El-Sayed (Triplet state. Its radiative and nonradiative properties), Roald Hoffmann and Robert B. Woodward (Conservation of orbital symmetry), and Theodore Brown (Nuclear magnetic resonance studies of organometallic exchange processes). The editorial advisory board included 18 white males from North Americanot at all unusual for a midcentury ACS journal. Now in its 50th year of publishing, much has changed in the operation of the journal though not in the style of the manuscripts. My predecessor Joan Valentine led the journal to global expansion, recognizing early on that wonderful research was being conducted in Asia, Europe, South America, and all corners of the planet. She also expected hard work from a very diverse editorial advisory board: recommending up-and-coming young scientists as authors to be invited, creating fora for discussing emerging topics for special issues, and advising on scientific content and direction. In 2017, our © 2017 American Chemical Society
editorial advisory board includes members spread from Canada to Uruguay and from Spain to Singapore. One special issue is long remembered by many of us. In 1995, past-Editor Fred McLafferty, along with Alan Bard, George Whitesides, and Richard Zare, conceived the idea of an entire issue dedicated to “Holy Grails in Chemistry.” Eight eminent scientists presented their ideas for future grand challenges in molecular sciences in Accounts published in the March issue of Volume 28. The topics ranged from the observation of the transition state to room-temperature superconductors to prebiotic chemistry and “unnatural selection.” Linus Pauling contributed a letter to the editor about the Holy Grails he tackled in his lifetime. This year, to commemorate the role of Accounts of Chemical Research in catalyzing new ideas to the broad readership of the chemistry community, we look ahead to the next quarter-century and ask: What will be the cutting-edge scientific grand challenges tackled by chemists, biochemists, and materials scientists for the next half-century? Watch for our special issue on Holy Grails in Chemistry, part 2, to be published in March 2017, and please attend the Presidential Symposium on Holy Grails in Chemistry at the ACS National Meeting in San Francisco on April 2, 2017.
Cynthia J. Burrows, Editor
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University of Utah
AUTHOR INFORMATION
ORCID
Cynthia J. Burrows: 0000-0001-7253-8529 Notes
Views expressed in this editorial are those of the author and not necessarily the views of the ACS.
Received: December 29, 2016 Published: January 17, 2017 1
DOI: 10.1021/acs.accounts.6b00649 Acc. Chem. Res. 2017, 50, 1−1
