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Dedication of This Special Issue of I&EC Research to Professor Donald R. Paul It is very fitting that this issue of I&EC Research be dedicated to Professor Donald R. Paul of The University of Texas at Austin. Professor Paul is entering his 25th year of service as Editor of I&EC Research, which makes him among the longest serving editors for this journal. He began his service as Editor in 1986 and guided the journal through its transformation from a series of quarterly, specialized publications into a monthly comprehensive publication. From the launch of the new format in January of 1987, he has shepherded the journal through a period of very rapid growth, in terms of articles and pages published, and he has guided the journal through what has literally been a revolution in publishing as the entire process of preparing, reviewing, publishing, and accessing journal articles evolved from a largely paper-based, mail-driven process to an essentially electronic process at every step of manuscript preparation, submission, review, publication, and archiving. Throughout this process, I&EC Research, under Professor Paul’s careful guidance, has maintained high quality and relevance to the field of chemical engineering, as judged by the increasing impact factor and number of citations both in an absolute sense and relative to other chemical engineering-focused journals. In 1987, when the new format of I&EC Research was first published, the number of pages published was 2 579. In recent years, the annual page count routinely exceeds 11 000, more than 4-fold higher than when Professor Paul started. I&EC Research attracts a global authorship. There has been explosive growth in submissions from countries such as China, which now * Corresponding author. E-mail:
[email protected].
exceeds the US, in authorship of papers in I&EC Research. The rise of the Internet and the widespread availability of computers sparked a wholesale reinvention of the mechanics of the publication process, and the American Chemical Society and I&EC Research have been at the vanguard of technology to speed the publication process. As a result, the median time from receipt of a manuscript until it is published on the Web is 22 weeks for I&EC Research, considerably faster than other chemical engineering journals. Professor Paul has adroitly managed these extraordinary changes in the demographics of authorship and the way publications are processed, continuously strengthening the reputation and quality of I&EC Research. Aside from his work as an outstanding Editor, Professor Paul is a legend in the field of polymer engineering and science, known not only for the quantity of contributions to the field but also the profound quality and insight that he has brought to the field. He is, in fact, one of the most cited scientists in the world. His work in polymer engineering and science has been cited nearly 30 000 times according to the Science Citation Index. His h-index is greater than 80. As a result of making some of the key discoveries in several areas of polymer science and technology, Professor Paul has received virtually every possible award and honor in the field of polymer science, including election to the National Academy of Engineering, receipt of the Herman F. Mark Polymer Chemistry Award, the Applied Polymer Science Award, and the E.V. Murphree Award from the American Chemical Society, receipt of the Alan S. Michaels Award for Innovation in Membrane Science and
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Technology from the North American Membrane Society, and receipt of the William H. Walker Award from the American Institute of Chemical Engineers. He has been elected as a Fellow of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, the Society of Plastics Engineers, the Materials Research Society, and the American Chemical Society (plus the Divisions of Polymeric Materials; Science and Engineering and Polymer Chemistry). In addition to these highly prestigious awards, Professor Paul has won a number of other major awards for his teaching and research activities. In summary, Professor Don Paul has been an outstanding editor for I&EC Research and an outstanding scientist as well. The journal has been in excellent hands during his tenure, and
the current high standing of the journal in the technical community is a tangible outcome of his long and distinguished service to the American Chemical Society and to the scientific community in general as a result of his service as the Editor of I&EC Research. Congratulations, Don, and thank you!
David T. Allen and Benny D. Freeman* Associate Editors, I&EC Research, Department of Chemical Engineering, The UniVersity of Texas at Austin IE1021249
