Editorial pubs.acs.org/macroletters
Five Years of ACS Macro Letters n July 2011, ACS Macro Letters started accepting manuscripts (to be published in our 2012 first issue) with an Editor-in-Chief (Tim Lodge), a Deputy Editor (Stuart Rowan), and two Associate Editors (Theresa Reineke and Chris Weder). Thanks to a dramatic increase in submissions (vide infra), we have since been able to add four more outstanding Associate Editors (Ryan Hayward, Rachel Segalman, Brent Sumerlin, and Marcus Müller) over the years. Thus, the end of 2016 marks the point that ACS Macro Letters has been in operation for 5 full years. It seems like only yesterday that we started accepting manuscripts! With 5 years of publishing now under our belt, it is a good time to give you a few statistics on the journal so you can see how it has progressed. Since 2012, we have seen a 50% increase in the number of manuscript submissions, highlighting the increasing attractiveness and impact of the journal. Our Impact Factor did rise again this year to 5.766 and our published papers received over 5000 citations. We now have the highest IF of any polymer journal that publishes primary research! In addition, over the years we have worked hard to increase the speed of our editorial and reviewing process while retaining the highest quality of service you expect from an ACS journal. The median time until you receive a first decision has improved by almost 30% since our first year, and the median time to online publication has improved by 22%. As always, these metrics are dependent on many factors other than the speed of our editorial team. As editors, we strive to have the manuscripts spend minimal time in our offices waiting for us to make referee requests or decisions (usually less than a day or two), so a large part of this improvement is a consequence of our outstanding reviewers. Thanks to you all! We are constantly striving to improve the service to both our authors and our reviewers, so you should feel free to contact the journal if you have any thoughts, concerns, or suggestions. One major thing that happened in 2016 is the fourth year of our partnership with Macromolecules, Biomacromolecules, and the ACS Division of Polymer Chemistry (POLY) by honoring the contributions of two early career individuals who have made a major impact on the field of polymer science. The 2016 Biomacromolecules/Macromolecules Young Investigator Award recipients were Cyrille Boyer, University of New South Wales, and Andrew Dove, University of Warwick. They presented lectures in a joint symposium at the Fall 2016 ACS National Meeting in Philadelphia and received their awards at the ensuing POLY/PMSE Awards reception. The call for nominations for the 2017 award may be found at https:// acspubs.formstack.com/forms/fall_lectureship_ macromolecules, with a deadline of January 15, 2017, and we encourage you to nominate deserving young colleagues. So, what can you expect in 2017? Well, while we have been in operation for only 5 years, 2017 marks the 50th anniversary of our sister journal Macromolecules. This golden anniversary will be marked with a series of commemorative 50th Anniversary Perspectives published in Macromolecules, focusing on a range of topics that have undergone considerable development during the life of the journal and that are still
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of contemporary interest. There will also be special symposia at polymer conferences around the world, including the 25th Anniversary Meeting of the Society of Polymer Science of India (January, Trivandrum, http://www.macroindia2017.org/), the 66th Meeting of the Society of Polymer Science, Japan (May, Chiba, http://main.spsj.or.jp/nenkai-e.html), the 41st Meeting of the Polymer Society of Korea (October, Jeju Island, http:// www.polymer.or.kr/english/), and the 15th Pacific Polymer Congress (December, Xiamen, http://www.ppc15.org/cinfo. php). In addition, there will be a one-day gala symposium at the ACS Spring National Meeting in San Francisco, featuring distinguished leaders in the field from around the globe, and a second symposium at the ACS Fall National Meeting in Washington, DC focusing more on emerging leaders in the community. So, keep an eye out for these events and celebrations, it is sure to be a fun year! A few minor housekeeping points to keep in mind for 2017, ACS Macro Letters now requires the inclusion of article titles in the references. In 2016, this was optional but was widely adopted and appreciated, especially for the way it helps guide interested readers to the most useful prior contributions. Another new development across all the ACS Publications portfolio is the requirement that every corresponding author register their unique ORCID identifier; this is easily obtained if you do not already have one (https://orcid.org/signin). It only takes a few minutes.
Timothy P. Lodge, Editor University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States
Stuart J. Rowan, Deputy Editor
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University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, United States
AUTHOR INFORMATION
Notes
Views expressed in this editorial are those of the authors and not necessarily the views of the ACS. The authors declare no competing financial interest.
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EDITOR'S NOTE The following Editor’s Note is from Stuart J. Rowan, Deputy Editor (Chicago; ORCID ID: orcid.org/0000-0001-81760594): At the Fall ACS Meeting in Philadelphia, we were all sad to hear that our Editor-in-Chief (EIC), Tim Lodge, has decided to step down in his role as EIC for both ACS Macro Letters and Macromolecules (after 17 years) at the end of 2017. Tim was truly the driving force behind ACS Macro Letters, and it is fair to say there would be no ACS Macro Letters without him. Given the impact that both Macromolecules and now ACS Macro Letters have had on the polymer publishing community over the years, it is certainly no understatement to say that Tim Received: December 17, 2016 Accepted: December 20, 2016 Published: January 17, 2017 66
DOI: 10.1021/acsmacrolett.6b00960 ACS Macro Lett. 2017, 6, 66−67
ACS Macro Letters
Editorial
has been one of most significant figures in guiding polymer publishing forward in the last two decades. So, a huge thank you to Tim and congratulations on gaining a large part of your life back! Enjoy! A new EIC for both journals will be announced later this year, and we will keep you updated on this. To keep up-to-date with events and news about the journal, follow @ACSMacroLett on twitter.
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DOI: 10.1021/acsmacrolett.6b00960 ACS Macro Lett. 2017, 6, 66−67
