Swiss-Japanese publishing joint venture

Empa and NIMS join forces to publish open-access journal

Jan 27, 2014 | MICHAEL HAGMANN
On 27 January 2014, Empa , the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology, and the Japanese National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS) signed a 5-year collaborative agreement on co-publishing the open access journal “Science and Technology of Advanced Materials” (STAM). Both Empa and NIMS are the leading materials science research institutes in their respective countries with histories spanning more than half a century..
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Caption: Signing Ceremony in the President's office, National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS). From left to right: Prof. Louis Schlapbach (Deputy Director of Global Research Center for Environment and Energy based on Nanomaterials Science, NIMS), Prof. Sukekatsu Ushioda (President, NIMS), Prof. Toyonobu Yoshida (Fellow, NIMS), Ms. Mikiko Tanifuji (General Manager of Scientific Information Office, NIMS), Prof. Dr. Gian-Luca Bona (Director, Empa), Dr. Yoshio Aoki (Division Director of External Collaboration Division, NIMS). Picture source/copyright: NIMS
 
STAM was founded in 2000, and in 2008, NIMS took over the management of its peer review and financial systems that resulted in a continuous rise of the impact factor from 1.267 in 2008 to 3.752 in 2012. Accepted articles are made available online within an open-access platform by the Institute of Physics Publishing, UK.
 
In January 2014, Empa has joined NIMS in the editorial management of STAM. Empa CEO Gian-Luca Bona has agreed to act as a STAM Regional Editor, whereas Harald Krug, a member of Empa’s Board of Directors, will become the new Co-Editor-in-Chief. Says Bona, “It is our intention to attract high-impact contributions from Europe and the US to STAM and thus make the journal one of the world’s leading publications in materials science. What’s more, we plan to extend the scope of the journal to cover new technology areas such as the use of novel materials for medical applications; this, we think, will greatly enhance the visibility and the overall appeal of STAM.”
 

Sukekatsu Ushioda, president of NIMS, welcomes Empa's participation and adds that “Empa will provide new opportunities for STAM to attract high-impact contributions from Europe and US, thus Empa's big step towards supporting STAM will make the journal more respectable and improve its global outreach. STAM is expected to cover traditional materials science fields with an accent on energy and environmental issues, but it is also expanding in new areas such as medical and bioengineering applications, where Empa has a significant expertise. I firmly believe that Empa's participation in publishing the open-access journal STAM will reinforce its position as a journal with a global audience.”
 

The NIMS-Empa agreement will provide additional momentum and opportunities for the journal's further development. In particular, it will increase the visibility of STAM in Europe and attract new authors and reviewers. Empa will also set up a STAM editorial office in Switzerland, which will act as the journal’s hub in Europe.

Further information will be available on the STAM homepage http://iopscience.iop.org/stam
 
 
 
About NIMS
NIMS is an independent administrative institution that was established to improve the level of materials science and technology in Japan; it is one of the largest and most internationalized research institutes in the country. Research at NIMS is focused on establishing techniques for designing, developing and characterizing novel materials, as well as on discovering new functions of traditional materials through innovative approaches. NIMS has a traditionally strong base in metals, ceramics, superconductors and wide-bandgap semiconductors, and is strengthening its expertise in organic and biological materials.
 

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