On March 23, 2015, ACS Publications staff together with an intrepid team of scientific editors, writers and reporters launched a new journal of unprecedented scope, reach and potential impact. Our audacious goal was to provide a venue for the most exciting research in the chemical and allied sciences, alongside more general content that would fascinate a broad readership within and outside the chemistry community. Thus was born ACS Central Science and we are proud to celebrate our one year anniversary this month, complete with a celebratory symposium at the National ACS Meeting in San Diego.
And unlike any multidisciplinary chemistry journal before us, right from day one we made ACS Central Science, designed to publish the best research, wholly open access and freely available to readers and authors. See an article of interest in our Twitter feed? Click on it and you are in—no subscription fees, VPN gymnastics or institutional affiliations necessary. This is a convenience for people like me, but essential for our readers who work in settings lacking resources for journal access and for citizens who are not scientists but want to learn more about how chemistry impacts their everyday lives. In this regard, ACS Central Science can be a powerful vehicle for elevating the visibility of chemistry in the world at large.
You—our authors and readers—immediately saw the value. You submitted your most exciting research findings and helped us deliver the message of chemistry’s centrality in science and society. In our first 12 issues we showcased leading edge research in which chemical concepts and technologies were applied to problems related to human health, energy science and climate change. Our research articles highlighted opportunities at the interface of chemistry and computer science, the focus of our anniversary symposium, and unveiled exciting new materials for batteries, catalysis and drug delivery. As an early testament to our breadth, one of our first few issues (June 2015) reported on the diverse topics of sea spray aerosol chemistry, new cancer imaging agents, and fundamental theories of hydrogen bonding. Fast-forward to this month, and you will see synthetic fuel catalysts and ionic liquid/electrode interfacial physics alongside a paper from my own lab introducing new diagnostic tests for early detection of type I diabetes and thyroid cancer.
We also published important fundamental discoveries in core areas of chemistry—new principles of catalysis, supramolecular structures, synthetic methods and theoretical models. And our front matter informed and entertained readers with stories of emerging industries and initiatives—synthetic food and personalized medicine, to name a few—as well as interviews with the fascinating people behind the science. ACS Central Science truly has something for everyone, and, importantly, everyone has access.
The journal’s first year of publication was also my first as an Editor, a personally and professionally enriching experience that I continue to embrace with gusto. Work in the trenches of scientific publishing stretches your brain in all kinds of new directions. I learned more chemistry reading a year of ACS Central Science submissions than in the three decades prior. Some of this newfound knowledge has infiltrated the classes I teach. I met more people from more diverse backgrounds—ACS staff, other editors, publishers, writers and reporters, as well as scientists around the globe—than any academic job could deliver. The experience has also tuned me in to professional opportunities that can benefit my students and postdocs, both past and present. I was surprised by how much there is to learn about publishing, even after one has published hundreds of papers from the other side of the table.
As it was when I celebrated my kids’ 1-year-old birthdays, I am proud of our accomplishments but anticipate much growth, hard work and exhilaration ahead. Our authors and readers will continue to form the core of our success, so keep the outstanding submissions coming and, as always, we welcome your feedback. I look forward to another year of shining light on chemistry’s centrality.
Views expressed in this editorial are those of the author and not necessarily the views of the ACS.