J Paleolimnol (2007) 37:471–473 DOI 10.1007/s10933-007-9104-3
EDITORIAL
Journal of Paleolimnology: Celebrating 20 years of publication John P. Smol
Published online: 20 April 2007 Ó Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2007
The Journal of Paleolimnology (JOPL) is now celebrating 20 years of publication. In many respects, one would expect a jubilant editorial to mark this important milestone. In fact, I do believe there is much to be happy about concerning the progress of paleolimnology and the role that our journal has played in its many successes. I will return to some of these happier points later in this editorial, but first I would like to pay a tribute to my friend and former co-editor-in-chief for 14 years, William (Bill) M. Last. It is with regret that I report formally in JOPL that Bill Last decided to retire as co-editor in December 2006. Bill also retired as series co-editor of the Developments in Paleoenvironmental Research (DPER) book series. As many in the paleolimnological community know, Bill’s outstanding efforts helped hundreds of paleolimnologists bring their contributions to publication. Bill is well known for his good humor, contagious enthusiasm, tireless work ethic, and remarkable editing skills. Bill joined me as the co-editor of JOPL in 1993, and we worked very closely together for over 14 years. As I have said repeatedly, the success
J. P. Smol (&) Department of Biology, Paleoecological Environmental Assessment and Research Lab (PEARL), Queen’s University, 116 Barrie St., Kingston, ON, CanadaK7L 3N6 e-mail:
[email protected]
JOPL has enjoyed in the past 14 years can be attributed largely to Bill’s outstanding skills as an editor, as well as his strong inter-personal and leadership abilities. We wish him well in his future endeavors and will miss him greatly.
William (Bill) M. Last; Editor Emeritus (1993–2006)
Returning to happier topics, I believe there is much to be pleased about regarding our journal! As we celebrate 20 years of publication, it is an opportune time to look back at what has been accomplished over the last two decades. A good starting point for any retrospective tour might be the opening editorial to the first issue of JOPL (Smol 1988). On a personal level, it is interesting to recall what were identified as challenges and concerns over 20 years ago, and compare them to what actually did happen with the journal.
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Bill Last, happiest when sampling a saline lake
One of the first concerns many paleolimnologists had in the 1980s, when a journal dedicated to paleolimnology was proposed, was that there would never be enough submissions or readers to support such a specialized journal. JOPL did have ‘‘growing pains’’ in those early years. Submissions were initially slow, and the early issues had a strong bias towards biological (especially diatom-based) paleolimnology, with a geographic focus on North America. With time, the journal became broader in its thematic and geographic foci. Sitting here in my Editor’s chair, I can assure everyone that a paucity of manuscripts has not been a problem for this journal for some years! The number of outstanding manuscripts being submitted continues to escalate. This, however, presents the problem of increasing our page budgets (which went up again slightly this year). JOPL’s current scope of subject matter and geographic coverage should be the envy of all multidisciplinary journals. Although it is hard to pigeonhole JOPL papers, as they are now so multidisciplinary, when Bill Last and I recently attempted to categorize papers published in 2005, and assign them as either primarily biological or geological, we came up with a 51% to 49% split (i.e. almost even spread between biological and non-biological studies). A similar analysis on geographic locations indicated that, in 2005, about a quarter of our papers were from Europe, and a similar proportion from North America, with the balance split amongst other continents. An assessment of subject matter covering our 20 years of publication indicates an initial surge of
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papers dealing with lake acidification (and especially diatom-based studies), followed by a steady expansion of subjects covering the diverse areas that make up paleolimnology. It is quite a contrast to compare the content of some of our early issues to the papers we are currently publishing. For example, in 2006, we had topics ranging from eutrophication in brackish waters (Weckstro¨m 2006), to the study of contaminants from power plants (Donahue et al. 2006), to interglacial climatic reconstructions from Siberia (e.g. Ilyashuk et al. 2006) A concern noted in the 1980s, and one addressed in the opening editorial (Smol 1988), was that a new journal such as JOPL would needlessly fragment and isolate paleolimnology. This has not happened at all, as paleolimnological approaches have been so successfully and seamlessly incorporated into so many new studies and endeavors. JOPL has served the dual roles of fostering the interdisciplinary nature of paleolimnology and coalescing paleolimnology into a well-respected discipline. As I wrote in 1988, it was my hope that the journal ‘‘...will provide a common vehicle for bringing together the diverse concepts, ideas, and techniques that make up paleolimnology. Rather than further fragment the science, it should help bring it together’’. I think we have fulfilled that expectation. So where do we stand now? JOPL continues to enjoy the enviable position of being able to consistently publish high-quality papers covering diverse subjects, on or ahead of schedule. With Springer’s highly competitive and effective delivery of journals via university consortia and other electronic packages, JOPL is very widely available. Moreover, with the recent addition of the OnLine First feature on the Springer web site, papers are now accessible, and fully citable by their doi (digital object identifier) numbers, shortly after galleys are corrected. The various citation indices, such as ‘‘impact factors’’ and other metrics produced by Thomson Scientific, continue to be very kind to JOPL. For example, in 2006, JOPL had the second highest impact factor of the 17 limnology journals currently ranked by Thomson Scientific, with impressive rankings in other subject categories as well. Although these indices have to be used cautiously, and I believe are often misinterpreted and over-interpreted, they do show that our papers are widely read and cited. New changes are coming. For example, we are now
J Paleolimnol (2007) 37:471–473
moving to a web-based journal submission and review system. These continue to be exciting times for paleolimnology and JOPL. There are many reasons to be happy and optimistic. I think we can be justifiably proud of the contribution the Journal of Paleolimnology has made to our discipline, as well as a wide spectrum of associated fields of research. I look forward to our future contributions with excitement!
473 hydrocarbons (PAHs) in lake sediments in central Alberta, Canada. J Paleolimnol 35:111–128 Ilyashuk BP, Andreev AA, Bobrov AA, Tumskoy VE, Ilyashuk EA (2006) Interglacial history of a palaeo-lake and regional environment: a multi-proxy study of a permafrost deposit from Bol’shoy Lyakhovsky Island, Arctic Siberia. J Paleolimnol 35:855–872 Smol JP (1988) Journal of Paleolimnology – further fragmentation or the synthesis of a developing science? J Paleolimnol 1:3 Weckstro¨m K (2006) Assessing recent eutrophication in coastal waters of the Gulf of Finland (Baltic Sea) using subfossil diatoms. J Paleolimnol 35:571–592
References Donahue W, Allen E, Schindler D (2006) Impacts of coal-fired power plants on trace metals and polycyclic aromatic
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