Dear Reader,
We would like to take this opportunity to wish you all the best for 2013!
For RNA Biology this is a special year, as it will be our 10th year of publication. We want to thank you for your support over the past years be it by submitting your own work, serving as peer-reviewer or guest-editor, or supporting our journal as member of the editorial board.
RNA Biology was launched in 2004 as a quarterly publication overseen by three Editors-in-Chief, Jan Barciszewski, Volker A Erdmann and Eric G Moss. The goal of RNA Biology was to bring together work in diverse disciplines that bears on RNA in the biology of cells and organisms. Much of that work was scattered in many different journals, and by gathering those papers under one roof, it was hoped that researchers would be better informed, more cross-fertilization would occur and the attention of the larger scientific community would be drawn to this important research. In 2007, Renée Schroeder took over as Editor-in-Chief, and in 2009 Paul Gardner joined the editorial team as Assistant Editor-in-Chief to oversee the RNA Families track. We were pleased to see the journal grow from year to year. In 2010 we switched to a bi-monthly publication schedule, and since 2012 RNA Biology appears monthly.
In its 10th year of publication, RNA Biology has become an important forum for RNA related research. Our journal is well established in the community, which is reflected by a continuous growth of high quality content and our latest impact factor of 4.9.
In addition to regular research paper submissions, the editorial team provides a variety of solicited contents such as timely Reviews, Point-of-Views (PoVs), Landes Highlights and papers in our RNA families track. Our PoV articles, in which authors discuss their previously published work, providing additional insights into novel aspects and current working models, were extremely successful and we will continue publishing this innovative publication type. Landes Highlights discuss interesting papers related to RNA research, recently published in other Landes Bioscience journals. A brief summary and a link to the original paper are provided. The RNA Families track features articles that describe either substantial updates of existing RNA families or novel RNA families. Articles in this track are linked with corresponding Rfam entries. RNA Biology thereby supports and continues the efforts of the existing Rfam database to systematically collect and annotate primary ncRNA data.
Furthermore, we regularly publish Special Focus Issues on interesting and timely topics in the RNA field. In 2012 we published Specials on Small RNAs and Virulence/Pathogenesis (issue 9-4), RNA and Disease (9-6), and Toxin-Antitoxin (issue 9-12). For 2013 we have planned on publishing a number of Special Focus topics, starting with RNA Helicases, guest-edited by Dagmar Klostermeier (University of Muenster, Germany) in the current issue (10-1). Later this year, Specials on CRISPR/Cas, Hfq, Transcriptomes/Bioinformatics and PPR proteins will follow. New Special Focus topics are regularly announced on our website, and of course we welcome your suggestions for future topics.
Finally, RNA Biology offers several popular website features. Our iPad application allows you to read the full issue of RNA Biology anywhere, just as you would the print issue. Subscribe to our RSS feed to see the latest published papers and “Like” us on facebook for daily updates.
We are looking forward to another exciting and successful year for RNA Biology, and hope that you will enjoy and continue to support us in the future!
Sincerely,
Renée Schroeder, Ph.D.
Editor-in-Chief
Paul Gardner, Ph.D
Assistant Editor-in-Chief
Eva M. Riedmann, Ph.D.
Acquisitions Editor