This issue of Powder Metallurgy represents an innovation: it is a ‘hybrid’ issue, consisting of both printed and online-only content. While the print issue has the normal appearance and page extent, a further 200 pages of original research papers are being made available online. The titles and page numbers of these online-only papers will appear in the contents list published in the printed version and subscribers can read them on the journal’s online site at www.ingentaconnect.com/content/maney/pm.
I emphasise that the papers appearing in the online-only section of the issue have been peer reviewed in exactly the same manner as any other paper in the journal, and will be indexed on the same basis by ISI, Scopus and other indexing services. In these two very important respects, there is no difference between the papers published in the two sections of this issue. Importantly, all authors of the on-line only content have confirmed their agreement to this mode of publication.
The publication of online-only content allows us to address another issue I am aware is of critical importance to authors; that is, to reduce the time between acceptance of papers and publication in an issue. Recent years have seen a significant increase in submissions and, despite PM’s rigorous refereeing procedures, there is now a considerable backlog of material. The hybrid issue will help the journal to achieve its target of reducing the time from acceptance to publication in an issue to below six months by the start of 2012. (I should stress that papers will continue to be published online via the journal’s Fast Track route as soon as proof corrections are returned. Fast Track papers can be viewed via the url above and cited using their unique DOI, or digital object identifier, found on the first page of each paper.)
This experiment with a new publishing approach also goes alongside other developments in online publication. Authors are being encouraged to incorporate supplementary material with their papers. This could include video files, animations and other content that is not compatible with standard journal format, or datasets or additional information that cannot be accommodated for reasons of space. For further information, consult the instructions for authors at www.maney.co.uk/journals/pom. It is also possible, for the first time, in 2011 to subscribe only to the online version of the journal (which allows access to both HTML and PDF versions of papers). These innovations, and the decision to publish a hybrid issue, are driven by the knowledge that a majority of PM readers are now accessing and reading the journal online.
It is not planned to produce further hybrid issues in 2011, though this year will see the production of five issues rather than the previous four per annual volume. We shall review the situation for 2012, together with plans for other projects such as digitisation of some of PM’s archive.
Graham Schaffer
Editor
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