BioMed Central Blog
New and improved impact factors for BioMed Central journals in the 2008 JCR
The latest edition of Thomson Reuter's Journal Citation Reports has just been released, with official Impact Factors for a total of 59 BioMed Central journals†. Impact factors are by no means a perfect quality metric, but these journal citation data provide strong evidence of the growing success of BioMed Central's open access journal portfolio.
Highlights include:
- Impressive initial Impact Factors for two key titles in the BMC series: BMC Medicine and BMC Systems Biology
- Initial Impact Factor for Nutrition & Metabolism, placing it in the top 25% of the NUTRITION & DIETETICS category
- Initial Impact Factor of 3.45 for Neural Development
- An increased Impact Factor for BMC Bioinformatics, now ranked #3 of 28 in MATHEMATICAL & COMPUTATIONAL BIOLOGY.
- An increased Impact Factor for BMC Plant Biology, which is now ranked #14 of 152 in PLANT SCIENCES (one of the top 10 research journals listed in the category)
- An increased Impact Factor of Malaria Journal . The TROPICAL MEDICINE category now has open access journals in both the #1 and #2 spots.
- Excellent performance by BioMed Central's cancer journals: Breast Cancer Research and Molecular Cancer's Impact Factors both increased to above 5.0, while BMC Cancer's Impact Factor is now above 3.0.
- Improved Impact Factors for society-affiliated journals published by BioMed Central: Geochemical Transactions , Journal of Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance and Acta Veterinaria Scandinavica
- A significantly increased Impact Factor for Critical Care, ranked #4 of 21 in CRITICAL CARE MEDICINE.
Full Impact Factor listing (new or increased impact factors are shown in bold)
† The Impact Factor for these titles are not yet present in the online version of the JCR database due to a technical problem at Thomson Reuters. The Impact Factor's shown are official Impact Factors provide by Thomson Reuters and will appear in the update to the 2008 JCR later this year.
The following titles: Substance Abuse Treatment, Prevention, and Policy, Molecular Neurodegeneration and Implementation Science, although tracked in Web of Science since 2006 and so expected to have Impact Factors this year, did not have data extracted by Thomson Reuters in time to generate a 2008 Impact Factor, so will appear in the 2009 JCR.
* Thomson Reuters have confirmed that the Impact Factor for Journal of NeuroEngineering and Rehabilitation originally listed in the 2008 JCR (1.127) was erroneously low. They have calculated a corrected value of 2.085, which is included in the updated online version of the 2008 JCR released in late September 2009.
Blog updated 25th June 2009: Information on missing Impact Factors
Blog updated 3rd July 2009: 59 Impact Factors, not 58 - thanks Gavin!
Blog updated 6th July 2009: Corrected Impact Factor provided by Thomson Reuters for Journal of NeuroEngineering and Rehabilitation
Blog updated 1st October 2009: Thomson have released the updated online version of the JCR, including official Impact Factors for BMC Systems Biology, Chemistry Central Journal, Diagnostic Pathology, Journal of Cardiothoracic Surgery, Neural Development and Radiation Oncology (which had been omitted in error from the initial release) and providing corrected (increased) Impact Factors for Journal of NeuroEngineering and Rehabilitation and BMC Structural Biology (which had been understated in the initial release).
Posted by Matthew Cockerill at 21:20 Comments (8)
Posted by Matt McKay on June 29, 2009 at 02:59 PM BST #
One question. I cannot find BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth on your list.What is the actual impact factor of BMC pregnancy and childbirth?
Yours faithfully
M.Kammerer
Posted by Martin Kammerer on July 01, 2009 at 11:19 AM BST #
Thanks
Posted by Chandra Prakash Kala on July 01, 2009 at 11:24 AM BST #
Posted by Anthony Cavender on July 01, 2009 at 02:51 PM BST #
Can you please tell me what is the impact factor of BMC Psychiatry? It is not on the list.
Best regards,
Graça Cardoso
Posted by Graça Cardoso on July 01, 2009 at 07:55 PM BST #
Thanks
Posted by Muhammad Imran Naseer on July 02, 2009 at 01:57 AM BST #
Posted by Chih-Hao Chen on July 06, 2009 at 02:50 PM BST #
The Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine is not yet tracked by Thomson Reuters as part of Web of Science, and so does not yet have an Impact Factor listed in the JCR. However, the citation data in Web of Science from other journals allows an unofficial Impact Factor to be calculated which provides a good estimate of what the Impact Factor would be. The 2007 unofficial Impact Factor for Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine was 1.23.
BMC Psychiatry is tracked by Thomson Reuters and should receive its first official Impact Factor in June 2010. Its 2007 unofficial Impact Factor was 1.28.
BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth's 2007 unofficial Impact Factor was 1.16.
[Updated unofficial Impact Factors based on 2008 citation data will be made available shortly.]
Because Molecular Brain only published its first articles in 2008, it is to early for any estimate of its Impact Factor to be made, official or unofficial.
Thomson Reuters have indicated that the corrected version of the JCR is likely to be released in the late Summer / early Fall.
Posted by Matthew Cockerill on July 16, 2009 at 06:35 PM BST #