Modern History of Our Journal: Chronicle of Difficult and Happy Years
Our journal is sixty years of age. It is considered that 60 years of life constitute one generation. However, the rates of developments in science vary, and it would be rash to use any time standard.Since the middle of the thirties when the happy idea to found the journal "Biokhimiya" inspired Alexander Nikolaevich Bakh, biochemistry as a science has grow up and "given birth" to a few new sciences, and it occupies the position of the recognized head of a numerous and prosperous family.
If we take a glance at the history of biochemistry over these 60 years, it can be compared with the geography of Christopher Columbus's time. Let us take the most familiar area for me, bioenergetics, as an example and see what had already been known and what was waiting for discoveries in the future.
- ATP had already been known for 6 years, but only 3 years later it
became clear that it is formed during respiration and 16 years later ATP was
shown to be formed in photosynthesis. The hypothesis about ATP as a "hard
currency" of the cell will be introduced only after 6 years.
- NADH was known under the clumsy name "first dihydrocodehydrogenase".
Its role as the universal hydrogen donor for the respiratory chain had not been
recognized.
- Mitochondria had been described in the last century, but nobody knew
that they are "electric power stations" of the cell.
- Respiratory phosphorylation had already been discovered, but the first
adequate hypothesis on the principle of its organization was proposed only 25
years later, and after another 17 years this hypothesis was to be recognized by
a Nobel prize.
- The mechanism of muscle contraction had to wait 16 years until the
ATPase activity of actomyosin was discovered.
- Photosynthesis was discovered long ago, but there were no ideas about
its organization. A member of our editorial board will be awarded a Nobel prize
for the structure of a photosynthetic reaction center 52 years later.
I became the Editor-in-Chief in the middle of 1988. It was the culmination period of Gorbachev's Perestroika in which the principle was declared: "If it is not forbidden, it is therefore permitted". From this standpoint, I decided to explore what could be improved in the journal, seeing that old prohibitions and obstacles quickly collapsed in the country and society.
Reformation was achieved without "destruction of the foundation" first of all because I inherited from my great predecessor a commonwealth of wonderful people who were selected by Severin and who worked for many years to create and maintain this journal. Here I want to mention Rada Draganovna Ozrina, scientific secretary of our journal since 1975. Her enthusiasm, endless patience, intellect, tactfulness, and style of work made her a good angel of our "child". Good words I must also say about Nadezhda Ivanovna Chirkova, permanent head of editorial office of "Biokhimiya", and her assistants.
Reform of the journal immediately met financial difficulties: the requirement of additional work required money. I applied to directors of biochemical institutes that were relatively rich even at that time to become our sponsors. And we were supported by the institutes of Bioorganic Chemistry, Proteins, Molecular Biology, Biochemistry, and the Belozersky Institute of Physico-Chemical Biology at Moscow State University. However, half of all sums of money was taken by Nauka Publishing House, which completely confiscated the remains in the end of the year. Soon financial crisis began in the country. Institutes became beggars and could not be our sponsors any more. So we had to apply to the USA, to Plenum Publishing House, where only grandparents were familiar with the crisis. According to an agreement with the Presidium of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, the All-Union Agency on Author's Rights, and Nauka, Plenum translated and issued the English version of our journal for more than 30 years. The editorial board had nothing to do with this agreement since it was a matter of hard currency which was strictly forbidden for Soviet people to see. All negotiations between Nauka and Plenum were mediated by the All-Union Agency on Author's Rights, which was either completely incompetent in this business or it strived for its own purposes rather than for the prosperity of our journals and their authors. We investigated the conditions of the contract, and since the time for its renegotiation approached and the power of the State was weakened, we took part in negotiations with Plenum. There were difficult and long discussions. Once the possibility of the agreement with Plenum was on the verge of failure But finally we singed an agreement providing fourfold increase of assignments from Plenum for Biokhimiya. This allowed rearrangement of the work of the journal and financial support for our authors and some other useful things (see below) under conditions of severest economical crisis, when survival not only of the journal, but of research institutes and scientists was questionable.
What distinguishes the present journal from the journal that was published eight years ago? First of all, the time for publication of papers shortened in the Russian version from 15 to 5 months and for the English version from 27 to 5 months. Now the Russian and English versions are issued simultaneously and the period from submission to publication of papers is not longer than that for leading international biochemical journals.
This was achieved due to formation of two teams in the editorial office. One of them prepares the original Russian version, and the other one begins to work on the English version right after acceptance of a manuscript for publication. Earlier Plenum waited for the appearance of the Russian version and only then began to translate it. This very effective work to a greater extent is facilitated by Richard Lozier, head of the "English" team and a known American biochemist, one of the leading experts in "retinal" proteins. He moved from California to Moscow for permanent work in the Institute of Physico-Chemical Biology at Moscow State University. The outstanding talents of Lozier as translator and editor essentially improved not only the quality of translation, but of the papers as well. Very often authors receive his advise both on the translation of their papers and the content itself. Parallel work on both versions of the paper allows his recommendations to be taken into consideration.
Due to the sharply increased support from Plenum, we were able to buy equipment for modern editorial work (computers, fax, electronic mail) and preparation of original copy. The improvement of our financial position allowed us to pay adequate salaries for people involved in the preparation of both versions of the journal. We also organized paid multiple review of papers. This resulted in a change in the style of communication between reviewers and authors. Now, instead of simple irreversible rejection of a paper, reviewers try to assist in its improvement to publishable quality.
For the most interesting papers we organized a new category, "Accelerated publications", where papers are published within 4 months. Also, I write to authors of such papers to invite them to submit papers to international journals. Being a member of Editorial boards of "FEBS Letters", "Biochemistry and Molecular Biology International" (BMBI), and "Bioscience Reports", I can come to a final decision about the publication of a paper. Using this possibility many of our biochemists have joined the international scientific community, and "FEBS Letters" and "BMBI" have become leaders in publishing papers of Russian scientists.
Recently, "Biokhimiya" has been added to the list of journals entered into the bibliographic databases of Medline, Current Contents, and Science Citation Index. The presence of key words in each paper was one precondition. However, that innovation was already accepted at a meeting of the Editorial Board on 28 November 1988. So, "Biokhimiya" is included into the "collective memory of the planet", and the abstract of a paper of any author can found in a few seconds and appear on the display of any computer user of these information systems. We are now preparing the "Home page" of "Biokhimiya" for the Internet system. It will include a description of the journal contents of issues, abstracts with key words, and also post and electronic addresses and fax number of authors. The page will be issued monthly. We also have negotiations with Plenum to get permission for introduction in Internet of full papers of accelerated publications as examples of papers published in Biokhimiya.
In general, I see in the future that good journals will present ALL their papers via Internet soon after acceptance of the paper for publication, i.e., before appearance of the printed version. Of course publishing houses resist this innovation because it may reduce subscriptions for the printed version. This tendency could be avoided by reducing the price of printed versions. A more radical way is governmental support or sponsorship by international organizations of journals that practice this most progressive mechanism for dissemination of scientific information.
An important consequence of this system will be a revaluation of the journal world. I predict a sharp increase in citation of journals available via Internet compared with journals that still work routinely. Of course such factors as tradition, prestige, and fashion play a certain role in science, but I feel that this role will finally take its appropriate position and become less hypertrophic than now.
Suffice it to say that before introduction into the international information systems our journal, which represents in biochemistry one of the most "scientific" countries in the world, only served as a certain "consolation prize" for authors who did not have the possibility to publish papers in the international journals. The majority of scientists in the world cannot read Russian, and only the few biggest libraries abroad have the Russian version of "Biokhimiya". Before reorganization of the journal, the English version usually appeared with a very long delay. It was printed without authors' correction and therefore contained mistakes that even misconstrued the sense. Also, that English version was very expensive. So, only very rich libraries could afford to subscribe to it. In addition, for the first 22 years the English version did not exist at all.
That is why the paper describing the discovery of oxidative phosphorylation in the respiratory chain that was published by V. A. Belitser and E. T. Tsybakova in "Biokhimiya" in 1939 became known in the West only in the 1960s due to my efforts. A. Lehninger did not know about that paper of Russian scientists, and in fact he rediscovered this phenomenon ten years later. But he could have spent his time, creative potential, and talent for the further development of the already known experiments made by Belitser and Tsybakova!
Considering the route the journal has traveled during recent years, we should remember that "Biokhimiya" gave modest but nevertheless important support for our scientists in the most difficult years for science during the postwar period. In the peak of the crisis (the beginning of 1993) the journal began to pay an honorarium of 10,000 rubles to authors. This lasted during 9 months up to the conclusion of a new contract with Plenum Publishing. That contract raised the authors' honorarium significantly. Also, authors could get an additional sum of money for the translation of their papers into English. These sums were paid immediately, without long-term bureaucratic procrastination and exorbitant allotments typical for the former All-Union Agency for Authors' Rights. Authors began to receive 20 reprints of the English version of the paper simultaneously with the delivery of the original typeset copy to the publisher, i.e., before printing of the journal. Promotion of the best authors to "FEBS Letters" and other prestigious journals (see above) was very important psychologically: we all needed some positive emotions during that difficult time.
The journal regularly published information about Russian and International Foundations having resources available to our biochemists. Earlier there was no tradition to publish information such as that found in "Poisk" and in special brochures.
In 1992 "Biokhimiya" became one of the first journals to consider papers without requiring a certificate that formally declared the absence of state secrets in the paper.
Since last year the Editorial Board distributes free 100 copies of the journal to leading libraries and Institutes of Russia and other CIS countries.
The journal is becoming a truly international edition. Nobel Prize winners Dr. D. Baltimore (USA) and Dr. H. Michel (Germany), President of the French Academy of Sciences Dr. M. Grunberg-Manago, the well-known biochemist from Seattle Dr. H. Neurath, and editor of the English version Dr. R. Lozier (USA) have joined the Editorial Board of our journal.
Beginning this year the English Since version has been published by MAIK-Nauka/Interperiodica. Plenum retained only the task of distribution of this version. Fortunately, these changes did not influence the financial condition of the journal. Moreover, the transition to Interperiodica finally allowed improving the quality of the Russian version published by Nauka. We have been fighting for this unsuccessfully for eight years. Also, we increased the size of the journal.
Some of our plans are still is not fully realized. For example, a new section "Biochemistry News" has a deficit of papers in spite of a reasonable additional honorarium for authors. I hope this situation will be improved due to the attraction of a biochemist from St. Petersburg, Dr. A. G. Golubev, to this work. Being a man of great erudition, he has a talent for simple and interesting interpretation of difficult scientific truth.
The plan for regular publication of "minireviews" on key aspects of biochemistry is also not realized. This is my fault: I could not force myself to press members of the Editorial Board involved in this work. It seems I have not learned to give orders when science is concerned.
Unfortunately, we do not have real business contacts with the Russian Biochemical Society which was invited to be one of founders of the journal. Of course as President of this society I feel my guilt.
In conclusion, I would like to show you a figure (what paper would do without pictures in our television century!) demonstrating the total number of manuscripts submitted to out journal annually, number of rejected papers, papers sent for revision, periods for publication of the Russian and English versions, and total number of subscribers.
Fig. 1. Dynamics of submission of manuscripts, periods for publication of papers, and the number of subscribers in 1987-1996. a: 1) Total number of submitted papers; 2) number of rejected papers; 3) number of accelerated publications; 4) number of papers accepted after revision (% of published papers). b: 1) Time for publication in the section "Accelerated Publications", "Biochemistry News", and "Short Communications" (months); 2, 3) average period for publication of papers in the Russian and the English versions, respectively (months); 4) number of subscriber to the Russian and English versions.The figure shows that the total number of submitted papers decreased in 1989 and remained lower until an increase appeared in 1994-1995. This increase continues now. The lower number of submitted papers in 1989-1993 may have been due to a few reasons. First of all, the opening of Russian society stimulated our scientists to publish papers abroad. This period was also characterized by the development of a financial crisis which seriously complicated research work in fundamental science. In the very beginning we toughened reviewing of papers, and this dissuaded some traditional authors of our journal. The latter factor was overcome by changing reviewing policy. If in these difficult years an author was able to finish a study and write a paper, a reviewer of "Biokhimiya" had to try to improve it to publishable condition even after twofold and even threefold critical reevaluation. This is a scientific and civil duty of reviewers. I must say that bright reviewers of our journal perfectly realize their duties. Very often they work as scientific editors and the journal pays them additional fees.
Considering the augmentation of the number of papers submitted in 1994-1995, we should take into consideration the very unfavorable factor of the collapse of the USSR, this interrupting completely the cooperation with scientists from Baltic countries. The number of papers from other former Socialist Republics also decreased.
Increase in the number of accelerated publications, papers receiving highest evaluation from both referees, is a positive tendency in 1993-1995.
I will not say more about the curves showing the time for publication of both versions of the journal; they speak for themselves. Now we are close to the maximal rate which is possible under our conditions.
Of course the reduction in the number of subscribers is upsetting. However, it is surprising that subscribers still exist in spite of lack of money and poverty. Thanking our subscribers, I would like to finish this paper.
