Cellular & Molecular Immunology (CMI) is a 13-year-old ‘young’ journal. In 2009, we were delighted to obtain our first impact factor score of 2.765. Since then, the impact factor of CMI has increased (Figure 1). Based on the 2015 Journal Citation Report released by Thomson Reuters, CMI has reached a new impact factor milestone with a score of 5.193 (5.018 without journal self-cites) and is ranked #31 out of 150 journals in the Immunology Category. In the ‘Impact Factor Era,’ nothing makes journal editors happier than seeing this delightful breakthrough. Here, we would like to share our happiness with our contributors. On behalf of the editors of CMI, Drs Xuetao Cao, Yongjun Liu, Zhigang Tian, our guest editors and the editorial board members, we express our sincere thanks to all of the authors, peer reviewers and readers.

Figure 1
figure 1

Changes in impact factor score of CMI between 2009 and 2015.

In a retrospective review of the papers published in the last three years (2014–2016) that contributed to immunology worldwide and our readership, we found six papers on viral hepatitic immunology, including topics ranging from HBV receptor NTCP,1 HBV-persistent mouse models and their immunologic tolerance,2 new perspectives on the immune tolerance to chronic clinical HBV infection,3 the roles of neutrophils4 and NK cells5 in HBV infection, and the role of chemokines in HCV infection,6 because these topics were attractive to our readers and investigators. We predict that the immunological study of viral hepatitis, a worldwide health problem, will continue to be important and sought-after research for many more decades.

Additionally, eight highly cited papers focused on reproductive immunology, including the physiological and pathological activation of immune cells in preterm labor,7 the interaction of extracellular vesicles with the maternal immune system during reproduction,8 the integrative roles of chemokines,9 MicroRNAs,10 NK cells,11 DCs12 and Th17 cells13, 14 at the maternal−fetal interface during pregnancy, and testicular immune privilege.15 The ongoing investigation of the unique immunological features of mammalian reproduction is likely to continue to attract increasing research and readership.

The interaction of iPSCs with the immune system has been investigated by many researchers, and two papers have focused on the potential immunogenicity of iPSCs16, 17 and their applications in immunotherapy,17 with both subjects likely to garner increased interest as their novel field of research develops.

We hope that more immunologists will contribute their best papers to CMI, among which we will organize more papers with common interesting into special issues to shape CMI’s features. We will continue to do our best to provide superior services to our authors and high-quality papers in immunology to our readers.