PRESS RELEASE FROM NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP
25 June 2009

Contact: Grace Baynes
Corporate Public Relations, Nature Publishing Group
T:+44 (0)20 7014 4063
g.baynes@nature.com

Nature Photonics' first Impact Factor of 24.982 clearly demonstrates the importance of this new title. The journal ranks first in both the optics and applied physics categories of the Science Edition of the 2008 Journal Citation Report (JCR), published this month by Thomson Reuters. Nature Photonics has the highest Impact Factor of all 353 journals which received their first evaluation in the 2008 JCR.

Launched in January 2007, Nature Photonics is dedicated to the best photonics research from academia and industry, with a scope that runs from fundamental science to engineering. "Photonics as a discipline impacts on many fields, and Nature Photonics publishes articles from optics to physics to engineering," said Dr Jason Wilde, NPG's Publisher for the Physical Sciences. "In order for articles to be of interest to a wide readership, the research needs to have broad impact and be of exceptional quality, as demonstrated by this first Impact Factor."

Nature Photonics' Impact Factor exceeds that of its competitors in the JCR Optics category by a wide margin: Laser and Photonics Reviews (4.357), Optics Express (3.880) and Optic Letters (3.772).

In the 'Physics, Applied' category of the JCR, Nature Photonics' sister journal Nature Materials is a close 2nd, with an Impact Factor of 23.132. Elsevier's Materials Science & Engineering R-Reports ranks 3rd, with an Impact Factor of 12.619, the only other journal in the category with an Impact Factor above 10.000.

Nature Photonics is the first research journal published by NPG to have its main editorial office in the Asia-Pacific region. Dr Oliver Graydon, Chief Editor of Nature Photonics, is based in Tokyo, Japan. "The decision to place the core editorial team in Tokyo was based on the strengths of the Asia-Pacific region in photonics research," said David Swinbanks, Publishing Director for the Physical Sciences at Nature Publishing Group and CEO of Nature Asia-Pacific. Three of the ten most cited articles published in Nature Photonics to date are from authors based in Japan.

Nature Photonics joins a growing portfolio of physical science Nature research journals that lead their fields. Nature Materials (23.132) and Nature Nanotechnology (20.571) both top one or more JCR categories. Nature Physicsis the number one primary research journal in multidisciplinary physics with an Impact Factor of 16.821. Launched this year, Nature Chemistry is already attracting high calibre research of wide interest.

Nature Photonics' strong debut Impact Factor is evidence of NPG's commitment to high quality and adding value to the literature. The publisher has consistently launched research journals in fields where there is space for a highly selective journal, publishing exceptional research of broad impact.

-ENDS-

Notes for Editors

All Impact Factors are taken from the 2008 Journal Citation Report, Science Edition (Thomson Reuters, 2009).

Thomson Reuters provide information about how Impact Factors are calculated here:scientific.thomson.com/free/essays/journalcitationreports/impactfactor/ and more detail on the Journal Citation Report here: scientific.thomsonreuters.com/products/jcr/

Related announcements:

Launch of Nature Photonics (December 2006): www.nature.com/press_releases/Nature_Photonics_launches.pdf

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