Editorial

The end of 2005 marks the completion of the second publication year for this editorial team. We thank the contributing authors, editorial team and board, and especially the 233 reviewers who have been of such great assistance to the performance of the journal. Their names are given at the end of this editorial.

The declared scope of the journal has been borne out in its published pages. This journal is devoted to high-quality original research that explores the mechanisms of disease pathogenesis, based on both human and experimental studies. Particular emphasis is given to research that elucidates the structural and molecular pathogenesis of disease. This includes research identifying the mechanisms underlying the morphologic manifestations of disease. We also seek high-quality reports that translate basic research findings into advances in diagnostic methodologies for human disease, and rigorous, full-length reports of technical advances in the investigation of human or experimental disease. The latter may include reports of novel animal models of disease, with detailed phenotypic characterization. Lastly, we publish concise critical reviews in the form of Minireviews, devoted to mechanisms of disease.

These principles are reflected well in the articles drawing the greatest attention from the reading public. Table 1 gives the top 10 articles accessed from the web in the form of HTML or PDF downloads, for publication years 2004–2005. The top article (de Kok et al) is, in fact, a technical report of which are the best ‘control genes’ to use for gene expression studies, and was viewed over 3900 times in 2005 at the time of this writing (January–September). This article is a detailed and rigorous analysis of the reproducibility of gene expression measurements. The second article (Zagzag et al) reveals the role of major histocompatibility complex antigens in invading glioma cells. The third article (Cunningham and Gotlieb) is a minireview on the role of shear stress in the pathogenesis of atherosclerosis. Of the remaining seven articles, one is a minireview on proteomics in pathology research; three are original research exploring a mechanism of invasive behavior in glioblastoma, and injury to the heart and pancreas; and three are also technical reports, on isolation of intrahepatic lymphocytes, detection of Variola virus in archived human tissue, and rapid detection of von Hippel–Lindau gene (VHL) exon deletions.

Table 1 Top 10 articles downloaded as HTML or PDF files, January 2005–September 2005

Table 2 gives the top 10 articles cited in the literature. The cited topics range from intestinal epithelial barrier function, and differentiation of insulin-producing cells from bone marrow stem cells; to molecular studies of cancers of the stomach, colon, kidney, and bladder. There are highly ‘current’ themes, such as stem cells, DNA methylation, analysis of receptors for PDGF and EGF. Interestingly, two technical reports are also among the top 10 cited articles: SELDI mass spectrometry for analysis of serum amyloid variants, and amplification of RNA transcripts using terminal continuation.

Table 2 Top 10 cited articles, January 2004–September 2005

We draw several conclusions from these data. First, the high volume of web downloads makes it clear that the scientific world turns to the web for access to the published literature. This underscores the value of electronic subscriptions to the scientific literature (and we are working to ensure that all major academic institutions have an electronic subscription to this journal). Second, published articles addressing molecular mechanisms of carcinogenesis are highly read, and this journal addresses the breadth of human and animal carcinogenesis. Third, mechanisms of tissue injury and response are also important, again across the panoply of mammalian tissues. Fourth, technical reports and critical reviews are of high value. The attention given to our technical reports is particular affirmation of our philosophy of publishing full-length papers, with detailed and rigorous reporting of data validating the reported methodology.

In 2005 (volume 85), we have published 129 articles across the broad spectrum of human and animal disease. A total of 41% of the articles were studies of human tissues; 43% were animal studies (ignoring the occasional articles which utilize both human and animal tissues). Technical reports and Minireviews comprise the remaining 16%. Studies of cancer totaled 24%; of noncancer topics 76%. There is a broad distribution across essentially all organ systems, with the brain (10%), gut (16%), and liver (16%) being the most common. The cardiovascular system (9%), hematopoietic and lymphoid system (9%), pancreas (8%), and kidney (5%) comprise a mid-frequency group. We are interested in increasing the number of articles we publish in the categories of breast, prostate, and endocrine other than pancreas diabetes, as these are under-represented in our pages (3, 4, and 3%, respectively). We welcome articles from these and other ‘tissue’ areas (eg, bone and soft tissue, skin, head-and-neck, gynecologic), but recognize that there are excellent subspecialty journals in these areas. Overall, these publication numbers reflect both the broad distribution of submitted articles, and the high quality of submitted articles in each potential category. The journal does not ‘pitch’ to one area of emphasis, as expert reviewers appropriate to each topic category are selected for external review.

Each month, we have highlighted articles of clear general interest to our readership. ‘Inside Lab Invest’ is a monthly editorial feature that gives background and comment on three to five articles per issue; the highlighted articles are featured each month on the home webpage for Lab Invest. ‘Inside Lab Invest’ also is published in the back pages of our sister journal, Modern Pathology. These editorial commentaries are intended to give context and perspective on articles in our pages; they also serve as an entry point for web access to our featured articles. We also now have opportunity to upload over half of our published articles to the main Nature Publishing Group web-environment, through the topical links found on the main web page (www.nature.com). Thus, authors publishing in Laboratory Investigation have substantive and multiple opportunities for ‘featured’ treatment of their work.

For volumes 84 and 85 (2004–2005), we have published ‘Pathology Elsewhere’, which seeks to identify recent key publications of relevance to articles published in the same issue of Lab Invest. In the coming year (2006, volume 86), this feature will be replaced by a ‘Pathology Forum’, in which single issues in the pathogenesis of disease will be examined by an expert editorial panel. At this time, I want to extend my thanks to the editorial team that has brought ‘Pathology Elsewhere’ to our pages for 2004–2005: Swan Thung, MD, Section Editor; and Sunil Badve, Maria Isabel Fiel, Maria Guido, Shabnam Jaffer, Gabriel S Levi, Raffaella Morotti, Romil Saxena, Arief Suriwanata, Guoxia Tong, Lawrence Tsao, and Ruliang Xu, Contributing Editors.

The journal has a strong commitment to providing timely and expert review of papers from submitting authors. Our acceptance rate was 26% in 2004, and 20% in 2005. Submissions are continuing at the same rate as in 2004 (615 new submissions), with our being on target for approximately the same as in 2005. Submitted manuscripts are subjected to rigorous editorial evaluation to determine appropriateness for the journal and to assign an initial scientific priority, drawing upon the diverse scientific expertise of our Executive Editorial Group, with consultation from Editorial Board members as needed. For papers published in 2005, approximately 39% of manuscripts passed this initial review and underwent external peer-review evaluation. For those manuscripts that were not felt to be appropriate for the journal on initial editorial assessment (61%), authors were informed of the ‘reject’ within 5 days; not uncommonly, this information was given within 24 h. We feel that such rapid review is only fair, as it enables the authors maximum opportunity to seek publication elsewhere with negligible delay. For manuscripts undergoing full external review, a decision was almost always rendered within 30 days, with ‘in-house’ editorial processing time representing 5–7 of those days. For manuscripts that were rejected with opportunity to resubmit, there was a 90% likelihood that the manuscript would ultimately be published in Lab Invest. Decision time on the resubmitted paper was usually less than 5 days. Lastly, accepted articles were published on-line usually within 5 weeks, and hardcopy within 16 weeks.

Taken together, our overall ‘turnaround time’ for reaching an initial decision on submitted papers averages 8 calendar days. Our data also indicate that a successful article can go from initial submission, through review and revision, and move to electronic publication on the web with a minimum of delay – 73 days on average (not including the authors’ revision time) from initial submission to date of on-line publication, and 112 days until hardcopy publication. This high performance is made possible by the strong commitment of the editorial team, the consistent and outstanding timeliness of our outside expert reviewers, the efficiency of the production team at Nature Publishing Group, and the superb web-based platform upon which this journal runs. We consider this level of performance an absolute requisite for serving authors who choose to submit their manuscripts to this journal.

A comment on the journal ‘Impact Factor’ is in order. In the 1999–2003 time frame, this journal has resided in the vicinity of ‘4’, with a range of 3.934–4.530. Laboratory Investigation has thus routinely ranked third among the general Pathology journals, behind the American Journal of Pathology and the Journal of Pathology. The journal slipped a bit to an Impact Factor of 3.702 for 2004 (issued in July, 2005; reflecting 2004 citations of articles published in 2002–2003), placing us sixth among the 64 ‘Pathology’ journals. We consider that this reflects in part the editorial transition at the end of 2003, as effort was made at the previous editorial office to bring to completion processing and publication of manuscripts in their office, with ‘back-loading’ of the journal pages at the end of 2003. This gives less time for published articles to be cited in the measured time interval, in this case January–December 2004.

We have been tracking both ‘Impact Factor’ and the ‘Immediacy Index’ (articles cited in the same year as their publication) for articles published in this journal since the start of our editorship (2004). The 2004 ‘Immediacy Index’ for this journal was 0.748, third behind J Pathol (1.044) and Am J Pathol (0.957; excluding high self-citation journals). The ‘Immediacy Index’ reveals which journals are currently publishing the ‘hottest’ papers, and may be a good indicator of future ‘Impact Factor’ performance. Our calculated 2005 ‘Impact Factor’ is tracking well, with every indication that it will approach or exceed 4.5 when finally issued in June 2006. At the current time, our 2005 ‘Impact Factor’ is tracking third to J Pathol and Am J Pathol among the general Pathology journals. It should also be noted that Laboratory Investigation ranks second among all pathology journals for total citations in the literature (11 048), clearly marking this as a major journal in the biomedical literature. We thus consider that Laboratory Investigation is in a strong competitive position as we move into 2006.

In closing, we call attention to a recent discussion in this journal of the value of the ‘Pathology’ literature.¹ Note was made that much ‘pathology’ research finds its way into the highest impact general medical research journals, and especially into higher impact ‘specialty’ journals (devoted either to organ systems or specific diseases). With our fellow ‘General Pathology’ journal editors, we hope that the best in pathology research can be published within the pages of pathology-oriented journals. We hold to the view that there is ample opportunity for growth and visibility of the several pathology journals, not at the expense of one another, but rather to the benefit of all investigators pursuing research into disease pathobiology.

Reference

1 Crawford JM, Tykocinski ML. Pathology as the enabler of human research. Lab Invest 2005;85:1058–1064.

List of Reviewers for 2005

Abraham, Clara

Abreu, Maria

Ahmed, Asif

Alcaraz, Maria

Alpini, Gianfranco

Anders, Robert

Apostolopoulos, Vasso

Asa, Sylvia

Baldwin, Don

Barclay, Wendy

Barr, Frederic

Barrett, Kim

Bellon, Georges H

Biedermann, Barbara

Bindokas, Vytas

Bockman, Dale

Brat, Daniel

Broude, Natalia E

Buckley, Christopher D

Buxbaum, Joel

Buxton, Denis B

Campbell-Thompson, Martha

Carroll, Steven

Chakrabarty, Subhas

Chan, Edward K

Chan, Lawrence

Chapman, William

Chen, Ching Shih

Cheng, Jason

Cibas, Edmund

Clark, Stephen

Clawson, Gary

Cohen, Samuel

Coisne, Caroline

Corless, Christopher

Costa, Jose

Crawford, James

Cruickshank, Sheena

Czerniak, Bogdan

Dalakas, Marinos

Damjanov, Ivan

Dammann, Reinhard

Davidson, Ben

Dudek, Steven

Duyster, Justus

Dwinell, Michael

Eberhart, Charles

Edelberg, Jay

Fan, Jianglin

Farquhar, Marilyn

Farrell, William

Fink, Mitchell

Frank, Karen

Fu, Kai

Fujii, Yoshitaka

Galli, Stephen

Gallick, Gary

Garvin, A Julian

Gavrilova, Oksana

Gebhart, Erich

Geijtenbeek, Teunis BH

Gershwin, M Eric

Glickman, Jonathan

Goldenring, Jim

Gorham, James

Gotlieb, Avrum

Gottardi, Cara

Gown, Allen

Gratchev, Alexei

Greenberg, Miriam L

Greiner, Dale

Griffin, Sian

Gutmann, David

Hanson, Mark A

Hatch, Grant M

He, Tong-Chuan

Heffelfinger, Sue

Hohlfeld, Reinhard

Holmbeck, Kenn

Iruela-Arispe, Luisa

Isaacs, John

Jennette, J Charles

Kaneto, Hideaki

Kanwar, Yashpal

Keely, Stephen

Klemke, Richard L

Komuro, Issei

Krause, Diane

Kroll, Todd

Ku, H Teresa

Kumar, Shant

Kuwano, Kazuyoshi

Ladanyi, Marc

Lasota, Jerzy

Lax, Sigurd

Lencer, Wayne

Lewis, William

Li, Allen

Liew, Choong-Chin

Lim, Megan

Lin, Sue-Hwa

Lingen, Mark

Liu, Chen

Liu, Fei-Fei

Lizardi, Paul

Lloyd, Ricardo

Loike, John D

Luis, José

LuValle, Phyllis A

Martinez-Hernandez, Antonio

Mavier, Phillippe

May, W Stratford

McAnulty, Robin

McCormick, Beth

McCulloch, Christopher

McIndoe, Richard

McKinnon, Peter

McLean, Gordon W

McManus, Bruce

Merchant, Juanita

Meredith, Stephen

Merlin, Didier

Metcalfe, Dean D

Michalopoulos, George

Michiels, Carine

Milosevic, Michael

Mir, Kalim

Mischel, Paul

Mobasheri, Ali

Moldawer, Lyle

Möller, Peter

Montag, Anthony

Morris, Cindy

Murphy, George

Muyldermans, Serge

Nicosia, Roberto

Nose, Kiyoshi

Notterpek Fletcher, Lucia

Nowak, Greg

Oh, S Paul

Oka, Max

Opavsky, Anne

Pachter, Joel

Padanilam, Babu

Pagano, Claudio

Pang, Linhua

Papadaki, Helen

Paulus, Werner

Pawelec, Graham

Perry, Arie

Petersen, Bryon

Pfeifer, Gerd

Piao, Zhe

Pittenger, Mark

Podolsky, Robert

Polverini, Peter

Prystowsky, Michael

Rahman, Proton

Ramadori, Giuliano

Ramos, Daniel M

Ramphal, Reuben

Reddy, Janardan

Reedquist, Kris

Reidy, Michael

Reinach, Peter S

Reinecker, Hans-Christian

Resnick, Murray

Rimm, David

Rippe, Richard

Rogaeva, Ekaterina

Ryter, Stefan

Saade, George

Sadikot, Ruxana

Salmi, Marko

Samson, Willis K

Saraiva, Maria João

Satoh, Minoru

Satoskar, Abhay

Saubermann, Lawrence

Sawabu, Norio

Schnitt, Stuart

Sestak, Karol

Shah, Bukhtiar H

Shirwan, Haval

Soejima, Kenji

Sporn, Michael

Srivastava, Rakesh

Sternberg, David W

Stout, Robert D

Strazzabosco, Mario

Sudbø, Jon

Surh, Young-Joon

Szabo, Csaba

Tache, Yvette

Tari, Ana

Tartakoff, Alan

Taxy, Jerome

Thiede, Christian

Thomas, Douglas

Thorn, Mari

Tornillo, Luigi

Tryggvason, Karl

Tsao, Sai Wah

Tuan, Rocky S

Tuan, Tai-Lan

Van de Vijver, Marc

Van Gilst, Wiek

Vander Heide, Richard

Vandesompele, Jo

Vaux, David

Verin, Alexander

Wang, Jian-Ying

Wang, Kevin

Wang, Nancy

Wang, Rennian

Wang, Timothy

Wang, Xing-Peng

Watson, Susan

Wen, Tom

Wilson, Jeremy

Witztum, Joseph

Woo, Y Joseph

Wysocki, Lawrence

Xuan, Jim W

Yang, Lijun

Yauch, Robert

Yeh, I-Tien

Yoder, Brian

Young, Leonie

Zatloukal, Kurt

Zhang, Jun

Zhang, You-Qing

Zucman-Rossi, Jessica