Scientific Publishing:Introduction to Forest Ecology and Management

An Elsevier Journal

Workshop presented atBeijing Forestry University

September 2012

Peter M. AttiwillEditor-in-Chief

Professor and Principal Fellow In BotanySenior Fellow, The Australian Centre

The University of MelbourneVictoria, AUSTRALIA

• Elsevier: leading provider of science and health information; a brief overview.

• Forest Ecology and Management: aims and scope of the journal, and some performance indicators.

• Special Issues of the journal; editing and review processes.

• ‘Exploring the Mega-Fire Reality’ 2011; a conference sponsored by Forest Ecology and Management.

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Elsevier at a glance

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Forest Ecology and Management Editor-in-Chief: Peter M. Attiwill School of Botany, University of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia attiwill@unimelb.edu.au

Editors: Dan Binkley Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO, USA dan.binkley@colostate.edu

Todd S. Fredericksen Ferrum College, Ferrum, VA, USA tfredericksen@ferrum.edu

Jean-Paul Laclau INRA-CIRAD, Piracicaba SP, Brazil laclau@cirad.fr

Cindy Prescott University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada Cindy.Prescott@ubc.ca

Hubert Sterba Universität für Bodenkultur Wien (BOKU), Vienna, Austria hubert.sterba@boku.ac.at

Forest Ecology and Management, 2010 Total submissions: 1351, rejected 864 (65%) Published: 496 articles, 4625 pages Review time: 4 weeks (6-8 weeks for papers

that go through the full review process) Most accepted papers:

USA 160 Canada 52 Germany 32

PROCESSING TIME, ALL MANUSCRIPTS (WEEKS)

YEAR NUMBER OF

PAPERS FIRST

DECISION REVISION

2007 1327 9.1 12.3

2008 1366 7.4 10.3

2009 1357 6.2 6.2

2010 1351 4.1 5.6

PROCESSING TIME, MANUSCRIPTS INTO PRODUCTION

EDITORIAL TIME (INCLUDING REVISION) 14

WEEKS

FINAL VERSION ON THE WEB 18 WEEKS

COMPLETE ISSUE ON THE WEB 25 WEEKS

PRINTED ISSUE 27.1 WEEKS

FULL-TEXT DOWNLOADS

2006 605,111

2007 763,853

2008 1,109,933

2009 1,282,012

2010 1,301,139

THE IMPACT FACTOR

Thomson ISI examines the 7,500 journals in its index to find the number of citations to Journal X in the previous two years. That

number becomes the numerator. The denominator is the number of original research articles and reviews published by Journal X in

the previous two years.

Citations beyond two years old do not enter into the impact-factor calculation. For example, for the year 2007, and for a given

journal:

Impact factor = (Citations in 2011 to articles published in 2009 & 2010)/(Tota l number of articles published in 2009 & 2010)

TOP MARKS

Journal

Citations in 2004 to articles

from 2002 and 2003

Articles published

in 2002 and 2003

Impact factor

Annual Review of Immunology 2,674 51 52.431 Cancer Journal for Clinicians 1,469 33 44.515 The New England Journal of Med icine 28,696 744 38.570 Nature Reviews Cancer 5,447 149 36.557 Physiological Reviews 2,069 61 33.918 Nature Reviews Molec ular Cell Bi ology 4,876 147 33.170 Reviews o f Moder n Ph ysics 2,294 70 32.771 Nature Reviews Immunology 4,937 151 32.695 Nature 56,255 1,748 32.182 Science 55,297 1,736 31.853 Annual Review o f Bioch e mis try 1,640 52 31.538 Nature Medicine 9,929 318 31. 223 Cell 17,800 627 28.389 Nature Immunology 7,531 273 27.586 The Journa l of the American Med ical Association 18,648 751 24.831

SOURCE: Thomson ISI

TOP MARKS

Review articles tend to get cited more than original research articles do; 7 of the top 15 journals are review publications.

Most of the top journals cover biology or medicine, which have far more active researchers than the physical sciences,

and hence draw more citations.

Thomson ISI, the company that issues impact factors, recommends that journals be compared with others in the

same category.

THE TOP 5 JOURNALS IN FORESTRY, 2008:

AGRIC & FOREST METEOROLOGY 3.7

FOREST ECOLOGY AND MANAGEMENT 2.5

TREE GENETICS AND GENOMES 2.4

TREE PHYSIOLOGY 2.3

JOURNAL OF VEGETAT ION SCIENCE 2.0

PLANT ECOLOGY 1.7

FOREST SCIENCE 1.7

TREES – STRUCTURE AND FUNCTION 1.6

EUROPEAN J. OF FOREST RESEARCH 1.6

ANNALS OF FOREST SCIENCE 1.6

Forest Ecology and Management publishes scientific articles that link forest ecology with forest management, and that apply

biological and ecological knowledge to the management and conservation of man-made and natural forests. The scope of the

journal includes all forest ecosystems of the world.

Some key features of papers with strong international interest include:

1. Clear connections between the ecology and management of forests;

2. Novel ideas or approaches to important challenges in forest ecology and management;

3. Studies that address a population of interest beyond the scale of single research sites;

4. Review Articles on timely, important topics.

http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/503310/authorinstructions

Consult the Guide for authors

Many papers are rejected because they do not fit within the aims and scope detailed above. Some examples include:

1. Papers in which the primary focus is, for example, entomology or pathology or soil science or remote sensing, but where the links to, and implications for, forest management are not clear and have not been strongly developed;

2. Model-based investigations that do not include a substantial field-based validation component;

3. Local or regional studies of diversity aimed at the development of conservation policies;

4. The effects of forestry practices that do not include a strong ecological component (for example, the effects of weed control or fertilizer application on yield);

5. Social or economic or policy studies (please consider our sister journal, 'Forest Policy and Economics').

DATA FOR 2010

Country Numbe r of paper s

submit ted

% of total num be r

submit ted

Rejection rate %

USA

257

18

45

CHINA 148 10 87

CANADA 97 6.7 54

SPAIN 92 6.4 83

AUSTRALIA 58 4.0 53

GERMANY 54 3.7 50

BRAZIL 52 3.6 87

JAPAN 44 3.0 80

INDIA 43 3.0 97

SWEDEN 38 2.6 49

All countries 65

IT IS NOT JUST A MATTER OFLANGUAGE DIFFICULTIES

Gaultheria fragrantissima Wall. (Ericaceae) is a shrub savanna type insect pollinated plant with an outcrossing breeding system and endozoic type seed dispersal by birds. In the present work we used cytoplasmic DNA markers (cpDNA and mtDNA) to study the genetic variation within and among populations of G. fragrantissima from the two biodiversity hotspots in India. This is further extrapolated to explain presence of G. fragrantissima in both WG and NE and to verify hypotheses of its migration from NE to WG. This is the first report on study of intraspecific cp and mtDNA variation in G. fragrantissima.

The dwarf bamboo (Fargesia rufa Yi), 1 growing understory in subalpine dark coniferous forest, is one of the main foods for giant panda, and it influences the regeneration of subalpine coniferous forests in southwestern China. We hypothesized that there are different physiological responses and leaf traits in the dwarf bamboo when exposed to elevated CO2, temperature and their combination. Our aims were (1) to measure how gas exchange, leaf traits and carbohydrate concentrations are affected by elevated CO2 concentration and temperature, and their combination; (2) to analyze the relationships among these morphological, physiological and biochemical traits under different conditions; (3) to determine whether the dwarf bamboo would benefit from the climate change.

Chlorophyll (Chl) is the green pigment of plants which harvests solar energy and converts it to chemical energy through process of photosynthesis. In last two decades, chlorophyll meters have been increasingly used in plant sciences as an effective tool for assessing nutrient and stress status of plant. However, it was not been used in stevia (Stevia rebaudiana Bertoni) plant. Thus, the objectives of this study were (1) to establish possible correlations among CCI value and total Chl and nitrogen content of stevia leaves for evolving non-destructive methods of Chl and nitrogen quantification in Stevia leaf and (2)to measure sensitivity level of CCM -200 to estimate the Chl content in leaf.

Research methodologies

Throughout: - Proper recognition of others. The plague of plagiarism - Communicate with others - Write up your thoughts and your work as you proceed - Give informal discussions, or seminars

Asking the right questions - Background reading; researching the libraries - Selecting and keeping references - Throughout – communicate with others

Formulating the question – setting up an hypothesis Is it answerable? - Within the science that we know? - Within the time frame of a graduate study? - Within the resources (money, equipment) available?

This is the first study of species diversity anddistribution in this important forest in the Dundas Tablelands. The study will be

important in developing new management strategies.

An understanding of the soil nutrients such as soil organic matter, total available nitrogen and the C: N ratio are very important for proper management of a wetland dominated system, as they greatly influence their productivity and possible successional changes. The present investigation was carried out to assess the issue on a spatial scale in different habitat types in Keoladeo National Park, Bharatpur, India to understand the influence of vegetation and other micrometeorological factors on the biogeochemical processes in the Park soil.

The forestry sector in Brazil has dramatically increased the productivity of exotic Eucalyptus plantations through intensive silviculture, genetic selection and breeding techniques . . . . . . We used the production ecology approach to examine patterns in growth, light use, and light use efficiency at an individual tree level across a 90 ha stand of seed-origin Eucalyptus grandis in the state of São Paulo. The plot-level wood productivity of this stand differed by more than 50% as a result of differences in soil physical and chemical attributes. We hypothesized that within plots, dominant trees are more productive than non-dominant trees as a result of greater light absorption and light use efficiency (wood growth/light absorption). We also hypothesized that with increasing productivity across plots, dominant trees would show larger increases in light use and light use efficiency in comparison to non-dominant trees.

Experimental design

Right from the start – how will the data be analysed?

What is the population of interest? ‘No amount of replication within a single site can provide degrees of freedom

for testing a hypothesis about a population of sites’.

SPECIAL ISSUES 2010-2011 Environmental stress and forest ecosystems: Case studies from Estonia

A commemoration of 100 years of avian research on USFS Experimental Forests

The FIRE PARADOX project: Understanding fire ecology and implications for management

The Ecology and Ecosystem Services of Native Trees: Implications for Reforestation and Land Restoration in Mesoamerica

Ecological Lessons from Long-Term Studies in Experimental Forests

European Forest carbon balance as assessed with inventory based methods

The Ecology and Silviculture of Beech

Productivity In Tropical Plantations

Managing landscapes at multiple scales for sustainability of ecosystem functions

Adaptation of forests and forest management to changing climates with emphasis on forest health: a review of science, policies and practices

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