EMORY WEB JOURNAL RECEIVES NATIONAL RECOGNITION

ATLANTA - The National Library of Medicine (NLM) recently included the Emory Eye Center's scientific journal, Molecular Vision, in its highly regarded database of scientific publications. Founded by Emory faculty in 1995, Molecular Vision is the country's first peer-reviewed life sciences journal to publish entirely on the World Wide Web.

"NLM databases are the preeminent bibliographic source worldwide for life-sciences publications," said Jeffrey H. Boatright, Ph.D., an Emory molecular biologist and a founding editor of Molecular Vision. "Inclusion in the NLM's database is an extremely important step for a journal. Many scientists publish only in NLM-indexed journals." Molecular Vision is included in the popular NLM indexes, Index Medicus, Medline and PubMed.

The NLM's selection criteria are rigorous - only a fifth of the journals reviewed are actually indexed. The NLM uses a committee chartered by the National Institutes of Health to review and select all biomedical and health journal titles included in its indexes. The committee selects journals that meet certain standards for scientific quality and importance and that provide content not already available in other published journals in the field. Of the 14,000 biomedical titles currently published throughout the world, only the top 3,800 titles are included on Medline and Index Medicus.

According to the National Academy Press, a section of the National Academy of Science, Molecular Vision has been recognized as "being interesting and important, presenting science-related information in imaginative, creative and compelling ways."

Molecular Vision is a peer-reviewed journal dedicated to the dissemination of research results in molecular biology, cell biology and the genetics of the visual system. There are no subscription fees or author page charges. Senior editor Boatright and Emory Eye Center scientists Stephen Cristol, M.D., Robert L. Church, Ph.D., John M. Nickerson, Ph.D., currently edit and design the web journal.