Current Research

One of the most frustrating aspects of science is the publication of research articles. Many times researchers in a small field are stuck with a conundrum: submitting to a journal that does not have a high "impact"; or submitting to a well respected journal and being turned down most likely because the editors do not think it will get good readership. The impact factor game is at play seemingly everywhere. When students talk about what will get them a good post-doc it is all about a Science, Nature, or Cell publication. All of these are great journals I read regularly. It must be said though that "impact factor" is not everything. On ISI cited reference search, you can find many papers within those "high impact" journals that obviously have not made an "impact" on anyone. Many articles go uncited or are cited very little. It is clear that the impact comes from a small proportion of the papers that are accepted.
Last year I became aware of PLOS. I was taking Advanced Cell Biology and Prof. William Brown gaves us all a take home exam which included a paper from PLOS Biology. I was very impressed by the rigor with which the research was done. I became very interested in the idea of open access publishing. Ever since then, I have frequented all of the PLOS journal websites and recieve emails regularly including articles which I am interested in. Most of the PLOS journals with published impact factors on ISI are quite respectable. I am sure that journals like Nature and Science are irritated by the success of open access journals. There is a lot of money to be made in publishing.
I recently published an article in PLOS One. PLOS One does not have a published impact factor. At first I was a little unsure. I am confident that the paper would have been accepted by JBC or Biochemistry but what I really wanted, and what PLOS One provides is an online community for scientists to communicate through. This does however require that scientists get involved. Most of us feel we are too busy or are just not interested in reading a paper unless it is in our field and is of interest. The articles published in PLOS One are very diverse and so it requires that we all be a little more conscientious in our pursuit of science. I am now making it a rule of thumb to read at least one paper a week from PLOS One in order to write a review or ask questions or something in order to learn and get some discussion started. Engaging in discussion has worked well in the past for me at conferences. Maybe the internet can provide a similar forum for discussion for scientists to see where the field as a whole is headed.