QScience Connect publishes first articles, debuts new functionality
01 December 2011
QScience Connect has today published its first articles on topics ranging from linguistics and food science to diabetes and an analysis of the sediments in streams on a Yemeni island.
QScience Connect is a new kind of peer-reviewed, open access journal which publishes research in all fields which meets the simple criteria of being ethical, valid and correct. No emphasis is placed on the perceived interest of the article, or the magnitude of the advance being described; rather the readers of the articles contribute to the evaluation process by reading and citing the article. The number of accesses of the article, and the number of times it is cited in other academic journals is a model of evaluation which makes the most of the online publishing environment.
Authors are also encouraged to submit articles to the journal which may consist primarily of video or audio. These submissions will be reviewed and, as with regular manuscript submissions, they will be published if they are found to describe novel and valid research.
Alongside these articles, QScience.com has also introduced an online commenting facility, linked to the readers’ social media accounts, which allows for direct communication on the article with the author and other readers.
This new service adds to the already existing features of article-level metrics, measuring downloads and citations, and the personalization and mobile features of the site, allowing browsing of content and access to search alerts with Blackberry, iPhone and Android handsets.
With all of our content being freely-available and open access, we believe these new developments improve the experience of accessing cutting edge research for both the scientific community and the public in general.
QScience.com already hosts eight scholarly journals covering diverse subject areas such as information & library studies, sustainable energy, education, medicine and bioscience, Middle Eastern healthcare, law, design and Islamic studies. Many other journals are scheduled to be added in 2012.