Professor Andrew Lumsden, FRS, Director of the MRC Centre for Developmental Neurobiology at King's, has launched a flagship online journal, Neural Development, giving scientists greater opportunity to publish and freely access research which explores the great mysteries surrounding the development of the nervous system.
(Media-Newswire.com) - Neural Development aims to discover how the nervous system arises and acquires the abilities to sense the world. It asks what are the genetic instructions for building a brain and how is its development so reliably orchestrated. And it examines how the astounding complexity of the brain can be crammed into the minute nucleus of a fertilised egg.
Having served for eleven years as editor of the premier journal Development, Professor Lumsden has long known that although there are a number of developmental biology titles, none of them focus entirely on issues of neural development – a now burgeoning field. He recruited three co-editors to assist him in the launch and running of the new title: Professor Bill Harris of the University of Cambridge, Professor Rachel Wong of the University of Washington and Professor Joshua Sanes of Harvard University. Many other world-class scientists from this field sit on the editorial board.
New features
The online open access journal will allow key findings in this field to be more rapidly published, accessible and far-reaching. Articles will be easy to cross–reference and there will be more rapid reviews. Movies and animations will also be a key feature, bringing to life the dynamic nature of the developing nervous system.
Professor Lumsden said, 'Our new journal is intended to serve all of those scientists who are fascinated by the developing nervous system, at whatever stage of the development. I believe that our format with online open access allowing rapid publication and the widest possible readership, clickable movies, and a top flight editorial board will be a tremendous asset to our field of developmental neurobiology.'
Professor Rachel Wong, co-editor of the journal, added, ‘Open access publication is not only of key importance to the international scientific community and the governments who support research. PCs and the internet are rapidly making paperless and free access the preferred method for reading the literature. Therefore I am committed to making Neural Development amongst the very best publications in the field.'
Notes to editors The MRC Centre for Developmental Neurobiology The MRC Centre for Developmental Neurobiology, funded in partnership by the Medical Research Council and King's College London, was founded in the year 2000 to promote research in this rapidly expanding area of neuroscience. The Centre occupies the entire fourth floor of New Hunt's House, a new research, library and teaching building on the Guy's Hospital Campus of King's College London. It comprises twenty-three laboratories and is headed by Professor Andrew Lumsden, FRS. A total of approximately 140 scientists, students, and staff work on related questions concerning the early steps in nervous system development.
King's College London King's College London is the fourth oldest university in England with more than 13,700 undergraduates and nearly 5,600 graduate students in nine schools of study based at five London campuses. It is a member of the Russell Group: a coalition of the UK's major research-based universities. The College has had 24 of its subject-areas awarded the highest rating of 5* and 5 for research quality, demonstrating excellence at an international level, and it has recently received an excellent result in its audit by the Quality Assurance Agency.
King's has a particularly distinguished reputation in the humanities, law, international relations, medicine, nursing and the sciences, and has played a major role in many of the advances that have shaped modern life, such as the discovery of the structure of DNA. It is the largest centre for the education of healthcare professionals in Europe and is home to four Medical Research Council Centres – more than any other university.
King's is in the top group of UK universities for research earnings, with income from grants and contracts of more than £100 million, and has an annual turnover of more than £363 million.
Further information Public Relations Office, King's College London Tel: 020 7848 3202 Email: pr@kcl.ac.uk
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