Conference: WASOG 2023

Organization: The World Association of Sarcoidosis and Other Granulomatous Disorders

Date: 19–21 June 2023

Place: Aula Medica, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden

Booth: #7

MDPI will be attending the WASOG 2023 conference, which will be held from 19 to 21 June 2023 at Aula Medica, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden.

WASOG 2023 will offer a creative meeting ground for investigating how novel experimental, theoretical and computational approaches in Sarcoidosis and Interstitial Lung Diseases (ILDs) can improve our understanding of their underlying disease mechanisms. It aims to build an even stronger scientific bridge between different sectors, ultimately closing the knowledge gap and accelerating the development and spread of precision medicine in ILDs.

The following MDPI journals will be represented:

• Biomedicines;
• Clinics and Practice;
• Diagnostics;
• Diseases;
• Genes;
• Healthcare;
• Hematology Reports;
• IJTM;
• JCM;
• Medicines;
• Reports.

Please reach out (diagnostics@mdpi.com) if you plan on attending this conference. Our delegates look forward to meeting you in person and answering any questions that you might have.

MDPI journals will be attending the 42nd annual meeting of the American Society for Virology as an exhibitor. This meeting will be held in Athens, Georgia, USA from 24 to 28 June 2023.

The American Society for Virology (ASV) is a wonderful community that brings together virologists from all areas of the field. As a result, the annual meetings are rich in diverse scientific offerings and they can be quite large (sometimes over 1600 attendees). This conference is hosted by the University of Georgia and held at the Classic Center; the scientific program will include symposia, concurrent workshops, poster sessions, exhibits, and special events. Professional development activities and social events will be interspersed throughout the meeting.

The following MDPI journals will be represented:

• Biomedicines;
• Life;
• Viruses;
• Cells;
• Vaccines;
• Veterinary Sciences;
• Microorganisms;
• CIMB;
• Pathogens;
• TropicalMed;
• Zoonotic Diseases;
• COVID.

If you are attending this conference, please feel free to start a conversation with us. Our delegates look forward to meeting you in person and answering any questions you may have. For more information about the conference and our booth, please visit: https://asv.org/asv2023/.

Today, we have clear evidence that HDPs have far more than broad-spectrum antimicrobial activity, including immunomodulatory effects, wound healing, LPS neutralization, chemotaxis, or anti-cancer effects. Moreover, the multifunctionality of HDPs has resulted in a lot of interest in the development of new therapeutic strategies against infectious diseases.

The “Antimicrobial Peptides AKA Host Defense Peptides” webinar will present the latest research on multifunctional host defense molecules. The webinar will cover a wide range of topics, such as structure/function studies, regulation of expression, mechanisms of action, and development of antimicrobial peptides as therapeutics. Invited speakers will represent cross-disciplinary research, including biochemistry, microbiology, structural biology, medicine, innate immunity, signaling, and drug development.

Date: 31 May 2023 at 10:00 a.m. CEST | 4:00 a.m. EDT | 4:00 p.m. CST Asia
Webinar ID: 893 2420 8525

Register now for free!

Program

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information on how to join the webinar. Registrations with academic institutional email addresses will be prioritized.

Unable to attend? Register anyway and we’ll let you know when the recording is available to watch.

Webinar Chair and Keynote Speakers:

• Jitka Petrlova, Department of Clinical Sciences, Division of Dermatology and Venereology, Lund University, Lund, Sweden;
• Parveen Papareddy, Department of Clinical Sciences, Division of Infection Medicine, Lund University, Lund, Sweden;
• Dr. Ester Boix, Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Faculty of Biosciences, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Cerdanyola del Vallès, Spain.

Relevant Special Issues:
“Antimicrobial Peptides Aka Host Defense Peptides – from Basic Research to Therapy”
Guest Editor: Dr. Jitka Petrlova 

“Antimicrobial Peptides Aka Host Defense Peptides – from Basic Research to Therapy 2.0”
Guest Editor: Dr. Jitka Petrlova

Conference: 8th European Congress of Virology 2023
Date: 4–7 May 2023
Location: Gdańsk, Poland

MDPI will be attending the 8th European Congress of Virology 2023 (ECV 2023) as an exhibitor, and we welcome researchers from different backgrounds to visit and share their latest ideas with us.

This conference is organized by the European Society for Virology. ECV 2023 will be a great opportunity for European virologists representing various fields of research to meet, present their results, and discuss all the developments in virology that have taken place during this unusual time. It will also be a great opportunity to meet friends, renew old acquaintances, and establish new collaborations. Although coronavirus studies will undoubtedly be one of the leading subjects at ECV 2023, it is important to have all research areas represented, including basic, clinical, veterinary, and plant virology. 

The following MDPI journals will be represented:

• Viruses;
• Microorganism;
• Vaccines;
• Pathogens;
• Biomedicines;
• Veterinary Science;
• Immuno;
• COVID.

If you are planning to attend this conference, please do not hesitate to start an online conversation with us. Our delegates look forward to meeting you in person and answering any questions that you may have. For more information about the conference, please visit the following website: https://www.eusv-congress.eu/.

This conference organized by the British Pharmacological Society and International Union of Basic and Clinical Pharmacologists (IUPHAR) will be held in Glasgow, Scotland, from 2 July to 7 July 2023. The topic of the conference focuses on pharmacology and drug discovery, research, and development, and the conference will include six days of symposia, keynote lectures, workshops, and debates. Discover the latest in pharmacology research and developments across 10 content themes.

Pharmaceuticals (ISSN: 1424-8247) is a peer-reviewed, open access journal of medicinal chemistry and related drug sciences, published monthly online by MDPI. Pharmaceuticals will participate in this event as an exhibitor together with nine other MDPI journals, among which Pharmaceuticals, Journal of Personalized Medicine and Biomedicines will have journal representatives at our booth.

The following MDPI journals will be represented:

• Pharmaceuticals (leading journal);
• Biomedicines;
• JPM;
• JCM;
• Marine Drugs;
• Children;
• Current Oncology;
• BioMedInformatics;
• JoX;
• Rheumato.

If you are attending this conference, please feel free to start a conversation with us at our booth #A22. Our delegates look forward to meeting you in person and answering any questions that you may have. For more information about the conference, please visit https://wcp2023.org/ or contact the Pharmaceuticals Editorial Office at pharmaceuticals@mdpi.com.

MDPI will be attending the Chinese Academic Conference on Tumor Biomarker, held in Shanghai, China, from 7 to 9 April 2023. This conference aims to achieve an in-depth exchange of the latest research results in the field of basic research, clinical application, cutting-edge technology, and industrial development in the field of tumor markers over the year. During this conference, MDPI will welcome researchers from different backgrounds to visit and share their latest inspirations with us.

The following MDPI journals will be represented:

• Biomedicines;
• Cancers;
• Cells;
• Diagnostics;
• Current Oncology;
• JPM;
• JCM;
• Onco;
• CIMB;
• BioMedInformatics.

If you plan on attending this conference, feel free to stop by our booth, #B155. Our delegates look forward to meeting you in person to answer any questions you may have.

For more information about the conference, please follow the link below: https://biomarker2022.sciconf.cn/cn/web/index/13496.

We had the pleasure of speaking with Prof. Dr. M. R. Mozafari, Editorial Board Member of Biomedicines (ISSN: 2227-9059), to discuss his experience with Biomedicines and the recent research trends in the field.

Prof. Dr. M. R. Mozafari is an expert in nano-biotechnology, encapsulation and targeting of bioactive agents with a substantial number of publications, 12 patents, five books and several book chapters. He is the author of the first book on nanoliposomes, he completed many industrial research projects, and developed methods (e.g., “Mozafari Method”) for the large-scale manufacture of controlled release systems without using toxic agents. Recently, he introduced a novel technology for the encapsulation and delivery of a bioactive material called "Tocosome".

We hope you enjoy the interview.

1. Why did you decide to work with Biomedicines?
The main important characteristics of MDPI in general, and Biomedicines in particular, are being well organized, user-friendly, fast process of publication, fast responses to emails, increasing citations and impact factor. Therefore, being associated with Biomedicines is prestigious for me and any scientist.

2. Could you tell us more about the journal and your role there?
Biomedicines is an internationally recognized, scientific, peer-reviewed, open access journal in the broad field of biomedicines, and allied disciplines, published monthly by MDPI. I am a Section Board Member of Biomedicines and currently act as a Guest Editor for two Special Issues. I have already compiled a Special Issue for this journal in which eight high-quality papers were published.

3. Why should scientists submit their manuscripts in Biomedicines?
Researchers and scientists want to see their articles attract a good number of readers and attain high citation numbers. These parameters are important in increasing the h-index of authors. Biomedicines journal is committed to assuring the quality and maximum visibility of the published manuscripts.

4. How would you recommend picking the right journal to submit your research in?
I recommend scientists to publish in prestigious and well-organized journals with high impact factor, high quartiles, reliable user-friendly websites, accessible editors and staff, and efficient promotional policy.

5. What makes a great research paper?
When I was an M.Sc. student, I remember how desperate I was to find a useful paper that can help me with my laboratory research and later on with the preparation of my thesis. A great research paper and a good review article can help scientists and researchers to find easy answers to their questions.

6. What excites you the most about the nano-delivery systems’ field?
Nano-biotechnology in general and nano-delivery systems in particular show a great promise to find solutions for challenging illnesses (e.g., cancer and viral infections) with no or minimal side-effects. The field requires ingenuity, creativity, and an inventive mindset.

We are thankful for Prof. Dr. Mozafari’s time and his support of Biomedicines.

As a leading open access publisher, MDPI provides scholars with a high-quality and rich academic exchange platform by continuously expanding into new and exciting research areas.

In December 2022, MDPI launched five new journals, covering multiple subjects such as life sciences, biology, medicine and pharmacology, social sciences and humanities. These new journals are being edited by established scholars across the world.

If you are interested in creating more open access journals with us to publish cutting-edge research, please send your journal proposal application to newjournal-committee@mdpi.com.

In a fair social community, women should have equal opportunities and be respected and included in diverse choices. Today is the 113^th International Women's Day and the world of science is seeing more female scientists emerge to lead their fellow researchers. We had the pleasure of speaking with Dr. Letizia Polito, Guest Editor of the Special Issue “Women’s Special Issue Series: Biomedicines”, published by Biomedicines (ISSN: 2227-9059).

1. What has led you to the fields of cancer therapy and drug delivery?

During my training at the University of Bologna, I had been particularly fascinated by the concept of the magic bullet created by Paul Ehrlich: being able to deliver toxic molecules in a specific (almost magical) way toward targets present on cells, eliminating them as they are responsible for a pathological state. I have never stopped working on this topic.

2. The spirit of research seems to be quite important to you. What was your main inspiration for pursuing a scientific career? Did you pick it up from your family or school?

My parents would have initially preferred a more traditional career for me, but they taught me to always follow my dreams and goals. At school, I was certainly impressed by my science teacher, his great knowledge and his ability to disseminate it. I think he was an important part of making my future choices.

3. You have had an impressive and productive career. Which of your accomplishments do you consider to be the most impactful ones? Of which are you most proud?

It is difficult to decide between my career achievements. I remember the hard work behind each of them, the personal relationships created in the research groups, the commitment, the effort, the study, the tiredness, but also the laughter during the breaks. Each example of research that I conducted represents a piece of my life, I cannot choose between one or the other. I can, however, say that I am quite proud of all my achievements, no matter how big or small they are.

4. Does being a woman pose particular challenges in the fields you research? How could the scientific community address these challenges?

When I started my career about thirty years ago, being a woman and a researcher often meant having to face important personal choices; first of all, it meant giving up (or postponing) the idea of having kids and starting a family. Today, in several countries, this is no longer a problem, but there are still many (too many) countries where being a woman means being forced to make life choices, where being a woman means limiting one's personal freedom. For the women living in those countries, the international scientific community should act as soon as possible to break down any cultural barriers.

5. Do you feel that scientific opportunities for women have increased during your career?

As I said above, important results have been achieved in many countries, but the road ahead is still very long and arduous. It is our duty to continue to keep the attention high and to raise awareness on this subject.

6. Can you tell us something about you that people would be surprised to learn?

When I was little, I dreamed of becoming a novel writer, but now, I only write scientific papers (I am sort of a cellular and molecular novel writer).

7. Given your long career in research and development, what would you say has been the highlight of your career?

I hope to be able to continue working and achieving results for many more years on plant toxins, immunoconjugates and drug targeting, improving the techniques currently available and continuing to put together many small pieces of the great puzzle of knowledge on these topics.

8. Please describe the most difficult challenge you have faced in your research work and how you overcame it.

Certainly, my most difficult challenge was to continue researching in Italy, even when it seemed that there could be economic and career obstacles that would be difficult to overcome. I have always had the support of my family who encouraged me not to give up and to continue on my path, even if it was an uphill one.

9. What are your aims for the future?

I hope that in the future it will be possible for our research group to perfect some immunoconjugates, possibly containing plant toxins, to be utilized for clinical use.

10. Do you have any advice for young researchers, especially young women, who might be interested in doing research in cancer therapy and drug delivery?

I have only one piece of advice for young researchers: always be curious, believe in your potential and never give up.

Dr. Letizia Polito’s contact information:
Email: letizia.polito@unibo.it

Relevant Special Issue:

"Women’s Special Issue Series: Biomedicines"
Submission Deadline: 30 April 2023

Special Issue information:

Dear colleagues,

We are pleased to announce a Special Issue entitled “Women’s Special Issue Series: Biomedicines” to celebrate and highlight the achievements of women in the development of new molecules and therapies for the cancer research area.

For this Special Issue, we are seeking the submission of original research articles and comprehensive review papers from oncology-related fields, in particular regarding new therapeutic targets, therapeutic strategies and research of biomedicines and biopharmaceutical products.

The series advocates the advancement of women in science. We invite contributions to the Special Issue whose lead authors identify as women. The submission of articles with all-women authorship is especially encouraged. However, we do welcome articles from all authors, irrespective of gender.

Dr. Letizia Polito
Dr. Nadia Alfaidy
Guest Editors

MDPI is pleased to announce that we now display the co-authors’ email addresses in addition to the corresponding author’s email address on the webpage of published papers, protected by Captcha. For more information about this change, please visit the journal’s instructions for authors page. 

We believe this change will facilitate academic discussions and advance our cause of open science and research. The corresponding authors are responsible for communicating with their co-authors and indicating in our system (https://susy.mdpi.com/) if co-authors would prefer for their email addresses not to be displayed.

Conference: 143rd Annual Meeting of the Pharmaceutical Society of Japan
Date: 25–28 March 2023
Place: Sapporo, Japan

MDPI will be attending the 143rd Annual Meeting of the Pharmaceutical Society of Japan as the exhibitor. This meeting will be held at Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Japan, from 25 to 28 March 2023. The organizing committee comprises the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Hokkaido University. The theme of the 143rd annual meeting is "PharmaScience: Integration for Breakthroughs". Through this meeting, we wish to contribute to the progress of research leading to the development of innovative drugs and therapies by bringing together researchers from various research fields.

The following MDPI journals will be represented:

• Biomedicines;
• JPM;
• Pharmaceutics;
• JCM;
• Pharmaceuticals.

If you are attending this conference, please feel free to start a conversation with us. Our delegates look forward to meeting you in person and answering any questions that you may have. For more information about the conference, please visit https://confit.atlas.jp/guide/event/pharm143/top.

On 9 February 2023, Clarivate, a global leader in providing trusted insights and analytics, added the Preprint Citation Index to the Web of Science platform, streamlining the research process by allowing researchers to locate and link to preprints alongside other trusted content in the database.

The Preprint Citation Index will act as a bridge to connect cutting-edge preprints with peer-reviewed journal articles published within the Web of Science Core Collection. Alerts can be easily set to monitor new research across several repositories and authors will also be able to include preprints on their Web of Science Research Profile to more accurately display their various research outputs.

As of its launch, the Preprint Citation Index will provide nearly two million preprints from various repositories, including MDPI’s own Preprints.org.

MDPI's Preprints Platform – Preprints.org

To advance Open Science and the fast dissemination of research, MDPI offers researchers a free multidisciplinary preprint platform. Preprints.org accepts submissions from all research areas and offers authors high visibility, permanent archiving, article-level Metrics and immediately citable content by assigning a Digital Object Identifier (DOI) to all preprints.

During submission to any MDPI journal, authors have the option to share their research as a preprint. After an initial screening, the manuscript is available online in 48 hours or less. Once online, preprints can be downloaded, shared, commented on, and cited, providing authors maximum visibility.

We invite you to join the ranks of the over 100k researchers using Preprints.org and share your research.

For more information, please visit Preprints.org.

Conference: 11th National Conference on Bioinformatics and Systems Biology
Date: 25–27 February 2023
Place: Guangzhou, China

MDPI will be attending the 11th National Conference on Bioinformatics and Systems Biology (CCBSB2023) as the exhibitor. The National Academic Conference on Bioinformatics and Systems Biology has been successfully held for ten sessions since its first session in 1998. It is a national event with the highest academic level and the greatest influence in the field of bioinformatics research in China. The theme of the conference is "The Latest Frontier Research of Bioinformatics and Systems Biology and Their Applications", and the topics cover translational informatics and data sharing security, biomedical data mining and computing, genome informatics, artificial intelligence and life sciences, group bioinformatics and integrated biology, non-coding RNA and RNA informatics, network biology, major disease omics informatics, biological macromolecular structure prediction and simulation, bioinformatics algorithm research, biological data resources, bioinformatics and drugs discovery, computational synthetic biology, agricultural and forestry informatics and other bioinformatics, and other frontier directions.

The following MDPI journals will be represented:

• Genes;
• JPM;
• Cardiogenetics;
• Bioengineering;
• Biomolecules;
• Metabolites;
• Cells;
• Symmetry;
• Biomedicines;
• Computers;
• COVID;
• Epigenomes.

If you are attending this conference, please feel free to start a conversation with us. Our delegates look forward to meeting you in person and answering any questions that you may have. For more information about the conference, please visit https://ccbsb2022.casconf.cn/.

We are pleased to announce that the winner of the Biomedicines 2022 Early-Career Women Award is Dr. Roberta Giuffrida.

Dr. Roberta Giuffrida is a dermatologist and a researcher at the Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine at the University of Messina (Italy). Dr. Giuffrida’s research interests are in new and existing non-invasive tools useful for the diagnosis and treatment of skin cancers, and her main focus is on dermoscopy. Dr. Giuffrida received her Ph.D. in 2020 and has an outstanding publication record, comprising 94 publications in peer-reviewed international journals, and her Hirsch index is 15. She is a rising star in the field of biomedicines. Please join us in congratulating Dr. Roberta Giuffrida on her outstanding achievements.

As the awardee, Dr. Roberta Giuffrida will receive an honorarium of CHF 1000, an offer to publish a paper free of charge in Biomedicines in 2023 after peer-review, and a certificate.

We would like to thank all the nominators from various fields of study for their participation and all the Award Committee members for their evaluation of many excellent nominees.

Prof. Dr. Shaker A. Mousa
Editor-in-Chief of Biomedicines

We had the pleasure of speaking with Dr. Simone Patergnani, Editorial Board Member of Biomedicines (ISSN: 2227-9059), to discuss his experience with Biomedicines and the recent research trends in the field.

Dr. Patergnani received his Ph.D. in biochemistry, molecular biology and biotechnology at the University of Ferrara, Italy. To date, he works at the University of Ferrara, Italy (Department of Medical Sciences, Experimental Medicine section) and the University Hospital of Ferrara, Italy, as a post-doctoral researcher.

Dr. Patergnani’s research is mainly focused on investigating the contribution of different intracellular organelles to regulating different cell signaling pathways, actively collaborating with several international research groups. In parallel, his work also involves testing and verifying whether new next-generation molecules or drugs already used in the clinical field have beneficial effects in the transmission of various intracellular signals, in regulating cellular metabolism, and in activating/silencing various proteins responsible for specific cell functions. In particular, his research in recent years has focused on analyzing the contribution of these cellular mechanisms in cancer, neurodegeneration, mitochondrial diseases, genetic diseases and cardiovascular diseases.

We hope you enjoy the interview.

1. Could you tell us about Biomedicines and your role in the journal?

Biomedicines is a journal that reports original investigations and reviews in the field of cell biology. I serve the journal as an Editorial Board Member, as well as a Guest Editor.

2. What makes a great research paper?

I think that there is no good answer to this question. It is something individual. It is not certain that if an investigation enthuses me, it would have the same effect on another researcher. Everybody has personal preferences and can have a different opinion than me. However, undoubtedly, good research must have great scientific value, be performed with a series of convincing experiments and be well-conceived and developed.

3. What excites you the most about the field of autophagy?

Autophagy represents “the first love” of my research career. I started to investigate this molecular mechanism when I was a student. Since then, research in the field has reached great improvements and is constantly evolving. It is incredible how different molecular pathways that are fundamental for different molecular mechanisms are always related to the autophagy process!

4. Could you describe the difficulties and breakthrough innovations encountered in this research?

I think that the most difficult aspect of my research topic is that all the world studies it. However, at the same time, this represents a fundamental aspect of my research. Since I’m aware of the existence of this high competition, I always try to do my best to be at the top. I think that the identification of specific autophagy-related genes that have been then used as specific markers for the identification of autophagy levels represents one of the most important breakthrough innovations. Another important aspect in the field of autophagy is unveiling the existence of different and selective forms of autophagy.

5. What are some current challenges in this field?

The main challenge in the field of autophagy is to demonstrate that by manipulating this process it is possible to fight several human diseases. However, before this, it is important to improve our knowledge of autophagy in such diseases. Autophagy can have a dual role according to the stage of the pathology and a pharmacological treatment aimed to modify its levels must be appropriate for the actual autophagy activity present in the cell.

6. Do you have any advice for young researchers?

The only thing that I can say to a young researcher is to never give up when an experiment fails. In research, this often happens. The young researcher must be ready to repeat it. Of course, before repeating it, it is important to understand why the previous experiment failed, they must understand whether the failure is due to a technical problem or because the starting hypothesis of the work is not totally correct. In the latter case, the young researcher must be ready to change the experimental design. If the young researcher is able to switch their ideas and improve themselves, they switch from a “young researcher” to a “researcher”.

We are thankful for Dr. Patergnani’s time and his support for Biomedicines.

We had the pleasure of speaking with Dr. Kenneth Lundstrom, Editorial Board Member of Biomedicines (ISSN: 2227-9059), to discuss his experience with Biomedicines and the recent research trends in the field.

Dr. Lundstrom received his Ph.D. in molecular genetics at the University of Helsinki, Finland. He has spent most of his career in big pharma and biotech start-ups in cancer therapy and vaccine development. Dr. Lundstrom has published more than 300 scientific articles. He is currently involved in vaccine development against SARS-CoV-2 and cancer immunotherapy.

We hope you enjoy the interview.

1. Why did you decide to work for Biomedicines?

I was attracted by the new set-up of MDPI and also by its presence in Switzerland. It seemed like a good opportunity to build something of value for the scientific community. Let me point out that I have engaged with other journals as a reviewer but also as an Editorial Board Member and even Editor-in-Chief.

2. Why should scientists submit their manuscripts in Biomedicines?

Biomedicines has a good impact factor, it is reliable, the reviewing process is fair and straightforward (most of the time!), the reviewing process is professional and rapid, and the turnover time from acceptance to online publication is impressively fast.

3. How would you recommend picking the right journal to submit your research in?

The reputation and impact factor of the journal are important. Reliable and fast procedure from submission, through reviewing, revision, proof corrections, and publication also affects the decision of which journal to choose. Obviously, when you publish frequently, it is great if you can receive waivers to limit the publication costs.

4. What do you look for most to determine if a paper will be published in the journal?

The scientific soundness of the data and the novelty are the most important things. However, the style of presentation, to ensure the manuscript is understandable for not only the experts, and also the language issue should not be forgotten. As quite a few manuscripts today are submitted by non-English speakers (i.e., native English speakers or persons with good knowledge of English), it is important to make sure that the text does not contain typos and grammatical errors and that the text does not sound like a direct use of Google Translate!

5. What is the priority for a good scientific article: great research with high scientific value or a well-thought-out composition and good writing?

As I already said above, high-quality science is most important, but the composition and writing standard are also important. Moreover, novelty and timely presentations should be highly valued.

6. What makes a great research paper?

Novelty, good science, good presentation, and good writing!

7. What excites you the most about the field of alphavirus-based gene therapy and vaccine development?

The field is relatively new, although alphavirus vectors have been around since the early 1990s. It seems that some sort of renaissance is going on, partly because of substantial progress in cancer immunotherapy and, not least, the development of nucleic acid vaccines against COVID-19. Perhaps the most attractive feature of alphaviruses is their flexibility as they can be used as recombinant and oncolytic viral particles, naked or nanoparticle-encapsulated RNA, or replicon DNA molecules. I could go on, but that would be another review!

8. Could you describe the difficulties and breakthrough innovations encountered in this research?

One difficulty has been to convince the scientific community of the safety of using alphavirus vectors and also demonstrating efficacy in clinical trials. Perhaps the most impressive breakthrough has been the demonstration of the efficacy of the current COVID-19 mRNA vaccines, which has had a direct impact on using alphavirus-based RNA delivery.

9. What are some current challenges in this field?

The main current challenges are to transfer the successful proof-of-concept findings from preclinical animal models to humans in clinical trials. Moreover, today, plenty of suspicion of the safe use of viral vectors has been encountered, especially due to so much misinformation/disinformation mainly related to the development of recent COVID-19 vaccines based on nucleic acids but also viral particles.

10. Do you have any advice for young researchers?

Conduct good research and ensure that you will be able to publish the results in good journals.

We are thankful for Dr. Lundstrom's time and his support for Biomedicines.

We are pleased to announce the launch of a new initiative—the MDPI Special Issue Mentor Program.

This program will enable early career researchers (who must hold a Ph.D. in a related field) to experience editing a Special Issue in MDPI journals, under the mentorship of our experienced Editorial Board Members or other experienced scientists. The mentor program will provide an excellent opportunity for early career scientists to gain editorial experience, and to cultivate their ability to edit scientific research.

The mentee’s responsibilities include:

• Proposing a Special Issue title and assisting the mentor in preparing a summary (around 200–400 words) and 3–10 keywords describing the background, importance, and goal of the Issue;
• Writing a brief promotion plan for the Special Issue;
• Preparing a list of scholars who may be interested in the Issue and personally e-mailing invitations on behalf of Guest Editors;
• Writing an editorial for the online Special Issue together with the mentor.

The mentor’s responsibilities include:

• Conducting a final check before the Special Issue is published online;
• Performing editorial control of the Special Issue and quality control of the publications, both of which must be carried out in a timely manner;
• Providing suggestions to younger scholars if they have any doubts or concerns regarding submissions;
• Organizing video calls with young scholars and the Editorial Office regularly to discuss problems and improvement suggestions for the Special Issue;
• Making and submitting decisions regarding submissions with the assistance of mentees.

Certificates and awards:
After the Special Issue closes, the Editorial Office will provide official certificates for all the mentors and early career researchers.

If you are interested in this opportunity, please send your Special Issue proposal to the Editorial Office of a journal you choose, and we will discuss the process (i.e., mentor collaboration, Special Issue topic feasibility analysis, etc.) in further detail. The full list of MDPI journals is as follows: https://www.mdpi.com/about/journals.

In addition to the new Special Issue Mentor Program, we will continue to welcome all Special Issue proposals focusing on hot research topics.

MDPI has just become the first open access (OA) publisher to reach the milestone of one million articles published. That is one million articles freely available to all, to circulate and build upon! We are proud to share this special moment with the global scientific community.

This landmark has been reached thanks to the immeasurable support of more than 600,000 expert reviewers, 66,000 editorial board members and 6700 hard-working colleagues across MDPI’s global offices.

Within more than 25 years of publishing, our journals received 2.1 million manuscripts and generated 4.6 million peer review reports to get to one million papers published.

Reaching the milestone of one million articles published reinforces our mission to remove any existing barriers and to make scientific research accessible to all. Since its inception, MDPI’s goal has been to create reliable processes to make science open. This is a path towards facilitating the dissemination of novel insights in scientific communities.

Regular feedback from authors and reviewers shows that our service is greatly appreciated and needed. At the same time, the feedback helps us identify areas for further improvement.

As it stands, a significant share of published research findings remain closed access. More than half of the content published with the most well-known legacy publishers stays behind a paywall, and that is not including articles published in hybrid OA journals, or made available months or years after publication.

A new policy announced by the US administration in August 2022 requires that, as of January 2026, all US federally funded research be made freely and immediately available after publication. While the new policy does not mandate articles be published under an open access license, it is aligned with the open access movement in removing all barriers to research. Similarly, some of the most advanced research institutions in the world intend to have all funded research articles published in open access by 2025.

MDPI is proud to be the leading agent of the transition to open access.

"Thanks a Million" to all the contributors!

We are pleased to announce that the website of the MDPI Sustainability Foundation has been revamped! For the past couple of months, our UX UI team and front-end developers have been working hard to launch the website in time for the opening of the Sustainability Awards nominations.

The website is not the only thing that has had a remodeling. Indeed, the format of the Emerging Sustainability Leader Award (ESLA) has been updated. ESLA is now a competition open to individual researchers or start-ups founded by researchers under the age of 35. Nominee applications will go through 2 rounds of selection until the final 3 are decided. The finalists will then be invited to give pitch presentations during the Award Ceremony to win either first place (10,000 USD) or runner-up (2 x 5000 USD).

The World Sustainability Award, on the other hand, remains the same: a total prize money of 100,000 USD is up for grabs by senior individual researchers or groups of researchers from the international research community.

Nominations for both the World Sustainability Award and the Emerging Sustainability Leader award are now open! Check out our new website for more information on how to nominate.

We are pleased to announce the launch of a new initiative—the Biomedicines Special Issue Mentor Program.

This program will enable early career researchers (who must hold a Ph.D. in a related field) to experience editing a Special Issue in MDPI journals, under the mentorship of our experienced Editorial Board Members or other experienced scientists. The mentor program will provide an excellent opportunity for early career scientists to gain editorial experience and cultivate their ability to edit scientific research.

The mentee’s responsibilities include:

• Proposing a Special Issue title and assisting the mentor in preparing a summary (around 200–400 words) and 3–10 keywords describing the background, importance, and goal of the issue;
• Writing a brief promotion plan for the Special Issue;
• Preparing a list of scholars that may be interested in the issue and personally emailing the invitations on behalf of Guest Editors;
• Writing an editorial for the online Special Issue together with the mentor.

The mentor’s responsibilities include:

• Conducting a final check before the Special Issue is published online;
• Overseeing editorial control of the Special issue and quality control of the publications in a timely manner;
• Providing suggestions to younger scholars if they have any doubts or concerns regarding submissions;
• Making and submitting decisions for the submissions with the assistance of mentees.

Certificates and awards:

After the Special Issue closes, the Editorial Office will provide official certificates for all the mentors and mentees.

If you are interested in this opportunity, please send your Special Issue proposal to the Biomedicines Editorial Office via the link: https://www.mdpi.com/journalproposal/sendproposalspecialissue/biomedicines, and we will discuss the process (i.e., mentor collaboration, Special Issue topic feasibility analysis, etc.) in further detail.

In addition to the new Special Issue Mentor Program, Biomedicines (ISSN: 2227-9059) continues to welcome all Special Issue proposals focusing on hot research topics.

Scientists at Stanford University have recently published an update of the list of the top 2% most widely cited scientists. The time node of the statistical data of this list is from 1960 to 2022, and it is divided into two lists: "Lifetime Scientific Influence Ranking" and "2022 Annual Scientific Influence Ranking". The "Lifetime Scientific Influence Ranking" counts the comprehensive influence performance of scientists during their careers, and the "2022 Annual Influence Ranking" focuses on highlighting the academic influence of scientists in the previous year. This ranking, considered the most prestigious worldwide, is based on the bibliometric information contained in the Scopus database and includes more than 200,000 researchers from the more than 10 million scientists considered to be active worldwide, with 22 scientific fields and 176 subfields taken into account.

We are pleased to share that 81 Editorial Board Members from MDPI’s journal Biomedicines (ISSN: 2227-9059) were featured in the World’s Top 2% Scientists list in 2022.

The latest rankings reflect the significant influence and research excellence of the scientists, who are committed to furthering their knowledge for the benefit of the world.

We would like to congratulate our Editorial Board Members on their excellent achievement and thank them for their immense contribution to the scientific progression and development of Biomedicines.

A range of MDPI journals will be attending the 15th Annual Meeting of Chinese Society for Immunology. This meeting will be held in Chongqing, China, from 27 to 30 December 2022.

The conference focuses on the following areas:

• Recognition and regulation of innate immune responses;
• Adaptive immune response;
• Immune metabolism and immune regulation;
• Immunity to COVID-19 infection;
• Tumor immunity and tumor immunotherapy;
• Autoimmune diseases and other topics.

The following MDPI journals will be represented:

• IJMS (leading journal);
• Vaccines;
• Metabolites;
• Cells;
• Cancers;
• Biomedicines;
• CIMB;
• Pathogens;
• Immuno.

If you plan on attending this conference, feel free to stop by our booth #B13. Our delegates look forward to meeting you in person to answer any questions you may have.

For more information about the conference, please see the following link: https://csimeeting2022.sciconf.cn/cn/web/index/13562.  

We are pleased to announce that the winners of the Biomedicines 2022 Young Investigator Award are Dr. Yuyan Jiang and Prof. Billy Wai-Lung Ng.

Dr. Yuyan Jiang is a postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Radiation Oncology at Stanford University, USA. Dr. Jiang is a highly productive young researcher with special interests in developing next-generation radio-sensitizer, bio-responsive cancer nanomedicine and photoactive ultrasensitive molecular probes for deep-tissue diagnosis. Since the beginning of her scientific career in 2016, she has published 39 peer-review articles in high-ranking journals including Nature Biomedical Engineering, Nature Communications, Chemical Reviews, Accounts of Chemical Research, etc. According to Google Scholar, her research has received > 5,500 citations and her h-index is 36. Dr. Jiang is an Editorial Board Member of Materials and Collagen and Leather. She is also the Guest Editor of two Materials Special Issues, including “Advanced Biomaterials Design and Sensing Application” and “Advanced Biomaterials for Cancer Sonodynamic Therapy”.

Prof. Billy Wai-Lung Ng leads the Ng Lab of Chemical Biology and Drug Discovery at the School of Pharmacy, Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK). His research interests are chemical biology, drug discovery, and medicinal chemistry. Prof. Ng completed his postdoctoral training at Harvard Medical School/Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Prior to Harvard, he was a research fellow at the University of Oxford, with funding support from the Croucher Foundation and Marie Curie Fellowship. He was a Fulbright Scholar at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) during his graduate study. He obtained his Ph.D. and B.Sc. (1st Class Hons.) in chemistry from CUHK. He has co-authored more than 20 papers in prestigious journals such as Science, Nature Chemical Biology, Molecular Cell, J. Am. Chem. Soc., Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., and ACS Central Science and he also serves as a reviewer for more than 20 journals including Science Translational Medicine, Nature Chemical Biology, and Nature Biotechnology. Prof. Ng was honored as a Young Global Leader (YGL) by the World Economic Forum in 2022. For further details, please visit his lab webpage: https://www.ngwailung.com.

As the awardees, Dr. Yuyan Jiang and Prof. Billy Wai-Lung Ng will each receive an honorarium of CHF 1000 and an electronic certificate.

We would like to thank all the nominators from various fields of study for their participation and all the Award Committee Members for their evaluation of the many excellent nominations.

On behalf of Biomedicines 2022 Young Investigator Evaluation Committee,

Prof. Dr. Shaker A. Mousa
Editor-in-Chief

Conference: 2022 BMES Annual Meeting
Date: 12–15 October 2022
Place: San Antonio, Texas, USA
Booth: #346

MDPI will be attending the 2022 BMES Annual Meeting as an exhibitor from 12 to 15 October 2022 in San Antonio, Texas, USA.

BMES holds an annual meeting where they have hosted up to 5,500 biomedical engineers who attend more than 2,500 scientific presentations on cancer treatment, heart disease, women’s health, global health disparities, and more. The meeting allows members to advocate for their innovative solutions, demonstrating their commitment to the society’s core value of health equity for all individuals. In addition, BMES shares scientific information to inspire the up-and-coming generation through four scientific journals, three special interest groups, and collaborations with other scientific societies to elevate the visibility and significant impact that the biomedical engineering community has worldwide as the thought leaders behind the future of human health.

From 12 to 15 October 2022, in the vibrant multicultural city of San Antonio, we will celebrate the tremendous contributions made by BMES members in research, teaching, education, and the workforce that directly impact many sectors of our society. We also aim to highlight equity issues in healthcare and education, stemming from racial and socioeconomic diversity, gender and sexual orientation, and disabilities.

The following MDPI journals will be represented:

• Applied Sciences;
• Bioengineering;
• Biomedicines;
• Biomimetics;
• Biomolecules;
• Biosensors;
• Cancers;
• CIMB;
• Diseases.

Please do not hesitate to reach out if you plan on attending this conference. Our delegates look forward to meeting you in person and answering any questions that you might have.

Peer Review Week began 19 September 2022 under the theme of “Research Integrity: Creating and Supporting Trust in Research”. Through various blog articles, podcast, and webinar, we discussed this crucial subject throughout the week, celebrating the essential role peer review plays in maintaining research quality.

To begin, we held a Webinar on the topic. Professor Peter W. Choate and Dr. Emmanuel Obeng-Gyasi joined Dr. Ioana Craciun, one of MDPI’s scientific officers, for an in-depth discussion.

We invite you to view the event recording:

During the week, the MDPI Blog in a series articles highlighted how good Peer Review safeguards research integrity. The following topics were covered:

• Peer Review Week 2022
• Research Integrity
• What We’ve Learned About Peer Review Reports
• 4 Steps to the Perfect Peer Review Report
• How to Write the Perfect Peer Review Report: An Interview
• Inviting Great Peer Reviewers

In a new edition of Insight Faster, an MDPI podcast, we were delighted to talk to the co-chairs of the Peer Review Week committee, Jayashree Rajagopalan (Senior Manager of Global Community Engagement for CACTUS) and Danielle Padula (Head of Marketing and Community Development at Scholastica) to get their take on this year’s event and its related topics.

You can find the Podcast here.

We hope you enjoy the contents!

Conference: ECB 2023: The 2nd International Electronic Conference on Biomedicines
Date: 1–31 March 2023

Biomedicines (ISSN: 2227-9059) is pleased to announce this call for participation in the 2nd International Electronic Conference on Biomedicines. ECB 2023 seeks to fulfill the need of academics to gather to share results and ideas by offering a completely digital (online) method of running this scientific conference. Researchers currently working on biomedicines are encouraged to join this event and share their findings with colleagues from all over the world.

The conference will cover but not be limited to the following general and related themes:

1. Frontiers of biomedicine in SARS-CoV-2;
2. RNA processing and human diseases;
3. Extracellular vesicles for biomarker discovery;
4. Medicinally active plants and phytochemicals;
5. Molecular mechanisms of neurodegeneration;
6. Immune system, tumor immunology, and autoimmune disease;
7. Obesity and metabolic diseases;
8. Nutraceuticals as adjuvant therapeutics;
9. Musculoskeletal tissue regeneration;
10. Wound healing;
11. Peptide-based piezoelectric materials;
12. Nanomedicine, combination cancer therapy, and immunotherapy.

All submitted abstracts will be evaluated by the conference peer review committee. Upon acceptance, authors will contribute an extended abstract for the conference proceedings and a slide presentation of their work. The authors with outstanding contributions will be invited to submit full manuscripts for potential publication in Biomedicines (https://www.mdpi.com/journal/biomedicines).

Important Dates:

Abstract Submission: 5 January 2023;
Acceptance Notification: 16 January 2023;
Full Paper Submission: 6 February 2023;
Final Paper Notification: 17 February 2023.

The Scientific Committee looks forward to receiving contributions in response to this call and will be happy to provide any further information to interested parties. Any questions may be addressed to the conference secretariat (ecb@mdpi.com).

We thank you in advance for attending this conference, and we look forward to a stimulating exchange.

To find out more about the conference, please visit the following link: https://ecb2023.sciforum.net.

Biomedicines (ISSN: 2227-9059) is recruiting volunteer reviewers. Reviewers are responsible for regularly providing timely, high-quality reports on manuscripts submitted to the journal. More information about the role is available at: https://www.mdpi.com/reviewers. 

Peer review constitutes an essential part of the publication process, ensuring that papers published in Biomedicines maintain its high standards. We are looking to recruit expert reviewers to help uphold the journal’s quality and efficiency expectations.

To apply, please visit the following link: https://susy.mdpi.com/volunteer/journals/review.

MDPI will be attending ASHG 2022, held in Los Angeles, USA, from 25 to 29 October 2022.

The following MDPI journals will be represented:

• Genes;
• JPM;
• Biomedicines;
• Biomolecules;
• Cardiogenetics;
• Cancers;
• Brain Science;
• Symmetry;
• Diagnostics;
• Metabolites;
• Cells;
• Biology;
• Humans;
• DNA.

If you plan on attending this conference, feel free to stop by our booth: #1844. Our delegates look forward to meeting you in person to answer any questions you may have.

For more information about the conference, please see the following link:

https://www.ashg.org/meetings/2022-annual-meeting/.

We are currently recruiting Topical Advisory Panel Members for the journal Biomedicines (ISSN: 2227-9059). The main responsibility of the new members of the Topical Advisory Panel is to regularly provide support to Guest Editors and Editorial Board Members. More information on the responsibilities of the Topical Advisory Panel is available at the following link: https://www.mdpi.com/editors#Supporting_Editor_Responsibilities.

Biomedicines is an international, scientific, peer-reviewed, open access journal on biomedicines published monthly online by MDPI. The aims and scope of the journal can be found on the following website: https://www.mdpi.com/journal/biomedicines/about.

The benefits of Topical Advisory Panel Members include the following:

• The opportunity to publish one paper per year with a discount in Biomedicines, as well as potential discounts for additional papers you invite;
• A certificate of recognition of your position;
• Additional sponsorships for conferences organized by Topical Advisory Panel Members of Biomedicines;
• Travel grants for conferences that you attend or organize.

To qualify as a Topical Advisory Panel Member, applicants must:

• Have experience in a field related to the journal;
• Have completed their Ph.D. within approximately the last 10 years;
• Have at least 6 papers published in the last 5 years, as a first author or corresponding author;
• Currently hold an independent research position in academia or a government institute.

If you are interested in this position, please apply via the following link: https://www.mdpi.com/journal/biomedicines/topical_advisory_panel_application, or send an email to biomedicines@mdpi.com with your academic CV. We look forward to hearing from you!

Biomedicines Editorial Office

We are delighted to welcome the following nine recognized researchers who recently joined the Editorial Board of Biomedicines (ISSN: 2227-9059).

We look forward to their every success, both in their research and in the development of the journal.

The 2021 citation metrics have been released in the Journal Citation Reports (JCR), and we’re pleased to announce the following results for MDPI journals:

For more information on Impact Factors and what it means to index academic journals, please visit our related blog posts.

* Journals given their first Impact Factor in 2022

Source: 2021 Journal Impact Factors, Journal Citation Reports ^TM (Clarivate, 2022)

MDPI’s Young Investigator Awards recognize promising junior researchers, acknowledge their contributions, and enhance communication among scientists. We are proud to present the winners for the year 2021 in the “Medicine & Pharmacology” category. The winners were selected by the journals’ editors.

We warmly congratulate the awarded young investigators for their outstanding contributions. MDPI will continue to provide support and recognition to the academic community.

Biomedicines:

• Jasper Fuk-Woo Chan, Queen Mary Hospital, Hong Kong
• Mateusz Maciejczyk, Medical University of Bialystok, Poland

Current Oncology:

• Matteo Lambertini, University of Genova, Italy

Dentistry Journal:

• Helen Rogers, Newcastle University, UK

Healthcare:

• Amir Karami, University of South Carolina, USA

Journal of Clinical Medicine:

• Andrea Palermo, Campus Bio-Medico University, Italy

Journal of Personalized Medicine:

• Simone Di Franco, University of Palermo, Italy
• Catriona Hippman, University of Calgary, Canada

Medicina:

• Veeru Kasivisvanathan, University College London, UK
• Andrea Cortegiani, University of Palermo, Italy; University Hospital Policlinico Paolo Giaccone, Italy

Pharmaceutics:

• Qi Zhou, Purdue University, USA

We are proud to recognize the winners of MDPI’s 2021 Travel Awards in the “Medicine & Pharmacology” category for their outstanding presentations and to present them with the prize.

MDPI journals regularly offer travel awards to encourage talented junior scientists to present their latest research at academic conferences in specific fields, which helps to increase their influence.

The winners mentioned below were carefully selected by the journal editors based on an outline of their research and the work to be presented at an academic conference.

We would like to warmly congratulate the Travel Awards winners for the year 2021 and wish them the greatest success with their future research endeavors. MDPI will continue to enhance communication among scientists.

Biomedicines:

• Soheil Saeedi, University of Zurich, Switzerland

Dentistry Journal:

• Shawn Alexander Hallett, University of Michigan, USA

Medicines:

• Claire Albert, Yale University, USA

Pharmaceuticals:

• Raquel Filipa da Costa Viveiros, NOVA University of Lisbon, Portugal
• Patrick Jim Küppers, University Hospital Bonn, Germany

In order to acknowledge our reviewers, who so generously dedicate their time to reviewing papers, and demonstrate diligence, professionalism, and timeliness when reviewing manuscripts, MDPI journals regularly offer outstanding reviewer awards to scholars who participate in the peer-review process.

We are proud to recognize winners for the year 2021 in the “Medicine & Pharmacology” category for their outstanding contributions among extensive competition by presenting them with an Outstanding Reviewer Award.

We would like to take this opportunity to congratulate all of the winners on their achievement. MDPI will continue to provide support and recognition to the academic community.

Cancers:

• Antonio G. Solimando, University of Bari Aldo Moro, Italy
• Chenghui Li, University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, USA
• Joaquim Carreras, Tokai University, Japan
• Pierfrancesco Franco, University of Turin School of Medicine, Italy
• Laurentiu Pop, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA

Current Oncology:

• Margaret Fitch, University of Toronto, Canada
• Caroline Mariano, BC Cancer Agency, Canada; University of British Columbia, Canada

Healthcare:

• Naser Alsharairi, Griffith University, Australia
• Peter W. Choate, Mount Royal University, Canada
• Qin Xiang Ng, National University of Singapore, Singapore

Journal of Clinical Medicine:

• Giulio Francesco, Sapienza University of Rome, Italy
• Sebastian Schnaubelt, Medical University of Vienna, Austria
• Olga Kislitsina, Northwestern University, Northwestern Memorial Hospital, USA

Journal of Personalized Medicine:

• Onofrio Laselva, University of Foggia, Italy
• Ping-Hsun Wu, Kaohsiung Medical University, Taiwan
• Vladimir Vladimirov, Virginia Commonwealth University, USA
• Mauro Giuffrè, University of Trieste, Italy

Medical Sciences:

• Erika Palmieri, National Cancer Institute at Frederick, USA

Tomography:

• Anjul Khadria, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, USA

The purpose of our Best Paper Awards is to promote and recognize the most impactful contributions published within MDPI journals.

The editors of each journal carefully selected reviews and research papers through a rigorous judging process based on criteria such as the scientific merit, overall impact, and the quality of presentation of the papers published in the journal last year.

We are honored to present the winners in the “Medicine & Pharmacology” category, who were selected amongst extensive competition, and congratulate the authors for their outstanding scientific publications.

MDPI will continue to provide support and recognition to the academic community.

Antibiotics:

• “Antimicrobial and Synergistic Effects of Commercial Piperine and Piperlongumine in Combination with Conventional Antimicrobials”

by Eunice Ego Mgbeahuruike, Milla Stålnacke, Heikki Vuorela and Yvonne Holm

Antibiotics 2019, 8(2), 55; doi:10.3390/antibiotics8020055

• “Antibiotic Discovery: Where Have We Come from, Where Do We Go?”

by Bernardo Ribeiro da Cunha, Luís P. Fonseca and Cecília R. C. Calado

Antibiotics 2019, 8(2), 45; doi:10.3390/antibiotics8020045

Dentistry Journal:

• “Regeneration of the Periodontal Apparatus in Aggressive Periodontitis Patients”

by Zvi Artzi, Shiran Sudri, Ori Platner and Avital Kozlovsky

Dent. J. 2019, 7(1), 29; doi:10.3390/dj7010029

• “Treatment of Peri-Implant Mucositis with Repeated Application of Chlorhexidine Chips or Gel during Supportive Therapy—A Randomized Clinical Trial”

by Philipp Sahrmann, Cyrill Bettschart, Daniel B. Wiedemeier, Ahmed Al-Majid, Thomas Attin and Patrick R. Schmidlin

Dent. J. 2019, 7(4), 115; doi:10.3390/dj7040115

Healthcare:

• “Two-Year Use of Care Robot Zora in Dutch Nursing Homes: An Evaluation Study”

by Chantal Huisman and Helianthe Kort

Healthcare 2019, 7(1), 31; doi:10.3390/healthcare7010031

• “The Interlinked Rising Epidemic of Insufficient Sleep and Diabetes Mellitus”

by Vijay Kumar Chattu, Soosanna Kumary Chattu, Deepa Burman, David Warren Spence and Seithikurippu R. Pandi-Perumal

Healthcare 2019, 7(1), 37; doi:10.3390/healthcare7010037

Journal of Clinical Medicine:

• “Periodontitis: A Multifaceted Disease of Tooth-Supporting Tissues”

by Eija Könönen, Mervi Gursoy and Ulvi Kahraman Gursoy

Clin. Med. 2019, 8(8), 1135; doi:10.3390/jcm8081135

• “The Immunomodulatory Functions of Mesenchymal Stromal/Stem Cells Mediated via Paracrine Activity”

by Yueyuan Zhou, Yusuke Yamamoto, Zhongdang Xiao and Takahiro Ochiya

Clin. Med. 2019, 8(7), 1025; doi:10.3390/jcm8071025

• “Optimizing Detection of Kidney Transplant Injury by Assessment of Donor-Derived Cell-Free DNA via Massively Multiplex PCR”

by Tara K. Sigdel, Felipe Acosta Archila, Tudor Constantin, Sarah A. Prins, Juliane Liberto, Izabella Damm, Parhom Towfighi, Samantha Navarro, Eser Kirkizlar, Zachary P. Demko, Allison Ryan, Styrmir Sigurjonsson, Reuben D. Sarwal, Szu-Chuan Hseish, Chitranon Chan-On, Bernhard Zimmermann, Paul R. Billings, Solomon Moshkevich and Minnie M. Sarwal

Clin. Med. 2019, 8(1), 19; doi:10.3390/jcm8010019

Medicina:

• “Tumor Microenvironment”

by Borros Arneth

Medicina 2020, 56(1), 15; doi: 10.3390/medicina56010015

• “Comparative Epidemiology and Resistance Trends of Common Urinary Pathogens in a Tertiary-Care Hospital: A 10-Year Surveillance Study”

by Márió Gajdács, Marianna Ábrók, Andrea Lázár, and Katalin Burián

Medicina 2019, 55(7), 356; doi: 10.3390/medicina55070356

Pharmaceutics:

• “3D Printed Pellets (Miniprintlets): A Novel, Multi-Drug, Controlled Release Platform Technology”

by Atheer Awad, Fabrizio Fina, Sarah J. Trenfield, Pavanesh Patel, Alvaro Goyanes, Simon Gaisford and Abdul W. Basit.

Pharmaceutics 2019, 11(4), 148; doi:10.3390/pharmaceutics11040148

• “Mathematical Modeling of Release Kinetics from Supramolecular Drug Delivery Systems”

by Constantin Mircioiu, Victor Voicu, Valentina Anuta, Andra Tudose, Christian Celia, Donatella Paolino, Massimo Fresta, Roxana Sandulovici and Ion Mircioiu

Pharmaceutics 2019, 11(3), 140; doi:10.3390/pharmaceutics11030140

The 2021 citation metrics have been officially released in Scopus!

We are pleased to announce that 182 MDPI journals are included, of which:

● 21 journals received their first CiteScore.
● 85% of journals increased their CiteScore from 2020.
● 155 journals (85%) ranked above average, in at least one category.

The following 65 MDPI journals (36%) ranked among the top 25% of journals, in at least one category:

Source: 2021 CiteScores™ (Elsevier)

We are pleased to announce that Prof. Dr. Robert Passier has been appointed Editor-in-Chief of Section “Biomedical Engineering in Human Health” and Prof. Dr. Manfredi Tesauro has been appointed Editor-in-Chief of Section “Endocrinology and Metabolism Research”. We look forward to their contributions to Biomedicines (ISSN: 2227-9059).

The year 2022 marks the 10th anniversary of Biomedicines (ISSN: 2227-9059, IF: 6.081), a peer-reviewed, open access journal based on research in the field of biomedicine. Thus far, more than 2800 papers from more than 17,000 authors have been published in Biomedicines. As well as this, more than 6300 reviewers have submitted at least one review report to this journal. We value the contributions made by authors and reviewers. To celebrate the 10th anniversary of Biomedicines, we are arranging events and the release of special content. We hope that you will be able to join us to celebrate this milestone of our journal.

If you have any questions, suggestions, or recommendations, please do not hesitate to contact biomedicines@mdpi.com.

Biomedicines Editorial Office

It is our great honor to congratulate the Editorial Board Members and Editors in MDPI's journals who have been distinguished as 2021 Highly Cited Researchers by Clarivate, according to Web of Science data. We herewith express our gratitude for the immense impact the named researchers continue to make on scientific progress and on our journals' development.

Clarivate's annual list of Highly Cited Researchers^TM identifies the most highly cited scientists for the past decade. Their impactful papers are among the top 1 per cent in the citation distribution of one or more of 22 fields analyzed in the "Essential Science Indicators", distinguishing them as hugely influential among their peers.

The full list of 2021 Highly Cited Researchers  can be accessed at the following webpage in the Web of Science^TM https://recognition.webofscience.com/awards/highly-cited/2021/.

--- Highly Cited Researchers (HCR) is a Clarivate product.

Academic editors play a crucial role in leading our journals and ensuring that each article undergoes a robust and timely peer-review. With the launch of Topics this year and addition of Topic Editors to our family of academic editors, we decided it would be a good time to restructure our academic boards, thus providing more clarity and support for each role. MDPI is pleased to announce the launch of a new position—Topical Advisory Panel Member, that will replace the previous position of Topics Board Member. The Topical Advisory Panel will be comprised of early career researchers eager to gain experience in editorial work.

The main responsibility of the new members of the Topical Advisory Panel is to regularly provide support to Guest Editors, Topic Editors, and Section Board Members. The responsibilities of the Topical Advisory Panel are available here: https://www.mdpi.com/editors.

Each year, the members’ performances are evaluated, and outstanding members are promoted to the Editorial Board by the Editor-in-Chief.

To qualify as a Topical Advisory Panel Member, applicants must:

• Have expertise and experience in the field related to the journal;
• Have received a Ph.D. in the last 10 years, approximately;
• Have at least 6-8 published papers in the last 5 years as first author or corresponding author;
• Currently hold an independent research position in academia or a government institute.

If you are interested in this role, please contact the editorial office by email.

We look forward to hearing from you soon.

Founded in 1996, MDPI was one of the first fully Open Access publisher. Over 25 years MDPI has grown to become the largest Open Access publisher globally, publishing over 160,000 articles across more than 350 journals in 2020. At the core, MDPI was founded in response to a pressing need of fast publication and inclusion. The scholar was set at the centre of the publication process for the first time. Acting as a service provider, rather than a product provider, MDPI exists to help scientists achive their objective to disseminate research results. At MDPI, we believe scientists deserve a better service from the publishing world.

The International Open Access Week (Open Access Week), founded by the SPARC (the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition) Alliance and student partners in 2008, has been successfully running for 13 years. As an advocate and pioneer of open access publishing, MDPI actively responds to the call of International Open Access Week. This year’s theme of “It Matters How We Open Knowledge: Building Structural Equity” highlights the Recommendation’s call for equitable participation from all authors and readers.

For the last 25 years, MDPI has been committed to disseminating open research. Here is a video showing MDPI’s Commitment to Equity, Inclusion and Diversity for More than 25 Years.

International Open Access Week is an important opportunity to catalyze new conversations, create connections across and between communities that can facilitate this co-design, and advance progress in the building of more equitable foundations for opening knowledge—discussions and actions that need to be continued, year in and year out. MDPI has always aimed to provide professional and efficient publishing services to scholars around the world.

Our mission is to make scientific research accessible to everyone; this year, we interview and hold discussions with open science ambassadors on how to build an equal and inclusive environment for open science. Academic editors help us collaborate with more institutions to advocate for open access ideas.

Read our anniversary blog post: "Sharing 'Collective Human Knowledge': The Benefits of Open Access Publication"

Besides this, our scientific community is a key driver of our success and MDPI’s remarkable growth. Despite the pandemic, we have prepared online conferences and workshops to gather scholars from different communities.

The Basel Sustainable Publishing online forum provides an equal opportunity for stakeholders and researchers from multi-cultural environments to exchange ideas and eliminate barriers to participation.

Conference date: 25 October 2021, online
Conference website: https://bspf2021.sciforum.net/
Main topics: MDPI discusses the current dilemma of open access science from various perspectives such as governments, libraries, and publishers, and related measures on how to change the status quo of discrimination from a global perspective.

We aim to support equality, inclusion, diversity, and accessibility in scholarly communications. We collaborate with universities and key laboratories and have scholarly communications with researchers, teachers, and students on open access workshops.

• 25 October 2021
  Energies journal and Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences

• 28 October 2021
  Machines journal and State Key Laboratory of Traction Power, Southwest Jiaotong University

• 29 October 2021
  Processes journal and Beijing Institute of Technology

• 29 October 2021
  Coatings journal and Wuhan University of Technology

MDPI is committed to providing open access and high-quality publishing services for scholars and promoting rapid dissemination of academic achievements. We hope to promote the practices and policies of open access publishing and diversify the dissemination of academic achievements.

Rigorous peer-review is the cornerstone of high-quality academic publishing. Over 369,916 scholars served as reviewers for MDPI journals in 2020. We are extremely appreciative of all those who made a contribution to the editorial process in this capacity. At the beginning of every year, journal editorial offices publish a list of all reviewers’ names to express our gratitude. In addition, this year, the MDPI Top Reviewer Award was announced, to recognize the very best reviewers for their expertise and dedication, and their high-quality, and timely review reports. We are pleased to announce the following winners of the 2020 MDPI Top Reviewer Award:

• Adriana Burlea-Schiopoiu;
• Alban Kuriqi;
• Álvaro González-Vila;
• Alessandro Alaimo;
• Alexey Beskopylny;
• Alexander Yu Churyumov;
• Alberto Fernández-Isabel;
• Andrea Mastinu;
• Antonios N. Papadopoulos;
• Anton Rassõlkin;
• Antonio Humberto Hamad Minervino;
• Arkadiusz Matwijczuk;
• Artur Słomka;
• Baojie He;
• Bartłomiej Potaniec;
• Bojan Đurin;
• Camilo Arturo Rodriguez Diaz;
• Carmelo Maria Musarella;
• Chiachung Chen;
• Chiman Kwan;
• Cristian Busu;
• Danil Pimenov;
• Dan-Cristian Dabija;
• Delfín Ortega-Sánchez;
• Demetrio Antonio Zema;
• Denis Butusov;
• Elena Lucchi;
• Gaurab Dutta;
• Livia Anastasiu;
• M. R. Safaei.

For more information about how to become a reviewer of MDPI journals, please see: www.mdpi.com/reviewers.

UN's 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are the blueprint to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all. In 2020 the SDG Publishers Compact was launched, aimed to inspire publishers and accelerate progress to achieve the 17 goals by 2030. Members of the programme are committed to support the publication of materials that will promote and inspire actions towards SDGs.

MDPI is an eager advocate of SDGs and has already been supporting the programme by creating Special Issues and publishing a series of books on SDGs prior to joining the Compact in 2021. MDPI's Sustainability Foundation initiated the World Sustainability Awards in 2016. We fully support UN's goals to promote sustainable actions that make the world a better place for all and, as part of its commitment, we will focus our actions on SDG10: Reduced Inequalities whilst promoting all 17 SDGs. For more details, please visit the programme’s website: https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/sdg-publishers-compact/.

Joining this initiative was a unanimous decision. MDPI has in its core values the dissemination of science for all, breaking the wall between research access and under-represented members of the scientific community and the general population. To support this initiative further and continue to support under-represented scientists, MDPI will take a series of actions that will be announced once ready.

The first action MDPI takes is to nominate Dr. Liliane Auwerter as the coordinator of the programme. Dr. Auwerter studied Environmental Process Technology (UTFPR, Brazil), obtained her MSc degree in Water and Environmental Engineering (University of Surrey, UK) and in 2020 completed her PhD in self-healing low-friction materials for water transport (Imperial College London, UK), always focusing on diverse scientific projects that would potentially bring sustainability to industrial processes. As a student in Brazil, she engaged in volunteering activities focused on environmental education and took part in the Millennial Development Goals meetings held at the university.

For more information, please contact:
Dr. Liliane Auwerter
Scientific Officer
liliane.auwerter@mdpi.com

This serves to announce to our valued authors based in Japan that value-added tax, or consumption tax will now be imposed on article processing fees and other service fees for all papers submitted, or resubmitted (assigned new paper IDs), effective from 15 August 2021. The change is in accordance with the Japanese "Act for Partial Revision of the Income Tax Act and Other Acts" (Act No. 9 of 2015), which includes a revision of consumption taxation on cross-border supplies of services such as digital content distribution.

For additional information from the National Tax Agency please see here ("Cross-border supplies of electronic services").

Contact: Setsuko Nishihara, MDPI Tokyo

The 2020 citation metrics have been officially released in the Journal Citation Reports (JCR)!

We are pleased to announce that 85 MDPI journals are included, of which:

• 10 journals received their first impact factor
• 96% of journals increased their impact factor from 2019
• 32 journals (38%) ranked among the top 25% of journals, in at least one category

* Journals given their first Impact Factor in 2021

Source: 2020 Journal Impact Factors, Journal Citation Reports ® (Clarivate, 2021)

MDPI Books recently released Book Builder, a new online tool to conveniently arrange, design and produce an eBook from any content published in MDPI journals. Book Builder offers two functions: on the one hand (1) Selections, available to every registered user of MDPI; on the other hand (2) Special Issue Reprints, which can be used exclusively by Guest Editors of Special Issues.

Selections

In just a matter of a few clicks, all users are now able to assemble books from MDPI articles and receive instantaneous feedback in the form of a fully produced and compiled book (PDF), which can be downloaded or ordered as print copy. Selections can include any paper published with MDPI, picking and combining content from different journals and special issues.

This way, the user may for example choose to compile an ebook focusing around a particular topic, or assemble articles from a group of others.

We invite you to make yourself familiar with the new tool! The Book Builder can be found here: https://www.mdpi.com/books/book_builder.

Special Issue Reprints

The Book Builder allows Guest Editors of MDPI journals to create a reprint from a successfully completed Special Issue or Topical Collection in book format. If you are a Guest Editor for an MDPI journal, you can use the new tool  to create an PDF document which includes all articles published in the Special Issue as well as a book cover and table of contents.

For Special Issues containing a minimum of 5 articles, the Guest Editor can request its publication on the MDPI Book platform. Published reprints are assigned an ISBN and DOI.

In addition to the PDF copy of the Reprint Book, as a token of our gratitude, MDPI offers every Guest Editor one (1) complimentary print copy (via print-on-demand). All contributors benefit from a discount on orders of any additional print copies, to share with colleagues or libraries or others.

Why choose MDPI Books?

In line with our organization's values, MDPI Books publishes all content in open access, promoting the exchange of ideas and knowledge in a globalized world. MDPI Books encompasses all the benefits of open access—high availability and visibility, as well as wide and rapid dissemination. MDPI Books are distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution License, meaning as an author you retain the copyright for your work. In addition, with MDPI Books you can complement the digital version of your work with a high-quality printed counterpart.

If you are interested in editing a book volume or series, or have a monograph manuscript to be considered for publication, please submit your proposal online and look at our Information for Authors.

Contact: Laura Wagner, MDPI Books Manager (email)

In June of this year, MDPI will celebrate the 25th anniversary of its foundation. To mark this significant milestone, we have created a 25th Anniversary page on our website that evokes the development of our company over the past quarter-century.

MDPI has been a pioneer of Open Access publishing ever since the concept was first created.

In a wide-ranging interview, our CEO Delia Mihaila reflects on the company’s 25th anniversary and its contribution to the world of scientific publishing.

Delia considers how MDPI has evolved since starting life in 1996 as a visionary ‘project’ run out of an apartment in Basel, Switzerland, by Dr. Shu-Kun Lin. A chemist who was passionate about the long-term preservation of rare chemical sample, Dr. Lin was determined to help scholars publish their findings as quickly as possible and make their research results available to as wide a readership as possible worldwide. That determination remains unchanged 25 years later.

Today, MDPI is an international organization with over 4,000 employees based on three continents and in ten countries, and ranks among the world's top four academic publishers.

MDPI's mission is to accelerate access to new scientific research, delivering insight faster for researchers worldwide. Read more here about the company's remarkable success story and what the Open Access publishing model can offer the global scientific community.

At MDPI, we strive to make your online publication process seamless and efficient. To achieve this, our team is continuously developing tools and features to make the user experience useful and convenient.

As the number of academic papers continues to grow, so does the need to analyze and work with them on a large scale. This prompted us to design a new feature aimed at helping researchers find journals that are relevant to their publication by matching their abstract topic. In this regard, we designed a similarity model that automatically identifies the most suitable academic journals for your paper.

We are pleased to introduce Journal Selector, a new feature that measures similarity in academic contexts. By simply entering the title and/or abstract into our Journal Selector, the author will see a list of the most related scientific journals published by MDPI. This method helps authors select the correct journals for their papers, highlighting the time of publication and citability.

The methodology is known as representation learning, where words are represented as vectors in hyperspace. Representation helps us differentiate between different concepts within articles, and in turn, helps us identify similarities between them.

We used an advanced machine learning model to better capture the semantic meanings of words. This helps the algorithm make better predictions by leveraging scientific text representation. In turn, this ensures high precision, helping authors decide which journal they should submit their paper to.

The goal is to support authors to publish their work in the most suitable journal for their research, as fast as possible, accelerating their career progress.

Contact: Andrea Perlato, Head of Data Analytics, MDPI (email)

Biomedicines (ISSN 1999-4915; ODEN: BIOMID) is a peer-reviewed open access journal on biomedicines, published monthly online by MDPI. Biomedicines has passed another milestone by publishing its 1000th article since the journal inception in 2013. On behalf of the editorial team, we would like to express our gratitude to the Editor-in-Chief of Biomedicines, Prof. Dr. Shaker A. Mousa, all Section Editors-in-Chief and Editorial Board Members, as well as to the Guest Editors of Special Issues, Topics Board Members, and Reviewer Board Members who have ensured the continued success of the journal through their hard work and diligence.

Biomedicines is now covered in the Science Citation Index Expanded (Web of Science) with Impact Factor of 4.717 for 2020 and ranked 41/197 (Q1) in “General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology” and 48/219 (Q1) in “Medicine”.

MDPI is proud to adopt the principles of the Coalition for Diversity & Inclusion in Scholarly Communications (C4DISC) to support building equity, inclusion, diversity, and accessibility in scholarly communications.

The C4DISC represents organizations and individuals working in scholarly communications and is focused on addressing issues of diversity and inclusion within the publishing industry.

MDPI’s Managing Editors encourage the Editors-in-Chief and Associate Editors to appoint diverse expert Editorial Boards. This is also reflective in our multi-national and inclusive workplace. We are proud to create equal opportunities without regard to gender, ethnicity, geographic location, sexual orientation, age, disability, political beliefs, religion, or socio-economic status. There is no place for discrimination in our workplace and editors of MDPI journals are to uphold these principles in high regard.

Representatives from C4DISC meet monthly, and have started to implement initiatives to shed light and improve on the lack of diversity in scholarly communications. Some of the initiatives include developing a joint statement of principles; conducting market research; providing training resources, best practices, toolkits, and documentation for our collective memberships; and establishing outreach programs, curricula, events, and publications.

The Coalition is committed to:

• eliminating barriers to participation, extending equitable opportunities across all stakeholders, and ensuring that our practices and policies promote equitable treatment and do not allow, condone, or result in discrimination;
• creating and maintaining an environment that respects diverse traditions, heritages, and experiences;
• promoting diversity in all staff, volunteers, and audiences, including full participation in programs, policy formulation, and decision-making;
• raising awareness about career opportunities in our industries to groups who are currently underrepresented in the workforce;
• supporting our members in achieving diversity and inclusion within their organizations.

At MDPI we have slightly revised the layout for articles to be published in the 2021 Volume, starting at the end of December 2020. As of today, the article templates available for download on ‘Instructions for Authors’ pages have been updated.

The most noticeable change can be found on the first page of the article, where a left-hand column has been created to include the following front matter elements: (i) the recommended citation style for the article, (ii) the publishing history, (iii) as well as the Creative Commons Attribution license used (iv) a standard note regarding affiliations. At the same time, the extra spacing on the left means the authors’ affiliations are now more clearly set apart than before. Other front matter key elements such as journal logo, article type, article title, authors, abstract and keywords remain unchanged.

The blank column on the left runs through all pages in an article; as a result, the main text is slightly more condensed, which improve reader friendliness for smaller screens. Small figures/tables are aligned on the left with standard indenture, while large figures/tables are centered and covering the full width of the page. The revised layout was applied in the article pictured below, to serve as an example:

1) Information is displayed in the left information bar.

2) In the main text, there is a blank column on the left.

3) Small tables/figures are aligned on the left, large tables/figures are centered.

We are pleased to acknowledge that many academic editors who have made an impact on MDPI journals as editorial board members, editors-in-chief, or section editors, are recognized as 2020 Highly Cited Researchers by Clarivate.

Highly Cited Researchers highlights the top 1% of researchers, by citations, in one or more of the 22 fields used in Clarivate Analytics Essential Science Indicators. We offer our congratulations to 279 academic editors of MDPI journals who were recognized as the most influential scholars in their fields in 2020.

The full list of 2020 Highly Cited Researchers  can be accessed on https://recognition.webofsciencegroup.com/awards/highly-cited/2020/

--- Highly Cited Researchers (HCR) is a Clarivate product.

MDPI will be attending the conference Neuroscience 2020, which will be hosted in Washington, USA, 24–28 October 2020.

SfN’s 50th annual meeting is the premier venue for the presentation of emerging science in the field of neurosciences, where one can learn from experts, forge collaborations with peers, explore new tools and technologies, and advance their career.

The following MDPI journals will be represented:

• Brain Sciences (leading journal)
• JCM
• Medicina
• Genes
• Children
• Cancers
• Behavioral Sciences
• Cells
• IJERPH
• Disease
• Biomedicines
• JPM
• Pathogens
• Healthcare
• IJMS
• Psych
• Pharmaceuticals
• Clocks&Sleep
• Jounal of Intelligence
• Pharmaceutics

If you are attending this conference, please feel free to stop by our booth (Booth #208). Our delegates look forward to meeting you in person, to answer any questions you may have. For more information about the conference, please visit:

https://www.sfn.org/meetings/neuroscience-2020

We are delighted to announce the establishment of our Open Access agreement with Jisc Collections, which will allow UK institutions to benefit from access to article processing charge (APC) discounts and streamlined payment workflows.

All institutions participating in the agreement will also gain access to the MDPI online submission system where they can find full article metadata and pricing information for easy identification and additional transparency.

Eligible authors affiliated with the participating institutions are prompted to choose the corresponding Institutional Open Access Program (IOAP) when they submit an article via our online submission system.

About Jisc

Jisc's vision is for the UK to be the most digitally advanced education and research nation in the world. At its heart is the super-fast national research and education network, Janet, with built-in cyber security protection.  Jisc also provides technology solutions for its members (colleges, universities and research centres) and customers (public sector bodies), helps members save time and money by negotiating sector-wide deals and provides advice and practical assistance on digital technology. Jisc is funded by the UK higher and further education and research funding bodies and member institutions.

For more information, contact helen.dobson@jisc.ac.uk.

About MDPI

MDPI is a publisher of fully peer-reviewed, Open Access journals with a focus on thorough and rapid editorial processing. Its aim is to ensure that high-quality research is verified and made available to the research community as quickly as possible. MDPI stands at the forefront of the Open Access movement, having launched its first online journal Molecules in 1996. Today, MDPI is a leader in Open Access publishing with over 250 journals across all research disciplines, and all content published under a Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY).

For any questions about this agreement, please contact the MDPI IOAP team at ioap@mdpi.com.