"Computers and Biomedical Research" to become "The Journal of Biomedical Informatics"

"Computers and Biomedical Research" to become
"The Journal of Biomedical Informatics"

Computers and Biomedical Research (CBR) is being reborn in 2001 under the name "The Journal of Biomedical Informatics" (JBI). The journal will continue the tradition of excellence that began in 1968 under Homer R. Warner's stewardship and has continued for the last decade under the leadership of Al Pryor. I have agreed to take over as Editor in Chief, and I owe a debt of gratitude to Homer, Al, and Academic Press for the traditions that they have established and the quality of the editorial process. JBI will continue to be available to AMIA members at a specially reduced individual rate and the full text of articles will continue to be available on the web at Academic Press' IDEAL site.

Under its new title, JBI will continue the volume numbers from CBR and thus its historical ties to the first 33 volumes will not be lost. The change in title reflects our desire to emphasize informatics rather than the broad area of computers in biomedicine. We need to focus more in one area and the journal is intended to complement JAMIA by emphasizing informatics methodology rather than descriptions or evaluations of completed systems. Formative evaluation articles, and papers emphasizing innovative methodologies and their generalizability, will be encouraged. Graduate students may find JBI a particularly suitable venue for articles on PhD dissertation work, for example. We aim to make it an invaluable resource for medical informatics scientists/researchers and educators.

I am joined in this effort by an excellent group of associate editors that includes ACMI fellows Jim Cimino, Bob Greenes, Steve Johnson, Zak Kohane, and Bill Yasnoff. The full editorial board will be announced later. Our goal is to attract papers that are motivated by problems in the full range of informatics application areas: Clinical Informatics, Public Health and Population Informatics, Imaging Informatics, Bioinformatics, and all other domains of applied bioinformatics. Steve Johnson has taken on the special task of editing a series of methodology review papers, of which we intend to publish one in each issue.

For the time being JBI will continue to be published 6 times per year, with its first issue appearing in late February or early March of 2001. The size and design are totally changed. We are also converting the journal to a fully electronic editorial process. Papers will be submitted to the journal's offices in San Diego by electronic mail or FTP, and all reviews and distribution to reviewers, will be handled via email with attachments. The details of the submission and review processes, plus overall guidelines for the journal, are available on the web at http://www.academicpress.com/jbi.

dfs 12/13/00