Contemporary Classics in the Life Sciences: An autobiographical feast

Since 1977 Current Content.@ (C@ ) has been publishing commentaries written by authors of highly cited papers and books, identified by data from the Science Citation Index” (SCF ) and the SOcial Sciences Citation Index@ (SSCP ). I In their commentaries the authors describe how they developed and conducted their research. They frequently mention the work of coauthors and the help they received from other colleagues. Some recall obstacles they encountered, even rejection by journal editors of papers that subsequently became highly influential. The authors also speculate about why their papers or books received such extraordinary attention. Many mention that they were unaware of the large number of citations to their work. At ISP we call their exceptional articles and monographs citation classics. Their Citation Classicsm commentaries, in illuminating the behind-thescenes dimensions of scientific investigation and discovery, offer researchers, students, and h~torians of science insights ordinarily not found in the pages of professional journals and scholarly monographs. When we introduced this editorial feature to CC in 1977, the same commentary appeared in each of the CC editions. 1Two years later we provided a separate Citation Classic commentary suited to the subject area covered by each edition.z In 1981 we added a second Citation Classic to each issue of November 4, 1985