A new ICB sister journal focuses on clinical and translational immunology

C linical & Translational Immunology (CTI) has been launched as the sister journal to Immunology and Cell Biology (ICB), with the goal of creating an open-access publication focused on quality clinical research and reports that would be immediately and freely available to all interested readers. ICB has a long and illustrious history, being founded in 1924 as the Australian Journal of Experimental Biology and Medical Science. Under its original name, it became home to many outstanding publications in medical research and immunology contributed by eminent scientists such as Sir Frank Macfarlane Burnet, who published more than 90 papers in the journal between 1925 and 1972.1 As time progressed, there was an increasing focus on immunology, and in 1987 the journal changed its name to Immunology and Cell Biology, and became the official journal of the Australasian Society for Immunology. Today, ICB is among the oldest and most respected journals in the fields of cell biology and immunology. The changing landscape of the immunology field has resulted in an increasing focus on excellent clinical immunology and translational research, with a corresponding increase in submissions on these topics. The pioneering work undertaken by Professor Ian Frazer (Diamantina Institute, Queensland), who showed for the first time that a vaccine could be used to prevent cancer by creating the successful human papilloma virus vaccine to prevent cervical cancers,2 highlights the translation of critical basic research to the clinic. Owing to the emergence of new robust approaches to investigating clinical disease, the development of new disease models that much more closely mimic the human setting (for example, humanized mice) and translation of findings back into the clinic, the editorial board of ICB has decided that a new journal is merited to host a venue for these studies. Recently, ICB hosted a Special Feature that clearly reflects the greater integration between basic research and translation with a focus on Autoimmunity (Autoimmune Disease: Clinical Translation of Basic Immunology).3 Thus, in collaboration with the Nature Publishing Group (NPG) and Australasian Society for Immunology, we are thrilled to launch CTI. Such collaboration allows CTI to build upon the strong editorial foundation that has been laid through ICB while also incorporating the latest advances in publishing, such as online-only and open access, which facilitates rapid publication times, high readership visibility and greater collaboration within the research community. NPG provide pioneering technologies, innovative formats and world-class production in order to enhance the experience of the CTI community as they visit the journal website. Increased search functionality for papers of interest by article type, publication date or subject category as well as the ‘see more articles like this’ tool, which recommends links to relevant articles from all of NPG’s publications, make it easier to populate your library of literature in a particular field of interest. Accompanying selected accepted articles with a Research Summary, which is a professionally written, 100–150 words synopsis of an article, provides an additional opportunity to be notified of a paper of interest. A Research Summary presents information to readers about the aims, main outcomes and significant conclusions of the article. Authors and others are able to re-use, re-post, host and E-mail Research Summaries to highlight the value of their work. In addition, the first 140 characters of the Research Summary will be a ‘tweet-able’ sentence, so the community can now be kept informed of papers of interest through the use of social media. The advances in the immunology field and in publishing meld together nicely in CTI. On behalf of the entire editorial team, I welcome you to the CTI community and look forward to presenting the latest research to facilitate discussion and collaboration that will continue the advancements in the field of biomedical science.