Progress for Journal of Functional Morphology and Kinesiology in 2017

1. Looking Back on 2017

The Journal of Functional Morphology and Kinesiology (JFMK, ISSN 2411-5142) is a young journal first released in March 2016 [1]. This journal provides an advanced forum for research studies on functional morphology and kinesiology and the regulatory functions of movement. JFMK meets the growing demand for high-quality, peer-reviewed international journals, supplying easy access, the high publicity of Open Access, the Digital Object Identifier (DOI), ORCID, and CrossRef to all researchers. We are now indexed in the DOAJ (Directory of Open Access Journals), Scilit (a comprehensive, open-access scholarly database, developed and maintained by MDPI), and Google Scholar, and our full texts are archived in CLOCKSS (Digital Archive), e-Helvetica (Swiss National Library Digital Archive), and J-Gate (Informatics India). JFMK is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). To verify the originality of content submitted to our journals, we use iThenticate to check submissions against previous publications. MDPI works with Publons to provide reviewers with credit for their work and MDPI Scitations Alert to provide our authors information on new publications in their research field.

Kinesiology is the study of human movement or physical activity. A large, diverse metadisciplinary field like kinesiology has a variety of multi-disciplinary and sub-disciplinary journals publishing research. Kinesiology research can be found indexed in major databases such as Scopus, Web of Science, PubMed, and Google Scholar under subject areas such as education, physiology, rehabilitation, sports medicine, and sports science. These subject areas or categories of databases are just small subsets of the many sub-disciplinary areas related to kinesiology (e.g., athletic training, biomechanics, exercise physiology, psychology, leisure, measurement, motor behavior, public health, and sociology). The kinesiology field is a growing discipline as evidenced by the kinesiology-related journals by Journal Rankings—SCImago (Table S1). We hope to be included in this Journal Rankings soon.

We are proud to let you know that, thanks to your continuous support, Journal of Functional Morphology and Kinesiology has continued to grow in the fields of morphology, kinesiology, movement, biomechanics, sport medicine, and musculoskeletal disorders. It is my pleasure to confirm the progress recorded in 2017 [2].

Indeed, the number of published manuscripts has jumped from 41 in the 2016 volume to 89 in the 2017 volume, 12 scientific contributions for each issue, and we rejected in total 23 contributions to maintain the high standards of our journal. The Journal of Functional Morphology and kinesiology receives more manuscripts than it is able to publish and the decision as to which papers are accepted or rejected is a difficult one. The decision is based on several factors including originality, experimental design, scientific quality, data interpretation, clarity, and English quality to maintain the high standards of our journal.

In 2017, different special issues were activated thanks to the huge support of our editors. They include the following: “The Knee: Structure, Function and Rehabilitation”, edited by Nick Caplan [3]; “Muscle Damage and Regeneration”, edited by José Peña-Amaro [4]; “Articular Cells and Tissues in Health and Osteoarthritis”, edited by Alexandrina Ferreira Mendes and Charles J. Malemud [5]; “Selected Papers from TERMIS European Chapter Meeting 2017 on ‘Biomechanics, Morphology and Imaging,’” edited by Mauro Alini, Martin J. Stoddart, Victoria Workman, and Katja Schenke-Layland [6]; “New Advances in Human Posture and Movement”, edited by Olivier Hue [7]; “Tailored Exercise in Patients with Chronic Diseases 2017”, edited by Laura Stefani [8]; “Muscular Dystrophy”, edited by Guglielmo Sorci [9]; “Movement Analysis”, edited by Jan Cabri and Luís Silva [10]; “Motor Impairment and Neuropathic Pain in Patients with Neurological Diseases: Pathophysiological Mechanisms and Potential Treatment Options”, edited by Alessandro Castorina [11]; “Mechanisms and Pathophysiology of Concussion”, edited by Michael James Grey [12]; “Health Promotion in Children and Adolescents through Sport and Physical Activities” by Antonio Bianco [13]; “Role of Exercises in Musculoskeletal Disorders”, edited by Giuseppe Musumeci and Paola Castrogiovanni [14]; “Application of Biomechanics in Functional Rehabilitation”, edited by Vincent K. Ramsey and Nigel Gleeson [15]; “Recent Advances in Neurorehabilitation”, edited by Riggs J. Klika [16]; “Exercise and Aging”, edited by Maria A. Fiatarone Singh, Clark Dickin, and Brach Poston [17].

In 2017, three scientists not renewed their Editorial Board membership (Dr. Farasyn, Dr. Stylianides and Dr. Pasini), instead 12 distinguished scientists joined the Editorial Board: Prof. Dr. Elisabetta Falcieri (Università degli Studi di Urbino “Carlo Bo”, Italy); Prof. Dr. Laura Stefani (University of Florence, Italy); Prof. Dr. Lee E. Brown (California State University, USA); Prof. Dr. Mark Willems (University of Chichester, UK); Prof. Dr. Petek Korkusuz (Hacettepe University Faculty of Medicine, Turkey); Prof. Dr. Vincent K. Ramsey (United States Sports Academy, USA); Prof. Dr. Eleftherios Kellis (University of Thessaloniki, Greece); Prof. Dr. Jeffrey M. McBride (Appalachian State University, USA); Prof. Dr. Maria Fiatarone Singh (University of Sydney, Australia); Prof. Dr. Peter Hofmann (University of Graz, Austria); Prof. Dr. Antonio Paoli (University of Padua, Italy); Prof. Dr. Antonio Bianco (University of Palermo, Italy); Prof. Dr. Ali Mobasheri (University of Surrey, UK); Prof. Dr. Valentina Perciavalle (University of Catania, Italy); for a total of 59 editorial board members, nine advisory board members, and the editor-in-chief.

Journal of Functional Morphology and Kinesiology confirmed its status as an international journal by being present as a media partner, an exhibitor, or a sponsor at national and international meetings, among which were the following:

• The 22nd Annual ECSS Congress MetropolisRuhr 2017, MetropolisRuhr, Germany, 5–8 July 2017 (sponsored banner advertisement on congress newsletters);
• The 35th International Society of Biomechanics in Sport Conference, Cologne, Germany, 14–18 June 2017 (sponsored journal poster in coffee break);
• TERMIS European Chapter Meeting, Davos, Switzerland, 26–30 June 2017 (set up conference special issue);
• The XXVI Congress of the International Society of Biomechanics (Journal flyer distributions);
• icSPORTS 2017 (journal flyer and special issue flyer distributions);
• Italian Society of Sports and Exercise Medicine Conference, Firenze, Italy, 4 November 2017 (journal flyer distributions);
• Italian Society of Sports and Exercise Medicine Conference, Brescia, Italy, 19 November 2017 (journal flyer distributions);
• 71th Italian meeting of the Italian Society of Human Anatomy and Histology (SIAI), Taormina, Italy, 20–22 September 2017 (journal flyer distributions);
• 15th International Congress of Histochemistry and Cytochemistry (ICHC 2017), Antalya, 18–21 May 2017 (journal flyer distributions);
• 37th Annual Meeting of the Australasian Neuroscience Society, Sydney, Australia, 3–7 December 2017 (journal flyer and special issue flyer distributions).

2. Looking Forward to 2018

In 2018, we shall pursue our efforts to improve the journal through further growth and increased visibility.

In order to achieve this target and lay a strong foundation for publications in 2018 and application for indexing, we have made the following plans:

• follow up the planned papers from editorial board members;
• since special issues are the main source of submissions, set up two special issues every three months to attract more submissions, whose topics should keep pace with research focus;
• contact international conferences recommended by the editor-in-chief or by editorial board members and try to establish media partnership with them to make JFMK increasingly well-known among scholars;
• communicate with editorial board members regularly and ask for their help and suggestions for journal development;
• post high-quality papers through social media (e.g., Linkedin, Twitter, and Facebook) and increase online readership;
• reduce the processing time of each manuscript.
• try to have publications indexed by the Emerging Sources Citation Index (Web of Science) and by EMBASE (Elsevier) (we have already applied to these and will apply to PubMed and Scopus in the first quarter of 2018);
• try to be included in the SCImago Journal Rank in the kinesiology-related section;
• accomplish, for our authors, the best JFMK paper award and the JFMK travel grant award;
• garner, for the sake of journal promotion, support from sponsors for our editors to participate in, and disseminate our journal to, international conferences.

We hope that you share our enthusiasm for this new journal and we look forward to working with you to make JFMK a leader in its field. Your contributions are vital for the success of this new journal. The publication fees are fully waived for papers submitted in 2018. We look forward to receiving your contributions (papers, reviews, etc.) and proposals for special issues are always welcome.

It is my pleasure to end this editorial by wishing you a healthy and prosperous new year. This is also the opportunity for me to warmly thank, for their confidence, the following: our authors, readers, and reviewers, as well as our editorial advisors, eminent scientists in these fields that, with their experience and important suggestions, guide us in this great enterprise; our excellent editorial board members whose depth of experience covers a very broad spectrum on different disciplines related to morphology and kinesiology arena; the managing editor Olivia Yu for her huge support, the publishing manager Martyn Rittman, the assistant editors Celia Xu and Ivan Feng, that, day after day, thanks to their valuable contributions, ensure the growth of this journal; and, finally, all members of our teams in Basel, Barcelona, Beijing, Belgrade, and Wuhan as well as our sponsors.