Announcements

We are pleased to announce that 43 new scholars have been appointed Editorial Board Members for the journal Children (ISSN: 2227-9067):

Dr. Piero Farruggia

Dr. Cinzia Maspero

Dr. Mingbang Wang

Dr. Andrea Scaramuzza

Dr. Giovanni Filocamo

Prof. Dr. María Fernández-Hawrylak

Dr. Santosh K. Tadakamadla

Prof. Dr. Syuji Takei

Prof. Dr. Tonia Vassilakou

Prof. Dr. Luigi Titomanlio

Dr. Eugene Kim

Prof. Dr. Francesco Inchingolo

Dr. Kimberly A. Pyke-Grimm

Prof. Dr. Evalotte Mörelius

Dr. Jennifer Stinson

Dr. Anna Axelin

Prof. Dr. Antonio Scarano

Prof. Dr. Maria Grazia Cagetti

Prof. Dr. Jyu-Lin Chen

Dr. Mariá Cernada

Dr. Sarah Moxon

Dr. Jane D. Champion

Dr. Kun Tang

Dr. Anna Lewandowska

Prof. Dr. Ivan Hand

Prof. Dr. Angelo Aulisa

Dr. Min Sun Kim

Prof. Dr. Alfonso Papparella

Prof. Dr. Marzia Lazzerini

Prof. Dr. Marek Mandera

Dr. Cristian Zeni

Dr. Gerda van Wezel-Meijler

Dr. Nahla Zaghloul

Dr. Allan Glanzman

Dr. Bin-Bin Chen

Dr. Michele Callea

Dr. Ashlesha Kaushik

Dr. Francesco Leon

Dr. Eungkwon Pae

Dr. Samriddha Ray

Dr. Maria Marino

Dr. Benjamin J. Landis

Dr. William T. Zempsky

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.

Children (ISSN 2227-9067; indexed within Scopus, SCIE (Web of Science), PubMed, PMC, and many other databases) is launching a Topical Advisory Panel Member position. This role primarily involves providing regular support to Guest Editors, Topic Editors, and Section Board Members. A more comprehensive list of responsibilities of the Topical Advisory Panel Member is available on the following webpage: https://www.mdpi.com/editors.

Children is an international, peer-reviewed open access journal that provides an advanced forum for studies relevant to children’s health, related to the dissemination of clinical, epidemiological and translational science. The distinguished Editorial Board and the refereeing process ensure that the highest degree of scientific rigor and review is provided to all articles that are published in this journal, which typically consist of original research articles and reviews. We aim to promote Children to be recognized as one of the leading publication outlets, due to its high-quality and cutting-edge research in this broad and diverse field, which is all available to readers with unlimited free access. Further information on the journal can be found at https://www.mdpi.com/journal/children.

Every year, the performance of each member will be evaluated. Members who showcase outstanding performance will be promoted to the Editorial Board by the Editor-in-Chief.

To qualify as a Topical Advisory Panel Member, it is required that applicants:

• Possess expertise and experience in a field related to the journal;
• Have received a Ph.D. in the last 10 years, approximately;
• Have published at least 6–8 papers 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 role, or have any recommendations, please do not hesitate to contact us (children@mdpi.com).

We look forward to hearing from you soon.

Children Editorial Office

To specifically develop different research areas and attract more high-quality papers, we are pleased to announce the following Sections in Children (ISSN 2227-9067):

• Pediatric Neonatology;
• Pediatric Cardiology;
• Pediatric Nephrology;
• Pediatric Dermatology;
• Pediatric Nursing;
• Pediatric Orthopedics;
• Pediatric Dentistry;
• Pediatric Pulmonary and Sleep Medicine;
• Child and Adolescent Psychiatry;
• Pediatric Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine;
• Pediatric Allergy and Immunology;
• Pediatric Infectious Diseases.

We are now recruiting Editorial Board Members (EBMs) for these Sections. If you are an active researcher in one of the aforementioned fields and are passionate about publishing cutting-edge research, please do not hesitate to get in touch (children@mdpi.com). You can find more information on our homepage, https://www.mdpi.com/journal/children.

Editorial Board Members have the following responsibilities:

• Making decisions on whether a manuscript can be accepted or not, based on the reports we collect;
• Reviewing a small number of papers per year;
• Acting as a Guest Editor of a Special Issue on a topic related to your research interests;
• Promoting the journal Children and increasing its visibility at related academic conferences.

Children (ISSN 2227-9067) is a peer-reviewed, open access journal of pediatrics, focusing on the dissemination of clinical, epidemiological and translational science relevant to children’s health, published monthly online by MDPI. Children is indexed within Scopus, SCIE (Web of Science), PubMed, PMC, and many other databases.

We believe that by combining our rigorous editorial policies with your expertise, we can build a high-quality journal. We thank you in advance for your interest, and we look forward to collaborating with you.

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.

We are pleased to announce that Prof. Dr. Chiarella Sforza has been appointed Section Editor-in-Chief of “Pediatric Dentistry” in Children (ISSN: 2227-9067). We look forward to her contribution to the continued success of Children.

Name: Prof. Dr. Chiarella Sforza

Affiliation: Department of Biomedical Sciences for Health, Universita degli Studi di Milano, 20133 Milano, Italy

Interests: anatomy; face; 3D; craniofacial growth and development; evaluation of orthodontic treatments effects; clinical trial; special need patients; craniofacial syndromes; dental arches in pediatric population and their development; medical imaging 

The following is a short Q&A with Prof. Dr. Chiarella Sforza:

1. What appealed to you about the journal that made you want to take the role as its Section Editor-in-Chief?

Childhood is a very important part of our lives, and, thus, we must help all children to live their life in the best possible way by giving them the best support to become the future generation of adults. This can happen in a variety of ways, starting from a full understanding of their physical, physiological, and mental characteristics that are not just down-sized copies of adult ones.

The presence of a journal devoted to them opens the possibility of a fertile discussion among scientists, practitioners, and teachers. Children can be an agora, a public place for interchange, where good practices can be shared and new knowledge exchanged.

2. What is your vision for the journal?

The "Pediatric Dentistry" Section in Children should help authors share their results with colleagues, focusing either on a better description of children and how they change progressively, or on specific childhood diseases and their diagnosis, as well as treatment planning and follow up. 

The journal, together with top-level basic, translational, and clinical research, should also present short technical notes that help with practical issues. Experts’ opinions on selected topics of current interest may be an additional way to share knowledge.

3. What does the future of this field of research look like?

The general awareness that children’s health and diseases are unique, or have a distinct treatment, is growing, and is also supported by journals such as Children. We have to support the current and the next generation of medical doctors, pediatric dentists, dental hygienists, speech therapists, etc., to improve their understanding of childhood and pediatric treatment. Therefore, practical notes on technical issues should complement the classical reports of clinical, basic, and translational themes.

4. What do you think of the development of Open Access in the publishing field?

As a researcher working in a public university, I support the Open Access policies proposed and promoted by our governments and regulatory agencies. As my research is carried out using public funds, the relevant results should be made freely available to all the citizens. Unfortunately, this policy is not fully supported from a financial point of view as, in some occasions, there might be some budgeting issues.

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

We are pleased to announce that 36 new scholars were appointed Editorial Board Members for the journal Children:

Prof. Dr. Niels Wedderkopp (University of Southern Denmark, Denmark);

Prof. Dr. Christian Hirsch (University of Leipzig, Germany);

Prof. Dr. Harald Ehrhardt (Justus-Liebig-University, Germany);

Prof. Dr. Volker R. Schöffl (Friedrich Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany);

Prof. Dr. Benedetto Vitiello (Regina Margherita Hospital, Italy);

Prof. Dr. Manuela Verissimo (ISPA–Instituto Universitário, Portugal);

Prof. Dr. Staffan Janson (Karlstad University, Sweden);

Prof. Dr. Michelle de Haan (University College London, UK);

Prof. Dr. Mark A. Gottlieb (Northeastern Unviersity School of Law, USA);

Prof. Dr. Russell Hopp (University of Nebraska School of Medicine, USA);

Prof. Dr. Walter K. Kraft (Thomas Jefferson University, USA);

Dr. Peter Simm (Royal Children's Hospital Melbourne, Australia);

Dr. Nelson Alphonso (Queensland Paediatric Cardiac Research, Australia);

Dr. Cinzia Maspero (Fondazione IRCCS Ca’ Granda Ospedale Maggiore Policlinico, Italy);

Dr. Piero Farruggia (Di Cristina e Benfratelli, Italy);

Dr. Giovanni Filocamo (Via della Commenda 9, Italy);

Dr. Simone Pisano (Federico II University, Italy);

Dr. George Antonogeorgos (Harokopio University, Greece);

Dr. Leonardo Emberti Gialloreti (University of Rome Tor Vergata, Italy);

Dr. Adriano Carotti (Bambino Gesù Children's Hospital, Italy);

Dr. Sabine Plancoulaine (INSERM, CRESS, Research Team on Early life origins of health (EAROH), France);

Dr. Thomas Riedel (Cantonal Hospital of Graubuenden, Switzerland);

Dr. Liang-Jen Wang (Kaohsiung Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, Kaohsiung, Taiwan);

Dr. Ho-Chang Kuo (Chang Gung University College of Medicine, Taiwan);

Dr. David S. Cooper (University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, USA);

Dr. Mary Ellen McCann (Boston Children's Hospital, Boston, USA);

Dr. Rachel Neff Greenley (Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science, USA);

Dr. Mark A. Connelly (Children's Mercy Hospital, USA);

Dr. Bahaaldin Alsouf (University of Louisville, USA);

Dr. Oliver Mann (Universitätsklinikum Hamburg-Eppendorf, Germany);

Dr. Stefano Giuliani (Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Foundation Trust, UK);

Dr. Kelly A. Rouster-Stevens (Emory University School of Medicine, USA);

Dr. Nathan M. Novotny (Oakland University William Beaumont School of Medicine, USA);

Dr. Michele Maddux (Children’s Mercy Kansas City, USA);

Dr. Niko Kaciroti (Medical School University of Michigan, USA);

Dr. Edmond P. Bowers (Clemson University, USA).

We wish them every success in developing the journal.

Further details about the Editorial Board can be found at: https://www.mdpi.com/journal/children/editors.