Announcements

We are pleased to announce that the winner of the Life 2021 PHD Thesis Award is Dr. Brayon Fremin. Dr. Soukaina El Amrani Zerrifi and Dr. Carina Isabel Coelho Proença are honorable mentions.

Dr. Brayon Fremin is from Stanford University, USA. In his Ph.D. thesis, Dr. Fremin developed original ideas and methods for profiling RNA expression in the microbiome. The results—generated by concepts developed independently by Dr. Fremin himself while he was a Ph.D. student—are attracting considerable attention (> 100 citations) after being published in the most well-reputed journals. The procedures used were highly original, and identification of what genes are expressed and novel open reading frames of the microbiome should have a huge impact on understanding how the microbiome influences many disease states. His advisor, Dr. Bhatt, states “I have never met a more creative and pioneering translational scientist in my entire career”. We look forward to reading about Dr. Fremin’s many scientific accomplishments to come.

Dr. Soukaina El Amrani Zerrifi, from Cadi Ayyad University, Morocco, is recognized for her outstanding accomplishments and the impact of her work on the environment and bio-technological development of her country. In her thesis work, she isolated and identified multiple products from both seaweeds and bacteria that hold great potential for combatting cyanobacterial blooms, which represent a major ecological and environmental threat in many marine ecosystems. Her work has already been highly cited, and her advisor, Dr. Oudra, stated that she has “enormous potential to excel in research”.

Dr. Carina Isabel Coelho Proença, from University of Porto, Portugal, is recognized for her impressive productivity and impact within the field, as reflected by over 190 citations of publications arising from her Ph.D. work. Her research investigated the potential application of flavonoids targeting several diabetes-related enzymes as novel therapeutics. By means of systematic characterization, and sophisticated computational approaches, followed up by experimental validation, the study identified specific aspects of flavonoid structure that can enable differential targeting of five different enzymes which are central to diabetes. This large body of work generated nine highly cited papers with Dr. Proença as lead author. Her advisor, Dr. Fernandes, praised the “enthusiasm, commitment, hard work, and intellectual rigor” displayed throughout her doctoral studies.

As the awardee, Dr. Brayon Fremin will receive an honorarium of CHF 800, while all three of Dr. Brayon Fremin, Dr. Soukaina El Amrani Zerrifi and Dr. Carina Isabel Coelho Proença will have the opportunity to publish one paper free of charge before 31 December 2023 in Life, after peer review.

We want to thank all the excellent Ph.D. students who applied for this award as their brilliant CVs made the choice very difficult. We would also like to thank all of the Award Committee Members for their thorough evaluation of the applications.

1. “Self-Reported Real-World Safety and Reactogenicity of COVID-19 Vaccines: A Vaccine Recipient Survey”

Alexander G. Mathioudakis et al.

Life 2021, 11, 249; 10.3390/life11030249

Available online: https://doi.org/10.3390/life11030249

2. “Seroprevalence of Antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 among the Personnel and Students of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece: A Preliminary Report”

Ourania E. Tsitsilonis et al.

Life 2020, 10, 214; 10.3390/life10090214

Available online: https://doi.org/10.3390/life10090214

3. “One-Seventh of Patients with COVID-19 Had Olfactory and Gustatory Abnormalities as Their Initial Symptoms: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis”

Hsin Chi et al.

Life 2020, 10, 158; 10.3390/life10090158

Available online: https://doi.org/10.3390/life10090158

4. “The Microbiota/Host Immune System Interaction in the Nose to Protect from COVID-19”

Arianna Di Stadio et al.

Life 2020, 10, 345; 10.3390/life10120345

Available online: https://doi.org/10.3390/life10120345

5. “Investigation of Genetic Variations of IL6 and IL6R as Potential Prognostic and Pharmacogenetics Biomarkers: Implications for COVID-19 and Neuroinflammatory Disorders”

Claudia Strafella et al.

Life 2020, 10, 351; 10.3390/life10120351

Available online: https://doi.org/10.3390/life10120351

6. “Molecular Epidemiology Analysis of SARS-CoV-2 Strains Circulating in Romania during the First Months of the Pandemic”

Marius Surleac et al.

Life 2020, 10, 152; 10.3390/life10080152

Available online: https://doi.org/10.3390/life10080152

7. “Previous Humoral Immunity to the Endemic Seasonal Alphacoronaviruses NL63 and 229E Is Associated with Worse Clinical Outcome in COVID-19 and Suggests Original Antigenic Sin”

Daniele Focosi et al.

Life 2021, 11, 298; 10.3390/life11040298

Available online: https://doi.org/10.3390/life11040298

8. “Long-Term SARS-CoV-2 Infection Associated with Viral Dissemination in Different Body Fluids Including Bile in Two Patients with Acute Cholecystitis”

Rossana Scutari et al.

Life 2020,10, 302; 10.3390/life10110302

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.

We are pleased to announce the good news that Prof. Dr. Doron Lancet has been appointed Editor-in-Chief of the section "Origin of Life" Section in Life (ISSN: 2075-1729).

Prof. Dr. Doron Lancet completed his B.Sc. degree in Chemistry at Hebrew University, Ph.D. in Immunology at Weizmann Institute, and postdoctoral training at Harvard and Yale. Back at Weizmann, he pioneered research on the biochemistry and evolution of olfaction and headed a human genome research center, where he deciphered human diseases and developed GeneCards, the world-famous gene web compendium. In parallel, Lancet pioneered a lipid-first scenario for the origin and early evolution of life. For that, he established a novel computer-based chemical kinetics model that demonstrates how self-reproducing lipid assemblies can support a pre-RNA path for the origin of life under harsh prebiotic conditions.

The following is a short Q&A with Prof. Dr. Doron Lancet, who shared his vision for the journal with us, as well as his views of the research area and open access publishing:

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

I highly appreciate the vision and devotion of the journal in advancing and enhancing the level of publication in the field of origin of life.

2. What is your vision for the journal?

I see it progressing to be the world’s top journal in its field.

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

We are at a turning point in understanding the origin of life, moving from compound-centric to systems chemistry approaches. These have the potential for seeking chemical principles that could reveal how simple multi-molecular reproducers could emerge from a chaotic chemical environment.

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

An excellent trend!

We warmly welcome Prof. Dr. Doron Lancet as Editor-in-Chief of the Section “Origin of Life”, and we look forward to Life achieving many milestones under his leadership. For further information on the journal section, please visit https://www.mdpi.com/journal/life/sections/origin_life.

We are pleased to announce that Prof. Dr. Renate Kunert has been appointed Editor-in-Chief of the new Section “Cell Biology and Tissue Engineering” in Life (ISSN: 2075-1729).

Prof. Dr. Renate Kunert is a Professor of Animal Cell Factory Design at the Department of Biotechnology at the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences in Vienna. She is heading the Institute of Animal Cell Technology and Systems Biology and runs a research group working on the production of recombinant proteins in mammalian cells. Production clones are developed for the development of bioprocesses and investigation of cellular biology using methods relevant to systems biology. The model proteins range from monoclonal antibodies to difficult to-express proteins such as extracellular domains of viral envelope and cellular surface proteins. Protein engineering is applied by using rational and randomized approaches to obtain protein variants with the original or even enhanced specificity and functionality while increasing stability and producibility.

In teaching, Prof. Dr. Renate Kunert supervises students of the Bachelor and Master Curriculum Biotechnology in practical exercises and lectures on biotechnology, cell factories, biological therapeutics, and other elective lectures.

The following is a short Q&A with Prof. Dr. Renate Kunert, who shared her vision for the journal with us, as well as her views of the research area and open access publishing:

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

The journal is up to date in terms of the content addressed and the treatment of the topics. Cell biology and tissue engineering is a forward-looking discipline in human medicine.

Currently, the spectrum of cellular modifications for personalized medicine is very diverse and the idea of “Special Issues” is useful and forward-looking.

2. What is your vision for the journal?

The vision is to give many excellent scientists the opportunity to present their work in a highly visible way and to expand their network through this platform. In this way, we all contribute to the development of new treatment strategies.

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

This field of research will be the future of all medical innovations because protein substitution will be too expensive despite the production processes that have already and will additionally be improved.

4. What do you think of the development of open access in the publishing field?

Open access is absolutely necessary.

We warmly welcome Prof. Dr. Renate Kunert as the Editor-in-Chief of the Section “Cell Biology and Tissue Engineering”, and we look forward to Life achieving many more milestones under her leadership. For further information on the journal section, please visit the following link: https://www.mdpi.com/journal/life/sections/Cell_and_Tissue.

We are pleased to announce that the new journal Physiologia (ISSN 2673-9488) has established companionship with its sister journal Life (ISSN 2075-1729).

Physiologia is an international, peer-reviewed, open access journal aimed at publishing articles demonstrating conceptual advances across the realms of physiology, from humans and animals to plants and cells. With a focus upon integrating molecular, cellular, systems, and whole organismal functions, the field of physiology has long been recognized as one which advances our understanding of the constructs of life across all species.

Physiologia publishes articles including research papers, reviews, editorials, and communications, etc. Our aim is to encourage scientists to publish their experimental and theoretical results in as much detail as possible. The full experimental details must be provided so that the results can be reproduced.

We are offering a full waiver on article processing charges for papers submitted before 15 December 2021. Manuscripts are peer-reviewed and a first decision is provided to authors approximately 15 days after submission; acceptance to publication is undertaken in 3 days (median values for MDPI journals in the second half of 2020). If accepted after peer review, your paper will be published in an open access format.

Manuscripts can be submitted via the journal’s online submission system at: https://susy.mdpi.com/user/manuscripts/upload?journal=physiologia.

Read the editorial prepared by Editor-in-Chief, Prof. Dr. Philip J. Atherton here.

We cordially invite you to consider Physiologia as the platform for publishing your work.

Physiologia Editorial Office

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.

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.

The Annual Conference for the Society of Chinese Mechanical Engineering Biomanufacturing Division and the International Symposium on Bio-Manufacturing (ACBD-ISBM2023) will be held from 17 to 19 March 2023, in Beijing, China. The conference is organized by the Society of Chinese Mechanical Engineering Biomanufacturing Division, Beihang University, and co-organized by Tsinghua University, Academy of Military Medical Sciences, and Southeast University.

Symposia：

• Biomanufacturing and Regenerative Medicine;
• Bio-Bionic Manufacturing and Planting/Interventional Devices;
• Biosensor and Flexible Electronics Manufacturing;
• Multi-Scale Biomimetic Manufacturing;
• Micromanipulation and Minimally Invasive Instruments.
• Biological Modeling and Bio-3D Printing;
• Tissue and Organ Chip;
• Innovative Medical Devices and Biomaterials.

The following MDPI journals will be represented:

• Bioengineering;
• Life
• Actuators;
• Applied Sciences;
• Biomimetics;
• Inventions;
• ASI;
• Machines.

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