Editorial

The past two years have seen a number of changes on the board of associate editors of the European Journal of Mineralogy (EJM). Denis Andrault and Bjørn Winkler departed after a long term of service – many thanks to you, Denis and Bjørn – and we welcomed many newcomers: Rossella Arletti, Elena Belluso, Razvan Caracas, Giovanni De Giudici, Fabrizio Nestola, Thilo Rehren, Encarnación Ruiz Agudo, Roland Stalder, Riccardo Tribuzio, and Vincent van Hinsberg. The diversity of their interests reflects the topical diversity of the frontiers of Mineralogy, and of the journal, from classical petrology and crystallography through fields such as biomineralogy, mineral physics, geochemistry, computational mineralogy, cultural heritage and species mineralogy. On the chief editors’ side, the situation has remained stable, with Patrick Cordier, Reto Gieré, Elisabetta Rampone and Carlos Rodríguez Navarro acting on behalf of the French (SFMC), German (DMG), Italian (SIMP) and Spanish (SEM) Mineralogical Societies, respectively, and Sergey Krivovichev on behalf of the European Mineralogical Union (EMU). Sergey receives many of the new-mineral descriptions and ensures their swift handling, in line with the practice of his predecessors Ekkehart Tillmanns and Ernst Burke.

Beginning February 2017, i.e. starting with this issue, the Newsletters of the IMA Commission on New Minerals, Nomenclature and Classification will also be published in EJM and will be made freely available on the journal website, thereby emphasizing the commitment of our EJM member Societies to the goals of the International Mineralogical Association. We therefore urge authors and readers to use and cite the EJM version of the Newsletters; this is a good way of increasing the journal’s visibility.

After many years of interruption, book reviews will also reappear in the journal under the guidance of associate editor Massimo Nespolo. Contributors are welcome!

Although some mineralogical journals have recently been facing extreme publication delays, EJM is maintaining a competitive handling and publication rate, with an average of six months between submission and online publication during the past two years (volumes 27 and 28). A number of papers have actually been published within two or three months. This does not mean that EJM has gone unscathed, and apologies are due to those authors for whom the production of proofs had to be delayed because of a change of EJM workflow during this past summer. This technical problem, together with the handling of a voluminous special issue (see below), resulted in delays in print publication of some of the 2016 issues. Instead of less than 10 months as in 2015 (vol. 27), we saw an average of 12 months from submission to print for 2016 (vol. 28). EJM is now again on a much better footing, and will be back to a regular schedule with the next issue. Combined with the almost immediate posting of uncorrected proofs on both the Ingenta and GeoScienceWorld websites of the journal – as ‘Fast Track’ and ‘Early Publication’ papers, respectively – this ensures maximum and early exposure of your work.

EJM also offers additional excellent news: the promotional waiving of page charges for articles longer than 12 printed pages is maintained until further notice. Moreover, as a further promotional offer for papers submitted from January to December 2017, there will be no extra charge for colour printing, provided its necessity is confirmed by the handling editor. As before, supplementary material deposited and linked to the article is available free of charge to the community on the GSW website of the journal. Authors are also reminded that EJM offers optional Open Access according to CC-BY-NC, a type of publication which grant agencies are beginning to emphasize more and more.

There were three special or thematic issues published in 2016: ‘Structural Mineralogy’, to honour our colleague Thomas Armbruster; ‘The 8^th European Conference on Mineralogy and Spectroscopy’ (guest-edited by Giovanni Andreozzi, Ferdinando Bosi and Francesco Di Benedetto), and ‘The 11^th International Eclogite Conference’ as a very impressive, last issue of the year (guest-edited by Hans-Peter Schertl, Walter Maresch, Bill McClelland and Chris Mattinson). For 2017, a special issue on ore mineralogy and the genesis of fascinating chromitites will honour the memory of Zdenek Johan; furthermore, papers presented at the 2^nd European Mineralogical Conference in Rimini (September 2016) will be gathered, including plenary lectures and contributions from the session ‘Mineral diversity, complexity and evolution’. A further special issue will be devoted to the building principles of mineral and material structures thereby honouring two tutelar figures of Crystallography, our colleagues Stefano Merlino and Giovanni Ferraris. We will be releasing a call for contributions shortly. Suggestions for other thematic or special issues are welcome, as are review papers.

This is the place to express our gratitude to all persons and institutions that contribute to the success of EJM and who maintain its high scientific standards: to authors and readers, to continuing chief editors, to the board of associate editors (see inside cover page and home page) and the many referees (listed each year in issue no. 6) who ensure the scientific quality of the material published, to departing Rainer Altherr and Juan Jiménez Millán (and their successors Gerhard Franz and Blanca Bauluz) as DMG and SEM representatives in the Managing Committee, to EDP Sciences on the production side as well as our Publisher and Hilke Bornholdt at Schweizerbart, who take care of the technical quality and timely publication of the journal, and to the French Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique for their continued support.