Bioinformatics (journal)

Bioinformatics (journal)
Title	Bioinformatics
Editor	Alfonso Valencia
Discipline	Bioinformatics
Abbreviation	Bioinformatics
Publisher	Oxford University Press
Frequency	Biweekly
History	1985–present
Impact	7.3
Impact-year	2023

Bioinformatics (journal) is a peer-reviewed scientific journal publishing research on computational methods applied to biological problems. The journal covers algorithm development, software, databases, and data analysis with applications to genomics, proteomics, structural biology, and systems biology. It is published by Oxford University Press and serves researchers affiliated with institutions such as the European Bioinformatics Institute, Broad Institute, and Wellcome Trust.

History

The journal was founded in 1985 during a period of rapid growth in computational biology that involved organizations like Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, Harvard University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Stanford University, University of California Berkeley, and European Molecular Biology Laboratory. Early contributors included researchers connected to the Human Genome Project, Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, National Center for Biotechnology Information, and Los Alamos National Laboratory. Over decades, the journal has documented developments tied to institutes such as Max Planck Society, RIKEN, CNRS, Karolinska Institutet, and University of Cambridge, and has published work by scientists from Columbia University, Yale University, Johns Hopkins University, University of Oxford, Imperial College London, University College London, ETH Zurich, University of Tokyo, and University of Toronto. Landmark technological advances reflected in its pages include microarray technology from Affymetrix, next-generation sequencing from Illumina and Pacific Biosciences, and computational frameworks emerging at Google DeepMind and IBM Watson Research Center.

Scope and Aims

The journal aims to disseminate methods and software relevant to molecular biology, computational chemistry, structural genomics, and functional genomics with relevance to projects at the Broad Institute, EMBL-EBI, Sanger Institute, and National Institutes of Health. Its scope spans sequence analysis, comparative genomics, phylogenetics, protein structure prediction, docking, and network inference, with topical overlap with journals and conferences such as Nature, Science, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Cell, Genome Research, Genome Biology, Nucleic Acids Research, Proceedings of the IEEE, ISMB, RECOMB, and ECCB. The audience includes researchers at institutions like Princeton University, University of Pennsylvania, Cornell University, Duke University, University of Chicago, University of Michigan, University of Washington, and Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory.

Editorial and Peer Review Process

The editorial board comprises editors and associate editors drawn from academic institutions including Stanford University School of Medicine, University of California San Diego, University of Edinburgh, University of Basel, University of Freiburg, University of Hong Kong, Seoul National University, Peking University, Tsinghua University, and Australian National University. Manuscripts undergo peer review by experts with affiliations such as MIT, Caltech, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, University of Minnesota, Wageningen University, University of Barcelona, University of Milan, University of Pisa, and KU Leuven. The process is governed by policies consistent with guidelines from the Committee on Publication Ethics and professional societies like the International Society for Computational Biology and European Molecular Biology Organization. Special issues and proceedings have been curated in collaboration with meetings such as ISMB, ECCB, RECOMB, and recent workshops organized by institutions like Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and EMBL-EBI.

Abstracting and Indexing

The journal is indexed in major databases and services connected to institutions and organizations including MEDLINE, PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, EMBASE, BIOSIS, Chemical Abstracts Service, and Google Scholar. Library catalogs and repositories at the Library of Congress, British Library, Bibliothèque nationale de France, German National Library, and National Diet Library of Japan list its holdings. Citation metrics are tracked by Clarivate Analytics, Elsevier, and CrossRef, and article metadata are preserved in archives associated with CLOCKSS, Portico, and institutional repositories at universities such as Columbia, Oxford, Cambridge, and Yale.

Impact and Reception

Articles published have influenced large-scale projects and consortia including the Human Genome Project, ENCODE, the 1000 Genomes Project, GTEx, Cancer Genome Atlas, International HapMap Project, Human Cell Atlas, and ProteomeXchange. The journal’s publications are cited across diverse institutions such as Harvard Medical School, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Scripps Research, Translational Genomics Research Institute, and St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. Its role in advancing methods for analyzing data from technologies produced by companies like Illumina, Thermo Fisher Scientific, and Oxford Nanopore Technologies has been noted in reviews in Nature Methods, Trends in Biotechnology, and PLOS Computational Biology.

Notable Articles and Special Issues

Notable contributions have included algorithms and tools developed at institutions like the Broad Institute, EMBL-EBI, Sanger Institute, and University of California San Diego; pioneering sequence alignment methods, gene prediction tools, protein structure predictors, and network analysis frameworks. Special issues have focused on themes tied to computational challenges addressed at conferences such as ISMB and ECCB, and on topics including metagenomics, single-cell sequencing, cryo-electron microscopy, structural bioinformatics, machine learning in biology, and synthetic biology. Influential papers came from collaborative teams involving investigators at Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, National Institutes of Health, University of Texas, University of British Columbia, McGill University, Karolinska Institutet, and Institut Pasteur.

Category:Bioinformatics journals