Citation of the Serbian astronomical journal and its comparison with other journals in astronomy and astrophysics

Abstract

This editorial is meant to present the results of an independent research on the Serbian Astronomical Journal citation and to make comparison of our journal to some other journals in astronomy and astrophysics. We have also collected information on many astronomical and astronomy related journals that may be useful to authors when preparing their papers for our journal, as well as for all other researchers in the field. The main sources that have been used in preparing this editorial are Thomson Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) Science Citation Index (SCI) database, Astrophysics Data System (ADS) at Harvard, Serbian Astronomical Journal archives, and to a less extent Elsevier’s database Scopus and SCIndeks (Serbian Citation Index). Table 1 gives a list of journals in astronomy, astrophysics, geophysics and space sciences that are covered by ISI and included in the ISI Journal Citation Report (JCR) for the year 2006. Journal’s impact factor and other criteria of bibliometric quality were omitted since they are considered as confidential information and are available through the ISI products. In Table 2 there is a list of leading multidisciplinary, physical and astronautical journals covered by ISI, that are related to astronomy or may include some astronomical content. Table 3 gives a list of selected journals in astronomy and astrophysics presently not covered by ISI. The list is far from complete and includes only the titles that the author has encountered while searching through the available databases and the Internet. The journals selected are active and generally prominent, they are either journals with long tradition or new journals that show progress in the field, and/or are journals interesting in the context of the geographical distribution of astronomical publications.