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History of atmospheric environment
Atmospheric Environment 43 (2009) 2–8
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Atmospheric Environment journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/atmosenv
History of atmospheric environment Peter Brimblecombe a, *, Karen Sturges b a b
School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK Faculty of Social Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK
a b s t r a c t Keywords: ASAAQ Elsevier New directions Pergamon Press Robert Maxwell Urban Atmosphere
There have been great transitions in the science of air pollution and science publishing since the journal began as the International Journal of Air Pollution in 1958. Atmospheric Environment witnessed the increased understanding of smog photochemistry in the late 1950s and the emerging fears of ozone depletion in the 1970s. The journal has grown, but not without the need to change and occasionally fragment only to reintegrate at a later date. At 9000 pages a year it represents an enormous editorial task that has had to be undertaken by more professional offices. This transition has been helped through the development of electronic tools, but the editorial offices strive to retain their personal relationship with authors and reviewers. An enhanced international perspective recognises the widening contributions made by scientists beyond Europe and North America. Ó 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
1. The context Postwar Britain was so often a place of struggle. Struggle can produce great change and it was London’s coal burning pollution that forced such a transition. The Great Smog of 1952 caused such public and political outcry that it brought the need to regulate air pollution into sharper focus (Brimblecombe, 2006; Fenger, 2008). The UK Parliament pressed for the fog episode to be taken seriously and despite pre-existing legislation (e.g. within Public Health Act 1936), the government was obliged to assemble the Beaver Committee, which paved the way to the Clean Air Act (1956). Although the success of the Act may be overstated, the new Act was more elaborate than earlier legislation, fostered practical approaches to pollution control and laid out the need to fund air pollution research. Atmospheric Environment was born out of these pressures. The scientific literature on air pollution was developing and works such as the World Health Organization monograph Air Pollution of 1961 showed a continued focus on episodes. However, a more radical approach is found in Leighton’s Photochemistry of Air Pollution of the same year. What better celebration could be offered to the tercentenary of John Evelyn’s Fumifugium of 1661? Despite this growing literature this was a time when scholarly journals were largely the remit of learned societies, which did not favour the applied sciences (Cox, 2002). Nevertheless, the need for a journal focussing on air pollution was widely felt. Italo Calvino’s novel La nuvola di smog, written at the beginning of Italy’s economic boom
* Corresponding author. E-mail address: [email protected] (P. Brimblecombe). 1352-2310/$ – see front matter Ó 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.atmosenv.2008.09.065
treated industrialization, the inability of intellectuals to adapt and accepted smog as a symbol. Calvino’s main character works for the journal Purification; a publication fighting against air pollution. The title of the journal reflects not only the need to clean urban air, but the mood of the protagonist. Atmospheric Environment was created out of this novel social awareness. This paper presents a brief history of Atmospheric Environment based on an archive of some 7000 pages of letters, minutes, log-books, etc. held in the UK Office of Atmospheric Environment at the School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia. The referencing system used for the archive is given at the end of the paper.
2. The creation of Atmospheric Environment In the early 1950s Pergamon Press, a little remembered publishing collaboration between Butterworths and Springer, was bought by the now-disgraced entrepreneur Robert Maxwell. Maxwell, born Ja´n Ludvı´k Hoch into a poor Yiddish-speaking Jewish family in the easternmost province of pre-World War II Czechoslovakia, escaped to Britain in 1940. He served with the British Army before becoming a newspaper censor for the British military authorities in a divided Berlin (Cox, 2002). Fewer men in late 20th century Britain have spread greater controversy and distaste than Maxwell, yet this account may oblige us to take a rather different perspective. In the mid 1950s Maxwell had become aware of the need for an air pollution journal. He visited Arie Haagen-Smit’s laboratory in California (MF 19/10/66) and in 1957 sent a member of staff from Pergamon Press to meet with Richard Scorer. Scorer, who became president of the Royal Meteorological Society, was asked to
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Fig. 1. The Atmospheric Environment family tree.
consider the idea of a scientific journal to supplement the National Society for Clean Air’s house magazine and the similar journal of the American Air Pollution Control Association. Both of these journals were concerned more with administrative than scientific aspects of the problem, so the new journal would occupy a different niche. The journal, which ultimately became Atmospheric Environment published by Pergamon Press, appeared for the first time as the International Journal of Air Pollution (Fig. 1) in 1958. The founding Executive Editors were Richard Scorer, G. Nonhebel, J. Pemberton and A.J. Haagen-Smit. Haagen-Smit was replaced by James Lodge in 1960 who served until the end of 1991. The young International Journal of Air Pollution remained somewhat marginal until the opening years of the 1960s when its name changed to The International Journal of Air and Water Pollution. The new title appeared on Volume 4, Number 1–2. 3. The emergence of Atmospheric Environment The editorial aspects of a joint air and water pollution journal were difficult, as the interests in water were oriented towards engineering, while the interest in developing air pollution came from scientists. Nevertheless, the idea of splitting The International Journal of Air and Water Pollution into two journals did not meet with universal approval from board members. Even among those who supported the creation of an air pollution journal, the choice of Atmospheric Environment as a title was not welcomed by some. One board member, Morten Corm thought Atmospheric Science would be better (MF 18/10/66) while Benjamin Linsky’s soundings led him to be even more strongly opposed to this ‘‘Mother Hubbard’’ name, which would require the formation of a separate air pollution journal (MF 28/11/66). Bert Bolin (MF 28/11/66) favoured Atmospheric Environment, as did Haagen-Smit. Arie Haagen-Smit wrote to Maxwell (MF 19/10/69) that since his visit to the laboratory some ten years ago, the journal had grown in importance, so it was sensible that the journal developed as Atmospheric Environment. The years seem to have been remarkably kind to this choice (B3/ SCORERb) and even today the title has a currency that gives it the flexibility to occupy the wide range of debate.
Robert Maxwell announced the new journal Atmospheric Environment to board members on 17 November 1966. He stressed the importance of atmospheric flow patterns and the role of topography and added a list of topics thought to be important: industrial aerodynamics; cooling and evaporation from water surfaces; shelter belts and snow fences; meteorology of urban areas; drifting snow, soil, sands; crop spraying dusts as well as all aspects of air pollution. It is this very last item from the list that has dominated the journal for so long and it was with this focus that the journal passed to the publisher Elsevier in 1991 which joined the ReedElsevier group in 1993 (Cox, 2002). The early editorial leadership was taken up by David Moore. Moore had been a graduate student in the Department of Meteorology at Imperial College and took up a post at the Central Electricity Research Laboratories of the Central Electricity Generating Board (B3/SCORERb). He was appointed editor in 1965 as a replacement for Richard Scorer (B3/SCORERa) and his proximity to the publisher, initiated his long and close association with the journal. He was keen that the journal adopt a distinctive livery, that depicted a twilight or sunset (MF 20/10/72). He settled on a narrow orange stripe representing light transmitted through dust and nuclei near the ground and a wider blue area, characterizing the molecular scattering in the bulk atmosphere. These panels are topped by a white band, the ‘‘colour’’ of the light at the top of the atmosphere (Moore, 1988b). Eventually, Moore’s design had to change to meet the requirements of a new millennium. Peter Brimblecombe’s thoughts, sketched during a meeting at Elsevier’s Kidlington office, ultimately formed a draft sent to the designers (these drafts form the cover of this special issue). The designers thus created the current pictorial cover, where the blue and orange represents the clean and photochemically polluted atmosphere. The city skyline reminds us of the strong focus on the urban environment, while the reflection in the lake symbolises the importance of less polluted settings. 4. Early growth The first half of 1968 passed with the receipt of just 30 manuscripts (MF 13/11/68), although the board meeting of 13 November
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reveals a healthy 1350 subscriptions to the journal. The early board members were often contributors and referees (B3/SCORERa). However, even in its earliest years, it began to develop as an advisory board and much discussion took place between its members and the publisher by letter. The concept of a board with advice as a primary role, rather than the provision of referee reports to manuscripts, persists to the present. Board meetings have been held in the UK, Europe and the United States and once in Japan. Since the 1990s there has been a tendency to use the American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting in San Francisco as a location. The archives also give us a flavour of the drinking habits of the earliest board members e.g. bar bills include the purchase of Nuits St Georges, St Johannes Geisberg, Gordon’s Gin, John Haig whisky, Dubonet, Guinness, lager and cider (MF 15/710/69). The journal’s early days were not easy. Manuscripts could often take six to eight weeks to be acknowledged and there were frequent production delays (MF 20/4/70). Concern expressed by board members ranged from page charges to abbreviating references (MF 30/7/69). Nevertheless, the journal was actively involved in the arrangements for the Conference on the Visibility Aspects of Air Pollution in London October 1969. Many of the concerns about lengthy delivery times for galley proofs and the paper flow remained through subsequent years. However, Atmospheric Environment was growing and costs began to rise steeply; so much so that Volume 3 overran its estimated 700 pages, necessitating a shortened last issue (MF 30/9/69). The transition to monthly publication was not necessarily viewed favourably, because as pointed out in a letter from James Lodge to A.S. Lowe at Pergamon Press, the production of thin issues was inefficient (MF 29/9/70). The board was continually undergoing evolution and this was not without its problems. A change in the policy at the Ministry of Transport, did not allow civil servants to act on editorial boards, so S.R. Craxford of Warren Spring Laboratory had to resign (MF 29/9/70). The early 1970s were troubled by cost increases. There was much debate over increasing the cost of the journal from £26 to £28, but editor David Moore believed rising costs justified this (MF 22/6/72). Jim Lodge was less convinced (MF 5/7/72) and throughout the 1970s opposed increases in cost, believing that Atmospheric Environment was pricing itself out of the market (MF 13/6/72). In the end Lodge had to accept the costing, but remained worried about the impact on subscriptions of shrinking research budgets (MF 18/7/73). Yet at the same time he was concerned about the restrictions to the amount of material that could be published. The board of 1973 was much interested in publishing papers about pollution from power stations and cooling towers (MF 6/4/73) and proposed a spin-off Review Series to lessen pressures on the page budget (MF 12/10/73). The journal was nevertheless growing and by Volume 6 there were 1686 subscribers. Long papers were becoming a problem (MS 15/5/74) and the limited space meant a move towards double column publishing, although David Moore did not like this format (MF 19/12/74) and editors began to be discerning about what was to be published. Maxwell felt they were on a tight rope (MF 16/7/75). This became particularly difficult in the face of world wide inflation and the printing paper shortages of the mid seventies. In 1976 Maxwell narrowly retained his re-acquired Pergamon Press in the face of hostile take-over bids, and was determined to cope with the paper shortage and improve the journal’s operations in these difficult times. The costly publication of papers in foreign languages (notably French) had to stop and additionally, the costs of typesetting were to be reduced (MF 12/11/76). The 1970s were also an important time in atmospheric chemistry. Mario Molina and Sherwood Rowland published their paper ‘‘Stratospheric sink for chlorofluoromethanes: chlorine atom catalysed destruction of ozone’’ in Nature in the summer of 1974. Maxwell was aware of the importance of this and a conference proposal (never developed) was to be placed before the
Fig. 2. Change in number of subscriptions to Atmospheric Environment.
Atmospheric Environment board. This conference would have examined the depletion of the ozone layer and recognised the impact of supersonic transport, nuclear explosions and CFCs on the ozone layer which could severely affect climate, skin cancer, etc. (MF 18/12/74). 5. Growing submissions and declining library budgets The journal had gained wide acceptance by the late 1970s, with well over two thousand subscribers and a steady stream of papers. This happy situation was not to remain. The growth in scientific literature, fluctuating international exchange rates, the rising costs of journals and indeed the cost models adopted by publishers began to have an impact (e.g. Cox, 2002). Library budgets could not cope resulting in declining subscriptions. The publisher wrote to Moore and Lodge on 31 August 1983 of their concern over the huge drop in library circulation. Almost two hundred libraries had not renewed for 1983, resulting in a very substantial loss (Fig. 2). The publisher’s response was to ask editors and editorial board members to use their influence to encourage their institutions to renew subscriptions. This was never very effective and the calls for members to pressure colleagues and institutions were often unwelcome. Board members felt powerless and resented pressures to market the journal. In 1984 a promotional letter sent by Pergamon Press to all lapsed subscribers offered them the volume they had missed for free and a 5% reduction in the current subscription charge. The declining subscriptions also meant that publishers faced considerable losses. International exchange rates ensured the beginning of a long and bitter battle between libraries and publishers over the high charges made for scientific journals. This issue retains contemporary relevance within the open-access debate. 6. Internationalisation In 1966 David Moore wrote to Gilbert Richards at Pergamon Press of his concern at the low number of contributions from Japan and the USSR (MF 9/11/66) and again in the Board of 1980 (B10 6/5/ 80). The editorial board often discussed the lack of material from the developing world in the 1980s and in 1985. David Moore observed that ‘‘most of the papers published in the journal to date have been concerned with various aspects of ‘‘chemical’’ air pollution. and published papers have also looked at different ways of reducing the impact of pollution, including the control of emissions and dispersion from tall chimneys. The alternative approach. to replace the pollution producing process by one which is free from chemical air pollution, has received much less attention.’’ He felt that the journal should widen and try to attract
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papers dealing with the problems posed by alternative sources of energy and materials and not overlook the danger to rapidly developing countries (B10). The situation had much improved over time, yet David Moore noted the continuing lack of interest in air pollution problems in the developing world. Few papers from these areas appeared in the international literature. Moore actively supported the development of a series of conferences Atmospheric Sciences and Applications to Air Quality to take place on the Asia-Pacific Rim. The first of these conferences took place in Seoul Korea during May of 1985 (Moore, 1986). He also had a strong interest in India and in January 1986 visited the country, supported by the British Council, to gain a sense of the air pollution science there (Moore, 1987). This reminded him that traditional fuels were not the way to cleaner air. He also visited the Indian Institute of Technology and later supported the publication of the proceedings of the International Conference on Tropical Micrometeorology and Air Pollution in New Delhi, February 1988. There was some discussion about creating a new journal Atmospheric Environment – Sustainability and Development, but this did not evolve. As we will see, more global coverage ultimately came with the development of Atmospheric Environment International. 7. Fragmentation The growing journal had become too expensive, particularly in the developing world. It was possible that a smaller more specialist journal might be appealing to an international market. Robert Bornstein, an urban meteorologist, suggested that there was currently no obvious journal for publication of work of totally urban concern. He proposed a separate journal and although the idea gained some momentum, it eventually emerged as a part of Atmospheric Environment, Urban Atmosphere. There were perceived problems with the proposed structure and Steve Schwartz, in a letter of 26 April 1989 (B1/UA 26/4/89), argued against Urban Atmosphere on a range of issues including: citation, editorial matters, fragmentation and logistics. He was not alone, the editor Michele Benarie agreed with the concerns (B1/UA 12/5/89), but Moore was in favour of the expansion and annotated his thoughts on Schwartz’s letter (B1/UA 26/4/89) and elsewhere (B1/UA 168A/ PerPM59/M59). He felt that the new journal was important because it addressed the question of developing countries and saw ultimately the creation of further spin-off parts, notably: Atmosphere and Development. The publishers decided to treat Atmospheric Environment Part B Urban Atmosphere as a separate entity with its own pagination for a three-year probationary period. It could be identified with Atmospheric Environment because of the format and cover (Fig. 1). Although it was distributed to all Atmospheric Environment subscribers as part of their subscription, it could be bought separately making it more affordable. The managing editor at Pergamon Press, Peter Henn, was in favour of Urban Atmosphere because it formed a good place for excess manuscripts submitted to Atmospheric Environment, avoided competition, yet had an established identity ensuring that authors felt no loss of prestige when their papers were published in Urban Atmosphere. The new journal was promised for 1989 (Moore, 1988a) although there were soon concerns about the lack of material for Urban Atmosphere. Peter Henn wrote to Bob Bornstein on the 15th September 1988: ‘‘I am very concerned to learn that we have yet to receive the papers for the first issue which, according to the schedule set out in my letter of December 4 should have reached us last month..’’ (B1/UA 15/9/88). An interim measure of transferring papers from Atmospheric Environment helped until the journal became established, but this required David Moore to divert papers originally to be placed in Atmospheric Environment to the new Urban Atmosphere part (B1/UA 168A/PerPM59/M59). This caused
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delays, confusion and disappointment. The first issue of Urban Atmosphere was delayed almost a year until 1990, with some papers being held up since the beginning of 1987. Nevertheless, the issue was rather thin, but Henn believed this was import to ensure high quality (B1/UA 10/5/89). The first editorial explained: Atmospheric Environment Part B Urban Atmosphere is ‘‘intended to be a medium by which information concerning urbanization could flow from the mid-latitudes where many current research efforts are carried out to the developing tropics where most of the largest cities will exist by the next century.It is hoped that Atmospheric Environment Part B will collect in one publication many of the papers on urbanization currently found distributed through a variety of other journals.’’ The issues began to appear more regularly with: 3 issues in 1990, 3 issues in 1991, 4 issues in 1992 and 4 issues in 1993. However, Part B of the journal never attracted a large number of subscribers. At the end of 1993 it was reincorporated into the journal, with the Part B designation vanishing. The distinctive blue and grey covers (Fig. 1) appeared on occasional issues until 1996, after which the re-merger was complete. The consequences of the re-merger left a gap in the ability of the journal to attract both authors and papers from a wider world. Atmospheric Environment lacked an identifiable relationship with many parts of the world where interest was growing. This concern led to the idea of devoting single issues to papers from given regions of the world, that would appear under the banner Atmospheric Environment International. These aimed to place regional issues in an international context. This development met a perceived need for authors from various regions in the world to publish high quality papers with a regional perspective. It also gave marketing opportunities in these regions. In the days before electronic copy Atmospheric Environment International issues formed collections of papers from a particular geographical area and showed the substantial volume of work being done in emerging countries. The modified cover carries letters ‘‘AEI’’ on the spine appears from 1999 to 2002. Changes in publishing style and increasing electronic access meant less need for a vehicle of this kind. The international context had come to be represented throughout the entire journal. Perhaps one of the most persistent developments of the 1990s was New Directions. These columns appeared in 1996 to give a more journalistic flavour to topics that were emerging rapidly, yet too speculative to justify fully fledged papers. Al Lefohn and Bill Sturges took charge and edited many thought provoking articles over the years. At the beginning, Keene et al. (1996) wrote an influential column ‘‘Reactive chlorine: a potential sink for dimethylsulfide and hydrocarbons in the marine boundary layer’’ about an issue that continues to attract debate (von Glasow, 2008). In 1998 Atmospheric Environment encouraged the submission of Millennium Reviews (B8 22/4/98), which were published in the journal and ultimately collected as a book (Austin et al., 2002), along with some radical future direction columns. In one of these, two students asked the question: ‘‘Could transgenic mice hear air pollution?’’ (Hill and Lythe, 2002). In further recognition of progress, Hanwant Singh introduced the Haagen-Smit Prize to be given annually to the authors of two outstanding papers published in the journal (Singh and Brimblecombe, 2007). Barbara Findlayson-Pitts served as the first chair of the selection committee (B1/HS) and the awards in 2001 went to papers of Atkinson (1990) and Schauer et al. (1996). A Haagen-Smit Prize Special Supplement republished the prize winning papers in 2007 (Singh and Brimblecombe, 2007). 8. Development of offices Jim Lodge, who had been with the journal since the early days, began to consider his retirement in the late 1980s. His retirement would leave such a large gap it was felt that journal growth would
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Fig. 3. Two Christmas post-cards distributed by Atmospheric Environment in the 1990s. These were drawn by Philip Judge, the cartographer in the School of Environmental Sciences of the University of East Anglia.
be assisted by a larger number of North American editors. Thus Hanwant Singh, Paul Lioy and Allen Lefohn were appointed (B3/ LODGE), while at the same time David Moore who had for many years received clerical assistance from Pam Roberts and was also aided by Alan Robins of the Central Electricity Research Laboratories. After the editorial office moved to the University of East Anglia, Moore was assisted by Peter Brimblecombe, until Moore died in 1989. For a short time the journal was edited by Alan Robins, but he was aware he could not set aside enough time to become an executive editor (B1 21/2/89). This editorial role passed to Peter Brimblecombe at the University of East Anglia in February 1990 (Austin, 1996). The journal was growing rapidly in size despite the declining subscriber numbers (see Brimblecombe and Grossi, 2008) and looked set to exceed three thousand pages by the 1990s. It became clear that the activities of largely unsupported part-time editors would be a constraint to growth. The emerging UK office inherited some of its style from David Moore; it still communicated by mail and adopted login books (F1, B4) to record the incoming manuscripts, a practice that still exists. Much communication was via post-cards and although these acknowledged submissions, they were also used to send Christmas greetings (Fig. 3). These reflect greater intimacy within the smaller journal. The increasing flow of material made new practices essential. Dave Moore had read every manuscript that passed through his office, but this had become an impossible task for a part-time editor. The journal appointed professional editorial staff to perform
the in-house review of material. Jill Austin, a meteorologist, joined early in 1990 and after her departure in 2003, Michele Raychaudhuri, with special interests in the museum atmosphere, was formally appointed in spring 2004 (B6/FP). From 1998 the work load proved so great that Karen Sturges joined the office to ensure a more rapid turn around of manuscripts and to engage with an increasing array of electronic tools. By the late 1990s it was also clear that a larger US office was also required. The editorial board, so dominated by men for many years, was fortunate in attracting some exceptional women atmospheric scientists. Additionally the journal had been served by an able group of publishing editors from the 1980s, this included Peter Henn, Anne Vindenes Allen, Jaques Kiebert, Hetty Verhagen. The role split into two with Friso Veenstra covering strategic issues and Kim-Lan Thonus monitoring day-to-day management of the journal. Kim has this year been replaced by Caroline ten Wolde. Journal growth took place at a time when the atmospheric sciences were developing new areas of investigation. Some topics achieved prominence and later faded from interest within the pages of the journal. This often led to concerns about continuing to publish papers that lacked scientific novelty. In 1988 Philip Hopke wrote to Jim Lodge (B9 5/1/88) suggesting that many receptor modelling papers were merely routine applications to different locations. This was one indication of a problem that continues in making judgements about papers of undoubted interest to local groups, but offer little new scientific or methodological insight.
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Growth also had detrimental effects. Despite much positive feedback about the journal, the size of the editorial task was such that authors did not always feel referees and editors understood the content and context of their manuscripts. The offices developed adjudication procedures for this along with processes to address ethical issues such as plagiarism, duplicate publication and conflict of interest. 9. Transition to electronic publishing One of the most important aspects of scientific publishing at the end of the 20th century is the shift to an electronic mode. Maxwell had sensed the potential for this change in the 1960s, but his dealings with Saul Steinberg of Leasco Data Processing were so fraught that the project never materialised (Cox, 2002). However, a quarter of a century later the widening use of email gave an opportunity of an alerting service Contents Direct which ran from 1995 to 2006. Publishers introduced occasional CD-ROMs and at one time these were seen a potential route to the future of the journal. However, they required a lot of work and extra editorials (B1/E/CD1), so became seen more as a marketing tool to be sent to subscribers instead of a brochure in the late 1990s (B8 8/6/98). A string of different initiatives attempted to provide editorial tools from the mid 1990s. The Virtual Editorial Office was demonstrated at an Atmospheric Environment meeting in April 1998 (B8 22/4/98), but was never used by the journal. The Virtual Environment was a prototype introduced by Elsevier in 1998 to provide a global environmental electronic information services. The first tool adopted by Atmospheric Environment offices was RMTS software to assist with editorial procedures in the late 1990s. In the UK the experience of this was not entirely positive, so the editorial team developed software internally, based on Microsoft Access 2000. In parallel they encouraged submission of material as files by email. This system remained in use until the introduction of EES (Electronic Editorial System) in 2005, because an intermediate system Elsubmit (B1/ES) proved cumbersome and was abandoned by Atmospheric Environment after a short trial period in 2001. In parallel there was a desire that Atmospheric Environment consider the provision of web-based electronic data in addition to printed material. This led to the development of The Air Pollution Exchange APEX in 1999, and eve-web today (B1/APEX). Elsevier’s eve-web today was an electronic journal that published short summaries of articles from Elsevier’s applied science journals in the new millennium. Although the APEX web pages led to the creation of guidance to referees, authors, special issue editors that remained active for almost a decade, it was overtaken, like many early ideas for electronic publication, by other developments. 10. Future The broad acceptance of the world wide web as the means for submission of papers and their final distribution represents the most radical transition in scientific publishing since the invention of the printing press which allowed the development of scientific journals by the 17th century. Electronic access means that the individual issues of the journal have little distinction, so it is likely that Atmospheric Environment will no longer publish special issues. In the web-environment, journal identity is harder to maintain and it is not clear how this will change the perceptions of readers. We approach a time when a whole generation of scientists, will never have held a hard copy of Atmospheric Environment, either as a past or current issue. The transitions of the 21st century have increased calls for other changes. The classic approach to peer review has shifted more to a community review in some journals such as the European Geophysical Union’s Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics. There has been a long debate about open-access to scientific literature.
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Funding bodies would like works they have supported to be freely accessible. However, it is a complex debate and an editorial in Nature talked about novel ways of making material freely available, but worried about the sustainability of some models (Anon, 2004). The author pays model may also be hard on authors (Gadagkar, 2008) in the developing world. A number of publishers, including Elsevier, who retain the traditional model have begun to offer authors the choice of opting for open-access. Atmospheric Environment is determined to remain flexible in a changing world. The significant increase in Asian research on air pollution will be recognised in the appointment of Chak Chan of Hong Kong University of Science and Technology to a new editorial office from the beginning of 2009. The future is never certain, but effort in this most significant endeavour is assured. Acknowledgement We would like to thank Luciano Morselli and Elena Bernardi for their thoughts on Italo Calvino and appreciated the various reviewers: Alan Robins, Hanwant Singh and Friso Veenstra made many useful suggestions. Additionally we have to acknowledge all those who have contributed so much to fifty years of endeavour. The article is short, but we hope we have at least caught the flavour of that effort. Archival material The archival material used here is stored in the UK Office of Atmospheric Environment at the School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia. This consists of a collection of material on microfiche gathered from Pergamon Press covering the years 1966– 1991 that amounts to some 5000 pages (Reference: MF), a folder (Reference: F) of material from David Moore and ten boxes of documents (Reference: B1–B10): B1 Development of Atmospheric Environment B2 Old issues of Atmospheric Environment B3 Atmospheric Environment history B4 Atmospheric Environment login books (1990–1999) B5 Publisher’s materials B6 Contract information B7 Office B8 Meetings B9 Scope, etc. B10 Meetings: office/editorial (1980–1999) These materials are cited in the text with these abbreviations, followed by a subcategory or date that locates the item within the box, microfiche, etc. References Anon, 2004. Experiments in publishing. Nature 431, 111. Atkinson, R., 1990. Gas-phase tropospheric chemistry of organic compounds: a review. Atmospheric Environment 24A, 1–41. Austin, J., 1996. Atmospheric environment – past present and future. Elsevier Environmental Science & Technology Newsletter (2), 1–11. Austin, J., Brimblecombe, P., Sturges, W. (Eds.), 2002. Air Pollution Science for the 21st Century. Elsevier, Amsterdam. Brimblecombe, P., 2006. The Clean Air Act after fifty years. Weather 61, 311–314. Brimblecombe, P., Grossi, C.M., 2008. The bibliometrics of atmospheric environment. Atmospheric Environment 43 (1), 9–12. Cox, B., 2002. The Pergamon phenomenon 1951–1991: Robert Maxwell and scientific publishing. Learned Publishing 15, 273–278. Fenger, J., 2008. Air pollution in the last 50 years – from local to global. Atmospheric Environment 43 (1), 13–22. Gadagkar, R., 2008. Open-access more harm than good in developing world. Nature 453, 450. von Glasow, R., 2008. News & views: pollution meets sea salt. Nature Geosciences 1, 292.
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Hill, J.G.T., Lythe, M., 2002. Future directions: could transgenic mice hear air pollution? In: Austin, J., Brimblecombe, P., Sturges, W. (Eds.), Air Pollution Science for the 21st Century. Elsevier, Amsterdam, pp. 655–657. Keene, W.C., Jacob, D.J., Fan, S.-M., 1996. Reactive chlorine: a potential sink for dimethylsulfide and hydrocarbons in the marine boundary layer. Atmospheric Environment 30 (6), i–iii. Moore, D.J., 1986. Keynote address and closing remarks: first international conference on atmospheric sciences and applications to air quality. Atmospheric Environment 20, 807–812.
Moore, D.J., 1987. Report on a British Council Specialist Tour to India. Atmospheric Environment 21, 2473–2480. Moore, D., 1988a. Editorial. Atmospheric Environment 22 (6), i. Moore, D.J., 1988b. 40th Anniversary of Pergamon Press. Atmospheric Environment 22 (6), i. Schauer, J.J., et al., 1996. Source apportionment of airborne particulate matter using organic compounds as tracers. Atmospheric Environment 30, 3837–3855. Singh, H.B., Brimblecombe, P., 2007. Haagen-Smit prize special supplement. Atmospheric Environment 41, S1.
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Atmospheric Environment journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/atmosenv
History of atmospheric environment Peter Brimblecombe a, *, Karen Sturges b a b
School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK Faculty of Social Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK
a b s t r a c t Keywords: ASAAQ Elsevier New directions Pergamon Press Robert Maxwell Urban Atmosphere
There have been great transitions in the science of air pollution and science publishing since the journal began as the International Journal of Air Pollution in 1958. Atmospheric Environment witnessed the increased understanding of smog photochemistry in the late 1950s and the emerging fears of ozone depletion in the 1970s. The journal has grown, but not without the need to change and occasionally fragment only to reintegrate at a later date. At 9000 pages a year it represents an enormous editorial task that has had to be undertaken by more professional offices. This transition has been helped through the development of electronic tools, but the editorial offices strive to retain their personal relationship with authors and reviewers. An enhanced international perspective recognises the widening contributions made by scientists beyond Europe and North America. Ó 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
1. The context Postwar Britain was so often a place of struggle. Struggle can produce great change and it was London’s coal burning pollution that forced such a transition. The Great Smog of 1952 caused such public and political outcry that it brought the need to regulate air pollution into sharper focus (Brimblecombe, 2006; Fenger, 2008). The UK Parliament pressed for the fog episode to be taken seriously and despite pre-existing legislation (e.g. within Public Health Act 1936), the government was obliged to assemble the Beaver Committee, which paved the way to the Clean Air Act (1956). Although the success of the Act may be overstated, the new Act was more elaborate than earlier legislation, fostered practical approaches to pollution control and laid out the need to fund air pollution research. Atmospheric Environment was born out of these pressures. The scientific literature on air pollution was developing and works such as the World Health Organization monograph Air Pollution of 1961 showed a continued focus on episodes. However, a more radical approach is found in Leighton’s Photochemistry of Air Pollution of the same year. What better celebration could be offered to the tercentenary of John Evelyn’s Fumifugium of 1661? Despite this growing literature this was a time when scholarly journals were largely the remit of learned societies, which did not favour the applied sciences (Cox, 2002). Nevertheless, the need for a journal focussing on air pollution was widely felt. Italo Calvino’s novel La nuvola di smog, written at the beginning of Italy’s economic boom
* Corresponding author. E-mail address: [email protected] (P. Brimblecombe). 1352-2310/$ – see front matter Ó 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.atmosenv.2008.09.065
treated industrialization, the inability of intellectuals to adapt and accepted smog as a symbol. Calvino’s main character works for the journal Purification; a publication fighting against air pollution. The title of the journal reflects not only the need to clean urban air, but the mood of the protagonist. Atmospheric Environment was created out of this novel social awareness. This paper presents a brief history of Atmospheric Environment based on an archive of some 7000 pages of letters, minutes, log-books, etc. held in the UK Office of Atmospheric Environment at the School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia. The referencing system used for the archive is given at the end of the paper.
2. The creation of Atmospheric Environment In the early 1950s Pergamon Press, a little remembered publishing collaboration between Butterworths and Springer, was bought by the now-disgraced entrepreneur Robert Maxwell. Maxwell, born Ja´n Ludvı´k Hoch into a poor Yiddish-speaking Jewish family in the easternmost province of pre-World War II Czechoslovakia, escaped to Britain in 1940. He served with the British Army before becoming a newspaper censor for the British military authorities in a divided Berlin (Cox, 2002). Fewer men in late 20th century Britain have spread greater controversy and distaste than Maxwell, yet this account may oblige us to take a rather different perspective. In the mid 1950s Maxwell had become aware of the need for an air pollution journal. He visited Arie Haagen-Smit’s laboratory in California (MF 19/10/66) and in 1957 sent a member of staff from Pergamon Press to meet with Richard Scorer. Scorer, who became president of the Royal Meteorological Society, was asked to
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Fig. 1. The Atmospheric Environment family tree.
consider the idea of a scientific journal to supplement the National Society for Clean Air’s house magazine and the similar journal of the American Air Pollution Control Association. Both of these journals were concerned more with administrative than scientific aspects of the problem, so the new journal would occupy a different niche. The journal, which ultimately became Atmospheric Environment published by Pergamon Press, appeared for the first time as the International Journal of Air Pollution (Fig. 1) in 1958. The founding Executive Editors were Richard Scorer, G. Nonhebel, J. Pemberton and A.J. Haagen-Smit. Haagen-Smit was replaced by James Lodge in 1960 who served until the end of 1991. The young International Journal of Air Pollution remained somewhat marginal until the opening years of the 1960s when its name changed to The International Journal of Air and Water Pollution. The new title appeared on Volume 4, Number 1–2. 3. The emergence of Atmospheric Environment The editorial aspects of a joint air and water pollution journal were difficult, as the interests in water were oriented towards engineering, while the interest in developing air pollution came from scientists. Nevertheless, the idea of splitting The International Journal of Air and Water Pollution into two journals did not meet with universal approval from board members. Even among those who supported the creation of an air pollution journal, the choice of Atmospheric Environment as a title was not welcomed by some. One board member, Morten Corm thought Atmospheric Science would be better (MF 18/10/66) while Benjamin Linsky’s soundings led him to be even more strongly opposed to this ‘‘Mother Hubbard’’ name, which would require the formation of a separate air pollution journal (MF 28/11/66). Bert Bolin (MF 28/11/66) favoured Atmospheric Environment, as did Haagen-Smit. Arie Haagen-Smit wrote to Maxwell (MF 19/10/69) that since his visit to the laboratory some ten years ago, the journal had grown in importance, so it was sensible that the journal developed as Atmospheric Environment. The years seem to have been remarkably kind to this choice (B3/ SCORERb) and even today the title has a currency that gives it the flexibility to occupy the wide range of debate.
Robert Maxwell announced the new journal Atmospheric Environment to board members on 17 November 1966. He stressed the importance of atmospheric flow patterns and the role of topography and added a list of topics thought to be important: industrial aerodynamics; cooling and evaporation from water surfaces; shelter belts and snow fences; meteorology of urban areas; drifting snow, soil, sands; crop spraying dusts as well as all aspects of air pollution. It is this very last item from the list that has dominated the journal for so long and it was with this focus that the journal passed to the publisher Elsevier in 1991 which joined the ReedElsevier group in 1993 (Cox, 2002). The early editorial leadership was taken up by David Moore. Moore had been a graduate student in the Department of Meteorology at Imperial College and took up a post at the Central Electricity Research Laboratories of the Central Electricity Generating Board (B3/SCORERb). He was appointed editor in 1965 as a replacement for Richard Scorer (B3/SCORERa) and his proximity to the publisher, initiated his long and close association with the journal. He was keen that the journal adopt a distinctive livery, that depicted a twilight or sunset (MF 20/10/72). He settled on a narrow orange stripe representing light transmitted through dust and nuclei near the ground and a wider blue area, characterizing the molecular scattering in the bulk atmosphere. These panels are topped by a white band, the ‘‘colour’’ of the light at the top of the atmosphere (Moore, 1988b). Eventually, Moore’s design had to change to meet the requirements of a new millennium. Peter Brimblecombe’s thoughts, sketched during a meeting at Elsevier’s Kidlington office, ultimately formed a draft sent to the designers (these drafts form the cover of this special issue). The designers thus created the current pictorial cover, where the blue and orange represents the clean and photochemically polluted atmosphere. The city skyline reminds us of the strong focus on the urban environment, while the reflection in the lake symbolises the importance of less polluted settings. 4. Early growth The first half of 1968 passed with the receipt of just 30 manuscripts (MF 13/11/68), although the board meeting of 13 November
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reveals a healthy 1350 subscriptions to the journal. The early board members were often contributors and referees (B3/SCORERa). However, even in its earliest years, it began to develop as an advisory board and much discussion took place between its members and the publisher by letter. The concept of a board with advice as a primary role, rather than the provision of referee reports to manuscripts, persists to the present. Board meetings have been held in the UK, Europe and the United States and once in Japan. Since the 1990s there has been a tendency to use the American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting in San Francisco as a location. The archives also give us a flavour of the drinking habits of the earliest board members e.g. bar bills include the purchase of Nuits St Georges, St Johannes Geisberg, Gordon’s Gin, John Haig whisky, Dubonet, Guinness, lager and cider (MF 15/710/69). The journal’s early days were not easy. Manuscripts could often take six to eight weeks to be acknowledged and there were frequent production delays (MF 20/4/70). Concern expressed by board members ranged from page charges to abbreviating references (MF 30/7/69). Nevertheless, the journal was actively involved in the arrangements for the Conference on the Visibility Aspects of Air Pollution in London October 1969. Many of the concerns about lengthy delivery times for galley proofs and the paper flow remained through subsequent years. However, Atmospheric Environment was growing and costs began to rise steeply; so much so that Volume 3 overran its estimated 700 pages, necessitating a shortened last issue (MF 30/9/69). The transition to monthly publication was not necessarily viewed favourably, because as pointed out in a letter from James Lodge to A.S. Lowe at Pergamon Press, the production of thin issues was inefficient (MF 29/9/70). The board was continually undergoing evolution and this was not without its problems. A change in the policy at the Ministry of Transport, did not allow civil servants to act on editorial boards, so S.R. Craxford of Warren Spring Laboratory had to resign (MF 29/9/70). The early 1970s were troubled by cost increases. There was much debate over increasing the cost of the journal from £26 to £28, but editor David Moore believed rising costs justified this (MF 22/6/72). Jim Lodge was less convinced (MF 5/7/72) and throughout the 1970s opposed increases in cost, believing that Atmospheric Environment was pricing itself out of the market (MF 13/6/72). In the end Lodge had to accept the costing, but remained worried about the impact on subscriptions of shrinking research budgets (MF 18/7/73). Yet at the same time he was concerned about the restrictions to the amount of material that could be published. The board of 1973 was much interested in publishing papers about pollution from power stations and cooling towers (MF 6/4/73) and proposed a spin-off Review Series to lessen pressures on the page budget (MF 12/10/73). The journal was nevertheless growing and by Volume 6 there were 1686 subscribers. Long papers were becoming a problem (MS 15/5/74) and the limited space meant a move towards double column publishing, although David Moore did not like this format (MF 19/12/74) and editors began to be discerning about what was to be published. Maxwell felt they were on a tight rope (MF 16/7/75). This became particularly difficult in the face of world wide inflation and the printing paper shortages of the mid seventies. In 1976 Maxwell narrowly retained his re-acquired Pergamon Press in the face of hostile take-over bids, and was determined to cope with the paper shortage and improve the journal’s operations in these difficult times. The costly publication of papers in foreign languages (notably French) had to stop and additionally, the costs of typesetting were to be reduced (MF 12/11/76). The 1970s were also an important time in atmospheric chemistry. Mario Molina and Sherwood Rowland published their paper ‘‘Stratospheric sink for chlorofluoromethanes: chlorine atom catalysed destruction of ozone’’ in Nature in the summer of 1974. Maxwell was aware of the importance of this and a conference proposal (never developed) was to be placed before the
Fig. 2. Change in number of subscriptions to Atmospheric Environment.
Atmospheric Environment board. This conference would have examined the depletion of the ozone layer and recognised the impact of supersonic transport, nuclear explosions and CFCs on the ozone layer which could severely affect climate, skin cancer, etc. (MF 18/12/74). 5. Growing submissions and declining library budgets The journal had gained wide acceptance by the late 1970s, with well over two thousand subscribers and a steady stream of papers. This happy situation was not to remain. The growth in scientific literature, fluctuating international exchange rates, the rising costs of journals and indeed the cost models adopted by publishers began to have an impact (e.g. Cox, 2002). Library budgets could not cope resulting in declining subscriptions. The publisher wrote to Moore and Lodge on 31 August 1983 of their concern over the huge drop in library circulation. Almost two hundred libraries had not renewed for 1983, resulting in a very substantial loss (Fig. 2). The publisher’s response was to ask editors and editorial board members to use their influence to encourage their institutions to renew subscriptions. This was never very effective and the calls for members to pressure colleagues and institutions were often unwelcome. Board members felt powerless and resented pressures to market the journal. In 1984 a promotional letter sent by Pergamon Press to all lapsed subscribers offered them the volume they had missed for free and a 5% reduction in the current subscription charge. The declining subscriptions also meant that publishers faced considerable losses. International exchange rates ensured the beginning of a long and bitter battle between libraries and publishers over the high charges made for scientific journals. This issue retains contemporary relevance within the open-access debate. 6. Internationalisation In 1966 David Moore wrote to Gilbert Richards at Pergamon Press of his concern at the low number of contributions from Japan and the USSR (MF 9/11/66) and again in the Board of 1980 (B10 6/5/ 80). The editorial board often discussed the lack of material from the developing world in the 1980s and in 1985. David Moore observed that ‘‘most of the papers published in the journal to date have been concerned with various aspects of ‘‘chemical’’ air pollution. and published papers have also looked at different ways of reducing the impact of pollution, including the control of emissions and dispersion from tall chimneys. The alternative approach. to replace the pollution producing process by one which is free from chemical air pollution, has received much less attention.’’ He felt that the journal should widen and try to attract
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papers dealing with the problems posed by alternative sources of energy and materials and not overlook the danger to rapidly developing countries (B10). The situation had much improved over time, yet David Moore noted the continuing lack of interest in air pollution problems in the developing world. Few papers from these areas appeared in the international literature. Moore actively supported the development of a series of conferences Atmospheric Sciences and Applications to Air Quality to take place on the Asia-Pacific Rim. The first of these conferences took place in Seoul Korea during May of 1985 (Moore, 1986). He also had a strong interest in India and in January 1986 visited the country, supported by the British Council, to gain a sense of the air pollution science there (Moore, 1987). This reminded him that traditional fuels were not the way to cleaner air. He also visited the Indian Institute of Technology and later supported the publication of the proceedings of the International Conference on Tropical Micrometeorology and Air Pollution in New Delhi, February 1988. There was some discussion about creating a new journal Atmospheric Environment – Sustainability and Development, but this did not evolve. As we will see, more global coverage ultimately came with the development of Atmospheric Environment International. 7. Fragmentation The growing journal had become too expensive, particularly in the developing world. It was possible that a smaller more specialist journal might be appealing to an international market. Robert Bornstein, an urban meteorologist, suggested that there was currently no obvious journal for publication of work of totally urban concern. He proposed a separate journal and although the idea gained some momentum, it eventually emerged as a part of Atmospheric Environment, Urban Atmosphere. There were perceived problems with the proposed structure and Steve Schwartz, in a letter of 26 April 1989 (B1/UA 26/4/89), argued against Urban Atmosphere on a range of issues including: citation, editorial matters, fragmentation and logistics. He was not alone, the editor Michele Benarie agreed with the concerns (B1/UA 12/5/89), but Moore was in favour of the expansion and annotated his thoughts on Schwartz’s letter (B1/UA 26/4/89) and elsewhere (B1/UA 168A/ PerPM59/M59). He felt that the new journal was important because it addressed the question of developing countries and saw ultimately the creation of further spin-off parts, notably: Atmosphere and Development. The publishers decided to treat Atmospheric Environment Part B Urban Atmosphere as a separate entity with its own pagination for a three-year probationary period. It could be identified with Atmospheric Environment because of the format and cover (Fig. 1). Although it was distributed to all Atmospheric Environment subscribers as part of their subscription, it could be bought separately making it more affordable. The managing editor at Pergamon Press, Peter Henn, was in favour of Urban Atmosphere because it formed a good place for excess manuscripts submitted to Atmospheric Environment, avoided competition, yet had an established identity ensuring that authors felt no loss of prestige when their papers were published in Urban Atmosphere. The new journal was promised for 1989 (Moore, 1988a) although there were soon concerns about the lack of material for Urban Atmosphere. Peter Henn wrote to Bob Bornstein on the 15th September 1988: ‘‘I am very concerned to learn that we have yet to receive the papers for the first issue which, according to the schedule set out in my letter of December 4 should have reached us last month..’’ (B1/UA 15/9/88). An interim measure of transferring papers from Atmospheric Environment helped until the journal became established, but this required David Moore to divert papers originally to be placed in Atmospheric Environment to the new Urban Atmosphere part (B1/UA 168A/PerPM59/M59). This caused
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delays, confusion and disappointment. The first issue of Urban Atmosphere was delayed almost a year until 1990, with some papers being held up since the beginning of 1987. Nevertheless, the issue was rather thin, but Henn believed this was import to ensure high quality (B1/UA 10/5/89). The first editorial explained: Atmospheric Environment Part B Urban Atmosphere is ‘‘intended to be a medium by which information concerning urbanization could flow from the mid-latitudes where many current research efforts are carried out to the developing tropics where most of the largest cities will exist by the next century.It is hoped that Atmospheric Environment Part B will collect in one publication many of the papers on urbanization currently found distributed through a variety of other journals.’’ The issues began to appear more regularly with: 3 issues in 1990, 3 issues in 1991, 4 issues in 1992 and 4 issues in 1993. However, Part B of the journal never attracted a large number of subscribers. At the end of 1993 it was reincorporated into the journal, with the Part B designation vanishing. The distinctive blue and grey covers (Fig. 1) appeared on occasional issues until 1996, after which the re-merger was complete. The consequences of the re-merger left a gap in the ability of the journal to attract both authors and papers from a wider world. Atmospheric Environment lacked an identifiable relationship with many parts of the world where interest was growing. This concern led to the idea of devoting single issues to papers from given regions of the world, that would appear under the banner Atmospheric Environment International. These aimed to place regional issues in an international context. This development met a perceived need for authors from various regions in the world to publish high quality papers with a regional perspective. It also gave marketing opportunities in these regions. In the days before electronic copy Atmospheric Environment International issues formed collections of papers from a particular geographical area and showed the substantial volume of work being done in emerging countries. The modified cover carries letters ‘‘AEI’’ on the spine appears from 1999 to 2002. Changes in publishing style and increasing electronic access meant less need for a vehicle of this kind. The international context had come to be represented throughout the entire journal. Perhaps one of the most persistent developments of the 1990s was New Directions. These columns appeared in 1996 to give a more journalistic flavour to topics that were emerging rapidly, yet too speculative to justify fully fledged papers. Al Lefohn and Bill Sturges took charge and edited many thought provoking articles over the years. At the beginning, Keene et al. (1996) wrote an influential column ‘‘Reactive chlorine: a potential sink for dimethylsulfide and hydrocarbons in the marine boundary layer’’ about an issue that continues to attract debate (von Glasow, 2008). In 1998 Atmospheric Environment encouraged the submission of Millennium Reviews (B8 22/4/98), which were published in the journal and ultimately collected as a book (Austin et al., 2002), along with some radical future direction columns. In one of these, two students asked the question: ‘‘Could transgenic mice hear air pollution?’’ (Hill and Lythe, 2002). In further recognition of progress, Hanwant Singh introduced the Haagen-Smit Prize to be given annually to the authors of two outstanding papers published in the journal (Singh and Brimblecombe, 2007). Barbara Findlayson-Pitts served as the first chair of the selection committee (B1/HS) and the awards in 2001 went to papers of Atkinson (1990) and Schauer et al. (1996). A Haagen-Smit Prize Special Supplement republished the prize winning papers in 2007 (Singh and Brimblecombe, 2007). 8. Development of offices Jim Lodge, who had been with the journal since the early days, began to consider his retirement in the late 1980s. His retirement would leave such a large gap it was felt that journal growth would
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Fig. 3. Two Christmas post-cards distributed by Atmospheric Environment in the 1990s. These were drawn by Philip Judge, the cartographer in the School of Environmental Sciences of the University of East Anglia.
be assisted by a larger number of North American editors. Thus Hanwant Singh, Paul Lioy and Allen Lefohn were appointed (B3/ LODGE), while at the same time David Moore who had for many years received clerical assistance from Pam Roberts and was also aided by Alan Robins of the Central Electricity Research Laboratories. After the editorial office moved to the University of East Anglia, Moore was assisted by Peter Brimblecombe, until Moore died in 1989. For a short time the journal was edited by Alan Robins, but he was aware he could not set aside enough time to become an executive editor (B1 21/2/89). This editorial role passed to Peter Brimblecombe at the University of East Anglia in February 1990 (Austin, 1996). The journal was growing rapidly in size despite the declining subscriber numbers (see Brimblecombe and Grossi, 2008) and looked set to exceed three thousand pages by the 1990s. It became clear that the activities of largely unsupported part-time editors would be a constraint to growth. The emerging UK office inherited some of its style from David Moore; it still communicated by mail and adopted login books (F1, B4) to record the incoming manuscripts, a practice that still exists. Much communication was via post-cards and although these acknowledged submissions, they were also used to send Christmas greetings (Fig. 3). These reflect greater intimacy within the smaller journal. The increasing flow of material made new practices essential. Dave Moore had read every manuscript that passed through his office, but this had become an impossible task for a part-time editor. The journal appointed professional editorial staff to perform
the in-house review of material. Jill Austin, a meteorologist, joined early in 1990 and after her departure in 2003, Michele Raychaudhuri, with special interests in the museum atmosphere, was formally appointed in spring 2004 (B6/FP). From 1998 the work load proved so great that Karen Sturges joined the office to ensure a more rapid turn around of manuscripts and to engage with an increasing array of electronic tools. By the late 1990s it was also clear that a larger US office was also required. The editorial board, so dominated by men for many years, was fortunate in attracting some exceptional women atmospheric scientists. Additionally the journal had been served by an able group of publishing editors from the 1980s, this included Peter Henn, Anne Vindenes Allen, Jaques Kiebert, Hetty Verhagen. The role split into two with Friso Veenstra covering strategic issues and Kim-Lan Thonus monitoring day-to-day management of the journal. Kim has this year been replaced by Caroline ten Wolde. Journal growth took place at a time when the atmospheric sciences were developing new areas of investigation. Some topics achieved prominence and later faded from interest within the pages of the journal. This often led to concerns about continuing to publish papers that lacked scientific novelty. In 1988 Philip Hopke wrote to Jim Lodge (B9 5/1/88) suggesting that many receptor modelling papers were merely routine applications to different locations. This was one indication of a problem that continues in making judgements about papers of undoubted interest to local groups, but offer little new scientific or methodological insight.
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Growth also had detrimental effects. Despite much positive feedback about the journal, the size of the editorial task was such that authors did not always feel referees and editors understood the content and context of their manuscripts. The offices developed adjudication procedures for this along with processes to address ethical issues such as plagiarism, duplicate publication and conflict of interest. 9. Transition to electronic publishing One of the most important aspects of scientific publishing at the end of the 20th century is the shift to an electronic mode. Maxwell had sensed the potential for this change in the 1960s, but his dealings with Saul Steinberg of Leasco Data Processing were so fraught that the project never materialised (Cox, 2002). However, a quarter of a century later the widening use of email gave an opportunity of an alerting service Contents Direct which ran from 1995 to 2006. Publishers introduced occasional CD-ROMs and at one time these were seen a potential route to the future of the journal. However, they required a lot of work and extra editorials (B1/E/CD1), so became seen more as a marketing tool to be sent to subscribers instead of a brochure in the late 1990s (B8 8/6/98). A string of different initiatives attempted to provide editorial tools from the mid 1990s. The Virtual Editorial Office was demonstrated at an Atmospheric Environment meeting in April 1998 (B8 22/4/98), but was never used by the journal. The Virtual Environment was a prototype introduced by Elsevier in 1998 to provide a global environmental electronic information services. The first tool adopted by Atmospheric Environment offices was RMTS software to assist with editorial procedures in the late 1990s. In the UK the experience of this was not entirely positive, so the editorial team developed software internally, based on Microsoft Access 2000. In parallel they encouraged submission of material as files by email. This system remained in use until the introduction of EES (Electronic Editorial System) in 2005, because an intermediate system Elsubmit (B1/ES) proved cumbersome and was abandoned by Atmospheric Environment after a short trial period in 2001. In parallel there was a desire that Atmospheric Environment consider the provision of web-based electronic data in addition to printed material. This led to the development of The Air Pollution Exchange APEX in 1999, and eve-web today (B1/APEX). Elsevier’s eve-web today was an electronic journal that published short summaries of articles from Elsevier’s applied science journals in the new millennium. Although the APEX web pages led to the creation of guidance to referees, authors, special issue editors that remained active for almost a decade, it was overtaken, like many early ideas for electronic publication, by other developments. 10. Future The broad acceptance of the world wide web as the means for submission of papers and their final distribution represents the most radical transition in scientific publishing since the invention of the printing press which allowed the development of scientific journals by the 17th century. Electronic access means that the individual issues of the journal have little distinction, so it is likely that Atmospheric Environment will no longer publish special issues. In the web-environment, journal identity is harder to maintain and it is not clear how this will change the perceptions of readers. We approach a time when a whole generation of scientists, will never have held a hard copy of Atmospheric Environment, either as a past or current issue. The transitions of the 21st century have increased calls for other changes. The classic approach to peer review has shifted more to a community review in some journals such as the European Geophysical Union’s Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics. There has been a long debate about open-access to scientific literature.
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Funding bodies would like works they have supported to be freely accessible. However, it is a complex debate and an editorial in Nature talked about novel ways of making material freely available, but worried about the sustainability of some models (Anon, 2004). The author pays model may also be hard on authors (Gadagkar, 2008) in the developing world. A number of publishers, including Elsevier, who retain the traditional model have begun to offer authors the choice of opting for open-access. Atmospheric Environment is determined to remain flexible in a changing world. The significant increase in Asian research on air pollution will be recognised in the appointment of Chak Chan of Hong Kong University of Science and Technology to a new editorial office from the beginning of 2009. The future is never certain, but effort in this most significant endeavour is assured. Acknowledgement We would like to thank Luciano Morselli and Elena Bernardi for their thoughts on Italo Calvino and appreciated the various reviewers: Alan Robins, Hanwant Singh and Friso Veenstra made many useful suggestions. Additionally we have to acknowledge all those who have contributed so much to fifty years of endeavour. The article is short, but we hope we have at least caught the flavour of that effort. Archival material The archival material used here is stored in the UK Office of Atmospheric Environment at the School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia. This consists of a collection of material on microfiche gathered from Pergamon Press covering the years 1966– 1991 that amounts to some 5000 pages (Reference: MF), a folder (Reference: F) of material from David Moore and ten boxes of documents (Reference: B1–B10): B1 Development of Atmospheric Environment B2 Old issues of Atmospheric Environment B3 Atmospheric Environment history B4 Atmospheric Environment login books (1990–1999) B5 Publisher’s materials B6 Contract information B7 Office B8 Meetings B9 Scope, etc. B10 Meetings: office/editorial (1980–1999) These materials are cited in the text with these abbreviations, followed by a subcategory or date that locates the item within the box, microfiche, etc. References Anon, 2004. Experiments in publishing. Nature 431, 111. Atkinson, R., 1990. Gas-phase tropospheric chemistry of organic compounds: a review. Atmospheric Environment 24A, 1–41. Austin, J., 1996. Atmospheric environment – past present and future. Elsevier Environmental Science & Technology Newsletter (2), 1–11. Austin, J., Brimblecombe, P., Sturges, W. (Eds.), 2002. Air Pollution Science for the 21st Century. Elsevier, Amsterdam. Brimblecombe, P., 2006. The Clean Air Act after fifty years. Weather 61, 311–314. Brimblecombe, P., Grossi, C.M., 2008. The bibliometrics of atmospheric environment. Atmospheric Environment 43 (1), 9–12. Cox, B., 2002. The Pergamon phenomenon 1951–1991: Robert Maxwell and scientific publishing. Learned Publishing 15, 273–278. Fenger, J., 2008. Air pollution in the last 50 years – from local to global. Atmospheric Environment 43 (1), 13–22. Gadagkar, R., 2008. Open-access more harm than good in developing world. Nature 453, 450. von Glasow, R., 2008. News & views: pollution meets sea salt. Nature Geosciences 1, 292.
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Hill, J.G.T., Lythe, M., 2002. Future directions: could transgenic mice hear air pollution? In: Austin, J., Brimblecombe, P., Sturges, W. (Eds.), Air Pollution Science for the 21st Century. Elsevier, Amsterdam, pp. 655–657. Keene, W.C., Jacob, D.J., Fan, S.-M., 1996. Reactive chlorine: a potential sink for dimethylsulfide and hydrocarbons in the marine boundary layer. Atmospheric Environment 30 (6), i–iii. Moore, D.J., 1986. Keynote address and closing remarks: first international conference on atmospheric sciences and applications to air quality. Atmospheric Environment 20, 807–812.
Moore, D.J., 1987. Report on a British Council Specialist Tour to India. Atmospheric Environment 21, 2473–2480. Moore, D., 1988a. Editorial. Atmospheric Environment 22 (6), i. Moore, D.J., 1988b. 40th Anniversary of Pergamon Press. Atmospheric Environment 22 (6), i. Schauer, J.J., et al., 1996. Source apportionment of airborne particulate matter using organic compounds as tracers. Atmospheric Environment 30, 3837–3855. Singh, H.B., Brimblecombe, P., 2007. Haagen-Smit prize special supplement. Atmospheric Environment 41, S1.