Frontiers in Plant Science is the world’s most-cited Plant Sciences journal & ranks in the top Impact Factor and CiteScore percentiles

Frontiers in Plant Sciences continues to rank among the world’s top plant science journals in terms of influence and quality, as shown by our analysis of the 2017 Journal Citation Reports (JCR-2017; 2018, Clarivate Analytics), 2017 CiteScore edition (2018, Scopus, Elsevier) and other impact metrics.

• The world’s most-cited journal in the JCR category of Plant Sciences, with 11,239 citations in 2017 to 2,177 articles published in 2015 and 2016 (Figure 1)

• The world’s most-cited journal in the CiteScore category of Plant Science, with 16,444 citations in 2017 to 3,971 articles published in 2014, 2015 and 2016 (Figure 1)

• Ranks in the 89th percentile of journal Impact Factors in the JCR Plant Sciences category, with an Impact Factor of 3.677 (Figure 2)

• Ranks in the 94th CiteScore percentile in the Plant Science category, with a CiteScore of 4.14 (Figure 2)

• 8,100 published articles to date

• 67,500 citations to date

• 29 million article views and downloads to date

• Articles mentioned 550 times in the news to date

• Articles mentioned 30,000 times on social media to date

Figure 1: Analysis of the top 10 most-cited journals in the JCR Plant Sciences category (JCR-2017, released in 2018 by Clarivate Analytics) and CiteScore Plant Science category (2017 edition, released in 2018 by Scopus, Elsevier). Bar plots show the total number of citations in 2017 to articles published in 2015 and 2016 (JCR) and 2014, 2015 and 2016 (CiteScore), with Frontiers in Plant Science in red. A total of 222 journals are listed in the Plant Sciences category in the 2017 JCR edition, of which 38 are Open Access. A total of 389 journals are listed in the Plant Science category in the 2017 CiteScore edition, of which 114 are Open Access.

Figure 2: Analysis of Impact Factor and CiteScore rankings in the JCR Plant Sciences category and CiteScore Plant Science category. Grey lines represent all journals in each category ranked by their 2017 Impact Factor and CiteScore percentiles, with Frontiers in Plant Sciences shown as a red dot. Impact Factor is the average number of citations received in 2017 to articles published in 2015 and 2016, while CiteScore represents average citations in 2017 to articles published in 2014, 2015 and 2016. A total of 222 journals are listed in the Plant Sciences category in the 2017 JCR edition, of which 38 are Open Access. A total of 389 journals are listed in the Plant Science category in the 2017 CiteScore edition, of which 114 are Open Access; however the analysis here includes only those journals with a full three-year publication history, that is, with published articles in 2015, 2016 and 2017.

Top research in 2017

2017’s top plant science articles include exciting new research on gall formation, seagrass ecology and improved agricultural crops and systems.

Hottest Research Topics

• Plant pathogenic Ralstonia spp. from the field to the lab and back again: mechanisms of pathogen virulence and host resistance, population biology, community ecology and strategies for bacterial wilt disease management

• Plastid proteostasis: relevance of transcription, translation and post-translational modifications

• Optimising Miscanthus for the sustainable bioeconomy: from genes to products

One of the ten Research Topic finalists in the 2017 Spotlight Award was also published in Frontiers in Plant Science:

• Biotrophic plant-microbe interactions

Top article picks

• Using a structural root system model to evaluate and improve the accuracy of root image analysis pipelines

• Using population and comparative genomics to understand the genetic basis of effector-driven fungal pathogen evolution

• RNA interference (RNAi) as a potential tool for control of mycotoxin contamination in crop plants: concepts and considerations

• Ethanol enhances high-salinity stress tolerance by detoxifying reactive oxygen species in Arabidopsis thaliana and rice

• Generation of high-amylose rice through CRISPR/Cas9-mediated targeted mutagenesis of starch branching enzymes

• Rocking the boat: damage to eelgrass by swinging boat moorings

• Root-knot and cyst nematodes activate procambium-associated genes in Arabidopsis roots

• Progress in genome editing technology and its application in plants

• An efficient visual screen for CRISPR/Cas9 activity in Arabidopsis thaliana

• Morphological plant modeling: unleashing geometric and topological potential within the plant sciences

Scientific excellence at scale

The impressive performance of Frontiers in Plant Sciences — and all Frontiers journals listed in the JCR and CiteScore metrics — reflects the continued success and influence of the Frontiers Open Science model of scientific excellence at scale.

All of this is only possible thanks to our research community and stellar editorial board. Frontiers congratulates Field Chief Editor Joshua Heazlewood and all Specialty Chief Editors, as well as the diligent work of the Associate and Review Editors, authors and the Frontiers Journal Management team, for this outstanding achievement.