Winding down for the big holiday

Apologies to authors who have submitted papers to Minerals Engineering, there will be some considerable delay before we can send them off to referees.

I am about to leave for Cambridge and the IOM3 Mine to Market conference, which starts tomorrow, and when I return the Christmas and New Year holiday will effectively have started.

So authors, I must crave your indulgence and ask for your patience for a few weeks. I can assure you that both Pablo and I will knuckle down and clear any backlog around mid-January.

Let me take this opportunity of wishing you all very happy holidays and best wishes for 2016.

Minerals Engineering journal continues to thrive

This year's annual report for Minerals Engineering has made pleasant reading. Paper flow to the journal continues to increase, with an estimated 900 papers received in 2015 compared with 828 in 2014, which led last year to the first appointment of an associate editor, Dr. Pablo Brito-Parada of Imperial College, UK, to assist with the workload. Pablo settled into his role very quickly and is a tremendous asset. He has taken on the tasks of editing the special issues of Computational Modelling '15 and Flotation '15.

Although the number of papers submitted has increased, the number actually published has decreased, as the rejection rate has risen to 74% compared with 65% in 2014. This increase is to a large extent due to the increase in number of articles submitted from China, accounting for 25% of the total, but unfortunately the rejection rate from China still remains very high at 88%, compared with 21% from Australia, which still acounts for the highest number of submitted papers, slightly higher than China.

Minerals Engineering's impact factor (IF) is the highest of all journals in its field, but this does not cause me to leap for joy, as I am no great fan of IF, although I know it is important for research funding etc. What I find more important is ScienceDirect usage, a true indication of the interest in articles published, a staggering 530,537 downloads in 2014. But of equal importance is how the authors themselves rate the journal, and the Table below shows the results of the Author Feedback Program, a continuous research program monitoring the performance of Elsevier's primary journals. It allows Elsevier to closely monitor author opinion and thus journal performance.  

 Authors are invited to rate a number of statements concerning their publishing experience. These statements are grouped into areas, including reputation, peer review, production speed, publishing services, the editorial board and impact factor. Authors are also asked to rate another journal in which they have recently published, the score for each area or factor for Minerals Engineering then being compared against the average of all other titles. The "average", which is a convenient benchmark, is zero on the chart. Scores above zero mean for that area, Minerals Engineering is rated higher than average. Conversely, factor scores below zero, mean for that area, Minerals Engineering would be rated lower than average. The order in which the factors appear in the chart denote their importance to authors (i.e. the first factor listed is, on average, the most important consideration when deciding where to publish for the authors of the journal).

The nine factor scores are weighted according to their importance, and used to calculate a composite journal score. This score is then compared to the journal scores of other journals in which the author also recently published. The maximum potential journal score is 100, but in general, scores vary between 50 and 90. Minerals Engineering scores 92.2 against an average of 77.0, with 100% of authors agreeing that they are very satisfied with the journal.

These figures are very encouraging and a great tribute to the many people involved with the journal, including Dean Eastbury, the Executive Publishing Manager at Elsevier, who is a familiar face at many MEI Conferences, and the very efficient Production Manager Naveen Raja. But the peer-review process would be of nothing without my excellent associate editor, Pablo, and the 24 members of the international Editorial Board, to whom I often turn for advice, and the 260 international registered reviewers who give up their valuable time to keep the review process ticking. Thanks to you all, and a special mention to two in particular, Prof. Tim Napier-Munn, of the JKMRC and Rob Dunne, of Rob Dunne Consulting, both of Australia.

Tim Napier-Munn and Rob Dunne

Editorial Board member Tim has recently been awarded the Sir Willis Connolly Memorial Medal for 2015, a joint award between the AusIMM and the Barbarians for an outstanding communicator from the broad arena of science, engineering and technology, whose ability to communicate has advanced the professionalism, the industry or management of science, engineering and technology (more on MEI Online).

At the SME Meeting in Phoenix in February I look forward to seeing Rob receive the Robert H. Richards Award, for his pioneering work in the applications of SAG milling, flotation, and gravity concentration for gold and copper recovery. Rob has been involved with the journal since its inception, being a long standing Editorial Board member in its early days.

And it's only a couple of months since Editorial Board member Prof. Graeme Jameson was awarded the coveted Prime Minister's Prize for Science (posting of 21 October).

Comminution '16 Provisional Programme now available

Comminution '16 is now only 4 months away, so plan your journey and organise your accommodation soon if you would like to join us at the Vineyard Hotel in Cape Town in April. A fine programme awaits, and there will be great opportunities for networking during the 'happy hours', the dinner at Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens and during the extended coffee and lunch breaks in the exhibition/poster area. If you would like to exhibit, there are a few booths still available.

Happy hour at last month's Flotation '15

We would like to take this opportunity of thanking our sponsors again and we look forward to seeing familiar, and new, faces soon.

 

Birthday Celebrations

On behalf of all at MEI I would like to wish Prof. Doug Fuerstenau best wishes on his 87th birthday, which he celebrated today. Still actively involved in mineral processing, and travelling the world, he is a true inspiration.

I am a mere youngster in comparison but last week I hit 70, and I would like to take this opportunity of thanking all of you who sent birthday wishes, via email, LinkedIn, Facebook and mail. I very much appreciate your thoughts.

This afternoon I belatedly celebrated my 70th with close friends and family at home in Falmouth.

 

Last month's most viewed posts

The 10 most popular blog postings in November can be seen below, together with the date of the posting and the total number of comments on the post.

Prof. Alban Lynch interviews MEI's Barry Wills
2 November 2015 (31)
Flotation '15 Conference Diary
29 November 2015 (8)
Are these WASET conferences just a scam?
28 April 2013 (67)
MEI Young Person's Award for 2014 to Elizabeth Whiteman
16 November 2015 (2)
Flotation '15 dinner at beautiful Kirstenbosch
17 November 2015 (0)
A welcome to Flotation '15
15 November 2015 (0)
Happy hours at Flotation '15
19 November 2015 (2)
Eminent Biohydrometallurgist joins the Editorial Board of Minerals Engineering
11 July 2014 (1)
Final Calls for Abstracts: Biohydrometallurgy '16 and Sustainable Minerals '16
8 November 2015 (2)
MEI guide to walking in Cornwall
5 April 2014 (0)

If you are in Web View (mobile users can access this by scolling down to the bottom of the screen) you can also check various things in the right hand column:

• The latest MEI tweets from @barrywills
• Recent comments on postings
• The most viewed posts in the last 7 days
• The most viewed all time
• Dates of blog posts (click on the black arrows to open up individual months and postings)
• Labels, or categories

You can also subscribe to blog alerts by email, and access MEI's Facebook page and MEI Online via links in this column.

We encourage you to share your views by submitting your comments on blog postings. Last month there were over 18,000 page views, so interacting with the blog enhances your international presence by providing you, and your company or Institute, with valuable exposure.

Prof. A.K. Biswas, 1934-2015

Professor Arun Kumar Biswas, a distinguished faculty member of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kanpur from 1963 to 1995 passed away in Kolkata on November 30th after a difficult battle with leukaemia for the past couple of years. He used to teach a popular basic undergraduate course in mineral engineering. Professor Biswas was one of the founder members of IIT Kanpur and served this prestigious institute with distinction for more than three decades.

Born in 1934, an alumnus of Kolkata University (Silver Medallist, MSc Tech in Applied Chemistry, 1955 and PhD, 1955) and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), USA (S.M. in Metallurgy in 1962), Dr. Biswas was professor at IIT Kanpur from 1963 to 1995. After superannuation, he served as the Mahendralal Sircar Research Professor in History of Science at the Asiatic Society, Kolkata (1995-2001), as the AICTE Emeritus Fellow at the Jadavpur University (2001-2004) and INSA Research Fellow in Kolkata. He was a member of the INSA National Commission for History of Science and also its editorial board.

Author of 150 technical papers and 25 monographs, some edited multi-authored volumes, Professor Biswas built his international reputation in diverse fields: History of Science, Applied Chemistry, Mineral Engineering, Languages and Literature, Linguistics, History of Religion and Archaeo-metallurgy.

His sterling contributions in the field of history of minerals and metals and archaeo-metallurgy, available in the form of several monographs and a series of publications in the INSA periodical, Indian Journal of History of Science are most well known internationally. He had also written extensively on the pioneers of science education and research in India, for example, Mahendralal Sircar and Eugene Lafont.

In the field of Mineral Engineering, Professor Biswas was one among the foremost in the MIT tradition led my his mentor, Professor AM Gaudin. He was a founder member of the Indian Institute of Mineral Engineers (IIME) and remained passionately devoted to this field till the end. He guided more than 20 Masters and PhD students while at IIT Kanpur.

Professor Biswas was a prolific writer. Some of his well known books and monographs either authored or edited by him include - Science in India (1969), Frontiers in Applied Chemistry (1989), Minerals and Metals in Ancient India in two volumes (1996), History, Science and Society in the Indian context (2001), Minerals and Metals in the Pre-Modern India (2001), Father Lafont of St. Xavier's College, Kolkata and the Contemporary Science Movement (2001), Science in Archaeology and Archaeo-materials (2005), Mineral Processing to Elemental Science in the Medieval World: India and Europe (2011) and Mineral Engineering in India - Reflections (2012).

Amongst the many conference he participated while at IIT Kanpur, it is worth mentioning that he had attended and presented a paper during the IMPC held in Prague.

Professor Biswas was not only a great teacher but one of the father figures in mineral engineering in India. Professor Biswas was very passionately and intensely dedicated to mineral engineering all his life. He lived a rich and contented life. He was soft-spoken but stern, principled and an extremely sensitive human being.

We convey our heartfelt condolences to Mrs. Sulekha Biswas, their son, Sandipan Biswas and all the members of the Biswas family.

Kindly submitted by Dr. Pradip, Chief Scientist and Head, Process Engineering Innovation Lab, Tata Research Development and Design Centre, India

Dr. Pradip is an alumnus of IIT Kanpur and Professor Biswas taught him during his undergraduate days.