key: cord-0721621-ms98qyv4
authors: Ascoli, Giorgio A.; Kennedy, David N.; De Schutter, Erik
title: Farewell, Neuroinformatics!
date: 2021-10-29
journal: Neuroinformatics
DOI: 10.1007/s12021-021-09552-5
sha: 1d8c592ba0cecf1f6bf01b14dc167db373557d40
doc_id: 721621
cord_uid: ms98qyv4

nan

its core mission to provide a peer-reviewed venue for scholarly excellence in neuroscience informatics.

Nevertheless, we felt that the progressive moves towards bigger corporations, especially in the past two years, brought about mounting insistence from the publisher to increase the number of articles accepted in the journal, according, in our view, to the 'bigger is better' business logic. We steadily resisted this perceived pressure, unwilling to dilute the unique profile of Neuroinformatics into a broader, less clearly defined scope, or to compromise the standard of quality of its content. Alas, in August 2021 a representative of Springer-Nature notified us that our editorial contract would not be renewed at the end of this year. As of this writing, we are told that the search for new leadership has yet to begin. We appreciate the difference of opinion on the best course of action for Neuroinformatics, and we respect the publisher's prerogative to set the commercial agenda for its journals. Nonetheless, we express concern for the potential lack of continuity and absence of an organized transition. At the same time, we celebrate the spectacular progress in the field that this journal fostered during these 20 years. Neuroscience was radically transformed by the deep penetration of neuroinformatics in effectively all subfields of brain research. All major institutionally and philanthropically supported neuroscience research programs in these two decades emphasized informatics, including the US BRAIN Initiative, the EU Human Brain Project, the Howard Hughes Janelia research campus, and the Allen Institute for Brain Science. The pages of this journal documented the launch and adoption of seminal projects such as the Neuroscience Information Framework, 14 the Neuroimaging Informatics Tools and Resources Clearinghouse, 15 NeuroMorpho.Org, 16 the Collaborative Research in Computational Neuroscience data sharing program, 17 and the National Database for Autism Research, 18 just to mention a few. Meanwhile, the global neuroinformatics movement produced broadly used public resources such as the Allen mouse brain atlas, 19 Janelia's FlyEM 20 and MouseLight, 21 and the rapid population of the Neuroscience Multi-omic Archive, 22 Brain Cell Data Center, 23 and Brain Image Library, 24 among many others.

Researchers entering the foray today have outstanding opportunities, tools, and data that could only be dreamed of when this journal started. We are extremely grateful to our past and present Editorial Board members, selfless reviewers, and patient authors for their expert contributions to shaping the field as we know it today. It is exciting to imagine how human understanding of the nervous system and its operations will evolve in the future. We feel privileged for having shared this journey until now and we wish the best to all our readers and the broader community.

Financial Interest Disclosure. The authors received a modest annual stipend for their efforts as Chief Editors (the amount was not raised or inflation-adjusted since 2007).

Publisher's Note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations

The neuroscience information framework: a data and knowledge environment for neuroscience

Neuroimaging informatics tools and resources clearinghouse (NITRC) resource announcement

NeuroMorpho.Org implementation of digital neuroscience: dense coverage and integration with the NIF

Data sharing for computational neuroscience

Sharing heterogeneous data: the national database for autism research