The Inaugural Volume of <i>Small Science</i>—A Splendid Start

One year ago, we published the very first issue of Small Science. During this first year, the journal has received incredible support from the international scientific community and we were already able to publish 12 issues and a total of 86 wonderful manuscripts in its first volume. Overall, we are astonished and delighted by the fact that Small Science is fast-paced and receives such positive feedback. This would not have been possible without our authors who submitted their cutting-edge fundamental or interdisciplinary research at the micro- and nanoscale to Small Science. Table 1 highlights the top ten authors whose articles have received the most attention from research communities during the first year after publication. The citation numbers already indicate that these articles are highly relevant and influential. These manuscripts illustrate many, but certainly not all, highly topical subfields of research at the sub-macroscopic level — including energy storage, electrocatalysis, nanoarchitectonics, catalysis, 1D and 2D materials, and photonics. Our editorial team strives to span fields and scales of research, looking for outstanding performance or relevant conceptual advances with a strong potential for wider implementation. We ask our reviewers to rigorously evaluate the technical standard of submissions, and comment more generally on the broader impact and novelty of reported results. As such, it can be challenging to review manuscripts for a new journal that aims to develop into the premium Open Access journal in its field. We would therefore like to thank all reviewers who devoted their time and expertise in support of our journal. Furthermore, we are very grateful for our readers who instantly welcomed Small Science as a platform for accessing impactful scientific results. As a result, we find that each article has been downloaded nearly 1000 times on average in 2021. Unfortunately, it was rather difficult to engage with the community in person as many conferences had to be cancelled or postponed last year. In order to find an alternative, in November, Small Science hosted a virtual symposium entitled “Spotlights in Small Science” with more than 1800 individual participants worldwide. We are very honored that our Executive Editorial Board members Hideo Hosono, Vivian Yam, and Lei Jiang together with Takashi Kato, Damien Faivre, and Xinliang Feng shared their research insights and vision during this online symposium, making this a great and exceptional event. With in-person meetings still a while away we are currently planning another exciting online event in collaboration with our sister journal Advanced Science in March. Stay tuned for more details. Our highly renowned Executive Advisory Board has been and will be a tremendous and essential support. In the future, Small Science’s Executive Advisory Board will be accompanied by a topically and geographically diverse International Advisory Board of leading scientists who reflect the active nature of this vibrant community: Jong-Beom Baek, Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology, Republic of Korea Megan Butala, University of Florida, USA Chunying Chen, National Center for Nanoscience and Technology, China Antonio Facchetti, Northwestern University, USA Damien Faivre, Bioscience and Biotechnology Institute of Aix-Marseille, France Cristina Flors, Instituto IMDEA Nanociencia, Spain Shaojun Guo, Peking University, China Jennifer Ann Hollingsworth, Los Alamos National Laboratory, USA Yuri Kivshar, Australia National University, Australia Petra Mela, Technical University Munich, Germany Salvador Pané i Vidal, ETH Zürich, Switzerland Arri Priimägi, Tampere University, Finland Jinyao Tang, University of Hongkong, China Zhiyong Tang, National Center for Nanoscience and Technology, China Krasimir Vasilev, University of South Australia, Australia Ajayan Vinu, University of Newcastle, Australia Joerg G. Werner, Boston University, USA Zhichuan J. Xu, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore Xingchen Ye, Indiana University, USA Yan Yu, University of Science and Technology of China, China In 2021, the whole Small-family has seen an all-time high in submissions as well as published manuscripts. Naturally, this is to be expected for young and evolving journals like Small Science and its sister journal Small Structures which was launched just a few months earlier. However, the same trend is also observed for the established sister journal Small Methods and the eminent “mother journal” Small. Moreover, the number of authors who chose to publish their research under an Open Access license in our hybrid sister journals has never been higher. We consider this a strong confirmation that our Gold Open Access journal Small Science is best placed to address the community's demand for rapid publication of top-quality research reaching as broad an audience as possible. Strongly encouraged by this inaugural year, we are looking forward to a prosperous future working closely with our readers, reviewers, authors, and Advisory Board members. We are committed to continuous improvement and to publish the next exciting volume of fascinating research in Small Science. We wish you all a happy and healthy year 2022! On behalf of the whole team, Ulf Scheffler (Editor-in-Chief)