SI correspondent Gary Taubes discusses the citation record of Nutrition Reviews with Dr. Irwin Rosenberg, the journal’s editor. Nutrition Reviews, which was first published in 1942, covers issues of nutrition and policy on an international scale. In a recent analysis by ESI comparing the former and latter halves of the decade 1991-2000, Nutrition Reviews had the most improved standing among Agricultural Science journals as measured by the percentages of increased citations and citations per paper (impact). According to current ESI data, Nutrition Reviews is ranked at # 21 of journals in its field, with 7,115 citations. In addition to his responsibilities for Nutrition Reviews, Dr. Rosenberg is the director of the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University in Boston, Massachusetts.

How long have you been editing Nutrition Reviews, and what prompted you to take on the assignment?

I have been editor since 1989. I had always been an admirer of the journal. It clearly was a widely read review journal, probably the most widely used in the field. I had done some writing for the journal in earlier years, and I was persuaded that both the national and international stature and readership of the journal were such that it really could have an impact on education and science and even policy in nutrition.

How would you account for the increased citation rate of Nutrition Reviews?

I have to preface this by saying I really don't have any basis to make a judgment on this. But I would guess that if the citation rate has been increasing, it's because of our efforts to make the brief critical reviews we publish highly relevant to the emerging edge of, not only nutrition science, but also the broader area of the biomedical sciences. Some of these have been seminal, at the cutting edge of the field. We've also added two new features: one, on the interface between science and policy; the other is what we call "Nutrition Grand Rounds." These are places in which nutrition science and clinical care come together and can be used by everyone from researchers and professionals to practitioners and teachers. I suppose we've made progress by aggressively pursuing a policy of being highly current and highly selective of topics that are relevant to the field of nutrition and the broader community. Clearly, I think we would not have increased citations that much if the journal was only of interest to a selected community of readers in nutrition. This suggests we're reaching a broader community in the biomedical sciences and even food policy.

Were there specific changes in policy or editorial direction that might also account for the increased citation rate?

It wouldn't be fair to say that there has been any major shift in our policy—as would be the case, for instance, if we had shifted from a position that was less critical of government regulation to one that was highly critical. One thing we've done, however, is recognize that there are documents and reports published that are important in food and nutrition policy, both at a national and international level. We have tried to identify those reports, to make reference to them, to review them, and to sometimes comment upon them as early as possible after their release, and sometimes even simultaneous with their release. That way the importance of these policy documents can be brought to our readership in a way that they can use them for their own science and practice and writing and teaching and so forth.

Another thing we've done is try to keep abreast—using our rather extensive network of contributing editors, as well as colleagues at Tufts and throughout the International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI) system—of developments that might lead to regulatory action and, when appropriate, put forth the relevant issues of science and policy for our readers to consider. In some cases, we've worked in almost formal conjunction with either the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences or other divisions of the federal government, who were in the process of putting policy documents out there for discussion. In those cases, we helped to disseminate some of the information and stimulate people to be involved in the discussions. On occasion, the Food and Drug Administration will put out tentative rulings or recommendations that have a time period for response and we might try to encourage our readership to consider the scientific issues and make some of their views known in the rule-making process. We haven't done nearly as much of that as I think we might have, but nonetheless, that probably has introduced a certain amount of attention and perhaps excitement.

Have there been specific developments in the fields served by your journal that may have contributed?

Well, the field of nutrition certainly receives more attention than ever, although, I'm still not satisfied with the extent to which nutrition is becoming a mainstream part of medical sciences or practice. The evolution of nutrition science, along with the whole of biological sciences, has been really dramatic and exciting to the point that we're now getting into the high gear of applying the exploding sciences of genetics and molecular biology to the study of diets and other aspects of the environment on health. In a sense, nutrition has grown and exploded along with these other biomedical sciences, and I'd like to think we have tried to capture that growth in our editorial policy.

How do you see your fields evolving in the next few years?

I think, as with almost all journals relating to biomedicine, we are going to be seeing this increasing impact of our knowledge about the human genome and how that affects our understanding of disease and health. That, combined with population studies and basic science, will also lead to increased understanding of how nutrients and genes interact to have certain outcomes with respect to health or disease, risk or prevention. The other thing I see is new developments in how we're using nutrition science to influence policy, with regard to feeding the growing world's population, the potential impact of biotech, and considerations about food safety. I hope that we see even more discussion of equity considerations about food security and insecurity at the international level. These are the kinds of developments we are going to have to be concerned with at both a science and policy level, and I hope our journal can help to capture some of that as we go forward.

There's one other change I foresee regarding Nutrition Reviews specifically: we now have two foreign-language versions of the journal. For a few years already we have had a Japanese version and we're just now starting a Spanish-language version. Both are quarterly. I think we may very well be publishing other language versions in the future.

What do you consider the primary role of your journal?

As the most widely read review journal, I see Nutrition Reviews as an important resource, specifically for teachers at both the graduate and even undergraduate level. It's such a ready collection of information about current knowledge in nutrition. I think it will continue to stimulate and capture new readers by publishing very thoughtful and critical reviews. I think it will continue to target very current information in the shorter brief critical reviews that will bring to our readership not only some sense of what's going on in the world of nutrition science, but information from which they, as investigators, can benefit.

Finally, I hope that it will continue to stimulate discussion and questioning on the role of nutrition in formulating policy and how well the science is being put to the task.

What are the greatest challenges for publishing in the nutrition field?

One great challenge stems from the popularity of nutrition issues in the lay press. There is an awful lot being written on the subject, not all of it in the scientific literature. Much of it is in the popular literature and this continuously stimulates interest. So our challenge is to make sure that the articles we are publishing really represent the best kind of science and not just popular trends. And we still have to recognize that, even though we're not publishing for the lay public, we do have a broad readership. We have to be cognizant of their interests while simultaneously assuring that our standards for publishing scientific reviews remain the highest.

What are the significant controversies that are now affecting your journal or field and that you feel need special attention in your journal?

For starters, there is question of the relationship between diet, nutrients, human development, and disease. How much of this must be understood in terms of dietary change and the content of diets? How much must be understood in terms of a need for specific nutrient supplementation such as can be accomplished by fortification or targeted supplementation? Another controversy is about how much of the evolution of diseases, including the question of how we age, can be explained by biologic considerations that are innate and how much can be influenced by better diets and nutritional patterns. There is also the question of how much can we manipulate the food supply, both biotechnologically and otherwise, without having negative impacts on the environment. There are some trade-offs there of real concern. Finally, another major consideration and source of controversy is how to approach the problem of the misdistribution of food and resources in a globe that is getting smaller and smaller.

What one message would you like to convey to the general public about this journal’s work?

I guess it would be the message that by doing our job as effectively as possible in contributing to the education and scientific discourse among nutrition professionals and medical-care professionals, we will be making an important contribution to the process of giving people better health and better lives through better nutrition.

Did you expect this journal to become highly cited, or is this surprising to you?

It was a pleasant surprise. We hadn't been tracking our citations as we might have. I have had a strong impression from national and international travel that the journal is widely read, even more so than we can necessarily measure in subscriptions. So I was very pleased to see this impression confirmed. Increasing citations means the journal is really having an impact on both the writing and thinking in nutrition research and education.

Nutrition Reviews
Irwin H. Rosenberg, MD, Editor
International Life Sciences Institute, Publisher