Announcements

Our portfolio of journals available for publishing up-to-date research in immediate open access format has been further expanded. In June 2026, eleven new journals released their inaugural issues and two transferred journals released their first issue as part of MDPI, covering the subjects of environmental & earth sciences, chemistry & materials science, public health & healthcare, engineering, medicine & pharmacology, and biology & life sciences. 

We extend our gratitude to the Editors-in-Chief, Associate Editors, and Editorial Board Members who will shape the future course of these new journals. Each journal is dedicated to upholding strong editorial standards through a thorough peer review process, enabling impactful open access scholarship. 

Please feel free to browse and discover more about the new journals below. 

We would like to thank everyone who has supported the development of open access publishing. If you would like to create a new journal, you are welcome to send an application here or contact the New Journal Committee (newjournal-committee@mdpi.com).

Peer review is the invisible foundation of academic progress. The 2025 MDPI Top Reviewers are some of the key experts who helped build it.

We are honored to recognize 1000 individuals from our global community of 210,000 reviewers across 67 countries and territories—chosen for their commitment to rigorous, constructive peer review and the consistency of their contributions throughout 2025.

The Top Reviewers provided constructive and impartial feedback that makes research stronger and more impactful, and we are grateful for it.

The names of these reviewers are listed below in alphabetical order by first name:

(Note: we respected all privacy preferences, with part of nominees opting for limited attribution.)

We are pleased to share a recent interview conducted with Dr. Claudio Ferrante, the winner of the Molecules 2025 Editor of Distinction Award.

The following is an interview with Dr. Claudio Ferrante:

1. Could you briefly introduce yourself and your current role as an editor for Molecules?

I am Claudio Ferrante, Associate Professor in Pharmaceutical Biology at the Department of Pharmacy of “G. d’Annunzio” University of Chieti-Pescara, Italy. My research focuses on medicinal plants and their applications as health-promoting agents. As an Editorial Board Member of Molecules, I support the peer review process and try to do my best to maintain the journal’s scientific quality.

2. How has your experience been as an editor for Molecules?

My experience has been very positive. I consider the role of editor to be among the most prestigious and distinguished activities for a university professor, especially when collaborating with a prestigious scientific journal such as Molecules.

3. What major changes have occurred in chemistry research trends in recent years?

My point of view in this field is obviously related to phytochemistry and to its role in the characterization of medicinal plants. In recent years, I observed a strong impulse toward metabolomic investigations that are often coupled with well-designed pharmacological studies for elucidating the mechanisms of actions underlying the efficacy of medicinal plants. I am sure that the journal Molecules has played a pivotal role in this field thanks to the excellent work done by both authors and all colleagues from the Editorial Board.

4. What key trends do you observe in publishing?

In line with what was previously stated, I believe that topics such as medicinal plants and natural products will continue to attract numerous contributions in the coming years. This is due to several factors, including the steady growth of the market for products derived from medicinal plants, as agents that promote health, and the development of new strategies for creating production chains based on sustainability and the circular economy.

5. What advice would you give to early-career researchers interested in editorial work?

I reiterate that, in my view, editorial work represents one of the most prestigious roles for a faculty member, as well as for early-career researchers. I advise young colleagues to dedicate part of their working time to this type of engagement: it is a fundamental milestone in an academic career, offering constant opportunities for self-improvement and for challenging oneself.

6. How do you think Molecules has evolved over the last 30 years?

It is difficult for me to express an opinion over 30 years of activity. However, today we can state with certainty that Molecules is a highly prestigious journal. In my view, this is due to professionalism, dedication, and enthusiasm of everyone who works on it.

In collaboration with the Green Science for Sustainable Development Foundation, Polymers (ISSN 2073-4360), Molecules (ISSN 1420-3049) and Chemistry (ISSN 2624-8549) are jointly hosting an academic publishing workshop designed to educate attendees on MDPI's paper publication process and the ecosystem surrounding open access publishing. The session will cover an introduction to not only Polymers, Molecules and Chemistry, but MDPI journals as a collective, delving into the editorial process to provide valuable insights and sharing essential skills for structuring papers. Additionally, participants will be instructed on methods to improve their scientific writing, with our expert speakers leading the way to ensure that attendees gain a thorough understanding of how to improve their work.

Date: 8 July 2026
Time: 14:30–15:00 CEST
Venue: Camplus Santa Marta Venice, Venice, Italy

Schedule:

Chair and Speakers:

Chair
	Prof. Dr. Francesco Trotta is a Full Professor of industrial chemistry at the Department of Chemistry of the University of Turin. From 2001 to 2015 he also was associate researcher to the Institute of Membrane Technology, National Research Council. He was a Visiting Professor in 2015 at Ian Duglosz University in Czestochowa (Poland). He was member of the Italian Chemical Society (SCI), president of the National Association of Chemistry and Technology of Cyclodextrins. (CD.TE.C) and vice president of the European Cyclodextrin Society. He is also part of the Italian Scientific Society (ISA) and cofounder of Green Sciences for Sustainable Development Foundation (Venice). He is a member of the Editorial Boards of Polymers, International Journal of Molecular Sciences, Pharmaceutical Sciences and Acta Scientific Pharmaceutical Sciences.
Speakers
	Dr. Haewon Song has a research background in organic chemistry and chemical biology. She obtained her chemistry degree from the University of Oxford and gained further research experience at a DNA synthesis company. In 2015, she moved to Switzerland to pursue a PhD at ETH Zurich. After completing her doctorate, she joined MDPI, where she currently works as the Senior Deputy Managing Editor for Molecules and Chemistry.
	Dr. Lucía Gallego Aibar has a research background in organic chemistry and supramolecular polymers. She holds a chemistry degree from the University of Zaragoza, a master’s degree in organic chemistry from the Autonomous University of Madrid and a PhD from the University of Zurich. She joined MDPI in 2024, where she currently works as Deputy Managing Editor for Polymers.

Conference: China Materials Conference 2026
Date: 12–15 July 2026
Location: Wuhan, China

The China Materials Conference 2026, the annual academic conference of the Chinese Materials Research Society, will take place from 12 to 15 July 2026 in Wuhan, China.

The 2026 conference will feature a wide range of thematic sessions covering key and emerging areas, including energy materials, information materials, advanced structural materials, functional materials and devices, biomedical materials, materials for daily life and transportation, environmental materials, safety materials, and “AI + materials”, among others.

MDPI will be attending this event as an exhibitor, welcoming researchers from diverse backgrounds to visit and share their latest ideas.

The following open access journals will be represented at this conference:

If you are planning to attend this conference, please feel free to start a conversation with us. Our delegates look forward to meeting you in person and answering any questions that you may have. For more information about this event, please visit https://cmc2026.scimeeting.cn/cn/web/index/35126.

Impact Factors measure how often articles in scientific journals are cited—specifically, the average number of citations received in a given year by articles published in that journal over the previous two years, as tracked in the Web of Science. For researchers, the number answers a practical question: how often is work published in this journal being picked up and built upon?

The metric is assigned to the journal as a whole, not to individual articles. A high Impact Factor tells you something useful about a journal's place in its field; it tells you less about any single paper within it.

For a complementary, article-level view, MDPI lists an Altmetric score on each article page. Where the Impact Factor tracks academic citations, the Altmetric score captures broader online attention: how an article is being shared, discussed, and referenced beyond the journal literature. Together, they offer two different ways of asking the same question: is this research reaching people?

With 2025 CiteScores from Scopus published a few weeks ago, Clarivate has now released this year's Journal Impact Factors in the Journal Citation Reports (JCR).

254 MDPI Journals Saw a Rise in Impact Factor

This year's JCR include 330 MDPI journals across a wide range of disciplines. Of these, 231 journals are placed in the top 50% (Q1 or Q2) of their respective subject categories, a result that spans fields as different as materials science, public health, environmental studies, and mathematics. 78 journals hold a top-quartile position (Q1), and 33 journals have a JIF of 5.0 or above.

• 330 journals earned a Journal Impact Factor (JIF)
• 29 journals earned a first JIF
• 254 journals had an increase in JIF
• 71% of ranked journals are in Q1 or Q2

For the full metrics on any MDPI journal, visit our Web of Science journals overview page or a journal's individual statistics page.

29 MDPI Journals Received Their First Journal Impact Factor

A first Impact Factor is a confirmation for an emerging journal. It marks the point at which a journal has been publishing long enough, and cited broadly enough, to enter the formal record of scientific influence. For the research communities those journals serve, it signals that the work being published is being read and built upon.

This year, 29 MDPI journals received a Journal Impact Factor for the first time, across a range of emerging and established research areas. Each represents years of editorial development and peer review—recognized in 2026 for the first time in the JCR.

This is also part of a longer shift in how science gets indexed. When the Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI) launched in 2016, 24 MDPI journals were included. By 2024 that number had grown to over 200, reflecting a broader change in the visibility of open access publishing within major citation tracking systems, not just at MDPI but across the sector.

Open Access with Impact

MDPI journals have received a total of 25.2 million citations in Web of Science. That figure matters less as a measure of MDPI's reach and more as a measure of what happens when research is freely available: it gets found, read, and used. Open access is only meaningful if the work actually travels and citations are one indicator that it does.

More than 4.6 million authors have published with MDPI. That breadth, across disciplines, institutions, and geographies, is what makes open access at this scale worth doing.

Thank You to the MDPI Scholarly Community

These results belong to the people who do the actual work: the Editors-in-Chief who set the standards, the Editorial Board Members and reviewers who hold them, and the authors who choose open access for their research. The numbers in the Journal Citation Reports are the downstream effect of decisions made at the desk, in the review, and at submission. Thank you for making them.

Data: 2025 Journal Impact Factors, Journal Citation Reports™ (Clarivate, 2026)

MDPI will be attending the 10th Tokyo Conference on Advanced Catalytic Science and Technology, from 18 to 23 August 2026, at Waseda University (Waseda Campus), Tokyo, Japan.

The conference provides an excellent opportunity for researchers interested in catalysis to exchange new ideas and explore the latest developments in the field.

We would be delighted to welcome you to our booth, where you can learn more about our journals and speak directly with our team. We will be exhibiting from 19 to 21 August.

The following MDPI journals will be represented:

• Molecules;
• Materials;
• Sustainable Chemistry;
• C;
• Chemistry;
• Physchem;
• Photochem;
• Biomass;
• Compounds;
• Inorganics;
• Catalysts;
• Surfaces;
• Reactions;
• Organics;
• Molbank;
• AppliedChem.

If you plan to attend the forum, we encourage you to visit our booth and speak with our representatives. We look forward to meeting you in person and answering your questions.

For more information, please visit the official website: TOCAT10.

Conference: The CRS 2026 Annual Meeting and Exposition
Date: 6–9 July 2026
Location: Lisbon, Portugal

This conference will be the 53rd annual conference of the Controlled Release Society. The annual CRS conference is the most important conference in the pharmaceutics field. The main topics of the conference include nanomedicine and nanoscale delivery, immuno delivery, oral delivery, skin and mucosal delivery, ocular delivery, bioengineering, gene delivery and gene editing, alternative methods to animal testing, long-acting drug delivery formulations, delivery to the nervous system, artificial intelligence, predictive models in pharmaceutical technologies, etc.

Pharmaceutics (ISSN 1999-4923) is a peer-reviewed, open access journal on the science and technology of pharmaceutics and biopharmaceutics and is published monthly online by MDPI. Pharmaceutics will participate in this event as an exhibitor together with twelve other MDPI journals.

The following open access journals from MDPI will be represented at the event:

• Pharmaceutics;
• Molecules;
• Biomedicines;
• Sci. Pharm.;
• JPM;
• Gels;
• Pharmacy;
• Immuno;
• Medicines;
• CIMB;
• Future Pharmacology;
• Pharmaceuticals;
• JPBI.

1. You have served as the Chair of the ECSOC conference since 2000, accompanying this conference for 26 years. As we reach this milestone of the 30th edition, what new breakthroughs do you hope this edition will bring while building on its traditions?

Over these years, we have seen a steady increase in the participation of researchers, especially from regions with limited resources to attend global events. This, combined with the fact that it is free of charge thanks to the support of MDPI and other organizations such as USC, has transformed it into an international resource.

2. Since its launch in 1997, ECSOC series conference has become the longest-running electronic conference in the world, always maintaining a completely free participation model. In your view, what irreplaceable qualities have nearly three decades of online operation brought to this conference?

It has demonstrated that in the world of science (in this case, chemistry), values such as altruism are still preserved (a large number of collaborators have participated in the scientific committees without compensation) and that it can be defined as a field without barriers.

3. ECSOC-30 covers a wide range of topics, including organic synthesis, medicinal and natural products chemistry, supramolecular chemistry, and physical organic chemistry. What do you see as the most exciting emerging frontiers in synthetic organic chemistry today?

As the name suggests, the conference aims to provide a global forum for exchanging advances and developments in synthetic organic chemistry without establishing defined limits to its scope. Supramolecular and materials chemistry are experiencing significant progress, but organic synthesis and medicinal or natural product chemistry, which constitute a very important foundation for the advancement of knowledge, should by no means be relegated to a secondary role.

4. With over four decades of academic research experience, you have achieved breakthroughs in the fields of sustainable chemistry and the synthesis of pharmaceutically active compounds. Based on this extensive academic career, what qualities do you think an outstanding researcher most needs? What is the single most important piece of advice you would share with today’s early career researchers?

Currently, I place more hope in good researchers whose work maintains a healthy foundation and a good substrate for outstanding researchers to emerge. Therefore, I can only recommend perseverance and dedication, as enthusiasm is presumed to be inherent in anyone embarking on a research career.

5. Do you believe the future of organic chemistry will rely increasingly on interdisciplinary collaboration? Which cross-disciplinary areas are particularly promising?

YES, the more specialized knowledge becomes, the more necessary collaboration between different areas becomes, and organic chemistry is a foundation and tool for many fields, from the various specialties of analytical, inorganic, and physical chemistry, to other disciplines such as biochemistry, pharmacology, clinical medicine, and industrial processes.

6. Could you share some of your past conference experiences? Did these conferences assist you in promoting your research results, expanding your network, finding potential collaborators, or advancing your career, etc.?

My participation in ECSOC has opened up opportunities for me to establish relationships with research groups from other countries, which have been very fruitful, subsequently allowing for the exchange of researchers in training.

7. If you could say just one sentence to a young researcher who is hesitating to submit a paper and attend the conference, what would you say? What do you most want them to know that they can gain from ECSOC-30?

Visit the website, browse through the content of our previous editions, and you’ll likely find that your findings fit within the ECSOC framework. Above all, don’t hesitate to contact other participants to exchange ideas. Remember, if there’s one thing that’s true in organic chemistry, it’s that “If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants,” as Newton wrote to Hooke in the 17th century.