Sara Kate with her daughter Liora 4 years ago reading a JSST issue

Many readers of the Journal of Sol-Gel Science and Technology will be aware that for many years, the JSST Editors have been fortunate to work alongside Springer Nature Executive Editor Sara Kate Heukerott, who has been the Publisher’s Team Leader, Materials Science and Applied Physics Journals. It is with sadness that we have recently learned that Sara Kate will be stepping down from her role to pursue new challenges.

Sara Kate’s background and path into the world of publishing is intriguing and multidimensional. She studied at Harvard University, USA, gaining her first degree in Slavic Languages and Literature in 2008 with a minor in mathematics, together with several prizes and a role as the Editor-in-Chief of the Harvard Book Review. This was followed by studies at The University of Oxford, UK where she gained her M. Phil degree in Slavonic Studies with distinction in 2010. Her time at Oxford included a role as Fiction Editor for the Oxonian Review, thus sowing the seeds for her subsequent career in publishing.

Sara Kate joined Springer Nature in New York in November 2010 as Editorial Assistant (2010–2011). She subsequently served as an Assistant Editor (2012), Associate Editor (2013–2014), Editor (2014–2016), Senior Editor (2017–2019) and finally as Executive Editor from 2020 until now. During this period, she also became the founding publishing editor of two new scientific journals published by Springer. She assembled and led an editorial team based in the US and Europe and has managed a multimillion-dollar portfolio of publisher- and society-owned hybrid and open access journals in materials science, applied physics and astronomy.

For our journal, she also oversaw the launch of the very successful JSST Topical Collection series, the ISGS book program and in particular the 2nd edition of the Aerogels Handbook which should appear on the market very soon.

As JSST’s Editor-in-Chief, I have known Sara Kate since the beginning of her remarkable editorial work at Springer Nature. Our collaboration has always been excellent and rewarding and it has been a great pleasure to work with her practically every week over the past decade! On behalf of the JSST Editors and Editorial Board, I wish her all the best for the continuation of her highly successful publishing career as well as many wonderful years with her family (see picture). Hopefully, she will also take the opportunity to continue pursuing her many personal interests – baking, crocheting, hiking and ancient languages (Latin, Biblical Hebrew and Old Church Slavonic), among others.

Sara Kate’s role with our journal has been taken over by Jack Manzi, with whom the JSST Editors have also worked for some time. We welcome the opportunity to work more closely with him in the future as we continue to develop the Journal of Sol-Gel Science and Technology in support of the sol-gel community.

Michel A. Aegerter, JSST Editor-in-Chief

John Bartlett, Special Section Editor

Florence Babonneau, Yunfa Chen, Andrei Jitianu and Kazuki Nakanishi, Co-editors