Over its almost 20 years, Stem Cell Reviews and Reports (SCRR), has become one of the most-read stem cell and regenerative medicine-focused journals. Thanks to the excellent work of our Section Editors, Editorial Board members, and dedicated reviewers, our most recent 2022 impact factor (IF) is 4.8 representing 1627 citations in 2022 to the 337 citable items published in 2020 & 2021. Moreover, SpringerNature signed DORA in 2020, agreeing to consider multiple metrics of journals and research quality beyond the Impact Factor. The Scopus’ CiteScore for 2023, counts the citations received in 2019–2022 (4,441) to documents published in 2019–2022 (502). Based on these numbers, the 2023 CiteScore for SCRR is 8.8! And, our full text article downloads in 2023 soared to over 700,000! Our acceptance rate has been rather stable at around 25% - for close to 700 submissions this year.

Our journal is open to scientific progress, to new and challenging ideas as well as to controversies in the field. Paradigms in science change with time and, as Albert Einstein stated, “Blind belief in authority is the greatest enemy of truth” and Max Planck said, “One rule is important in science—only courageous people win”. Within stem cell biology, there is still a lot of work to be done to understand this fascinating cell system and courageous young investigators who challenge dogmas are welcome. In pursuing scientific truth another famous saying from Albert Einstein is that “Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new” and from Maria Sklodowska-Curie “I was taught that the way of progress is neither swift nor easy”. Therefore, we encourage scientists to submit their best work to help our journal grow to become the leading journal in stem cell research and regenerative medicine.

Taking into consideration the increasing number of papers submitted to SCRR, we are pleased to announce a re-structuring of the Sections and the addition of several new Section Editors. In addition to maintaining our well-established sections and their Editors, starting with the January 2024 issue, we will feature these new Section Editors and a new section in Dentistry:

Stem Cell Trafficking- Prof. Xinxin Huang, Fudan University, Shanghai, China

Adult Stem Cells and Tissue Regeneration - Prof. Hai-jie Wang, PhD, Fudan University, Shanghai, China

Transcriptomics and Stem Cells- Prof. Yasuhiro Murakawa, RIKEN Center for Life Science Technologies, Yokohama, Kanagawa, Japan

Stem Cells in Dentistry - Prof. Sibel Yıldırım, Bilecik Seyh Edebali University, Turkey

We must also thank and say ‘Farewell’ to three dedicated section editors who performed excellent work -- Professor Lou Pelus, Professor Igor Nasonin, and Professor. Ed Scott. However, we are pleased to announce that Professors Nasonkin and Scott have agreed to remain as valuable Editorial Board members.

We would like also to welcome two new Editorial Board members including Prof. Claudiana Lameu from the University of Sao Paulo, and Prof. Katarzyna Brzezniakiewicz-Janus from the University of Zielona Gora, Poland.

We are living in very exciting times of researching stem cells and their potential applications in the clinic. Regenerative medicine is still looking for a pluripotent/multipotent stem cell able to differentiate across germ layers and to be safely employed in therapy. Therefore, more work is needed in this promising area. We need to better understand the molecular mechanisms involved in regulating stem cell pluripotency and differentiation. Evidence indicates that non-coding mRNA and miRNA are substantial components of regulatory networks in early stem cell development. We also need to explore in adult tissues some very rare early development stem cells whose presence is postulated by several investigators.

Going forward, Stem Cell Reviews and Reports will continue to publish the latest discoveries and entertain challenging and provocative ideas. Therefore, we encourage you to submit your best work for our consideration, as we continue towards establishing our journal as the leading journal in stem cell research.