September 1, 2007 (Vol. 27, No. 15)
URL:
http://www.modernmicroscopy.com/main.asp
Rating:
Strong Points: Interesting and free
Weak Points: Not peer reviewed
Summary:
Another approach (and a slightly more traditional one) to communicating information about the subject of microscopy is that taken by the Modern Microscopy journal. The effort is not a staid, old library shelf publication, however. Rather, it is an online publication and it appears to be a good one. Published by The McCrone Group in Westmont, IL, Modern Microscopy has been in existence since 2003 and, of concern, the number of articles it has published has been decreasing since day one. For example, there were five listed in 2003, four in 2004, three in 2005, one in 2006, and none yet in 2007. Yikes! Numbers, of course, don’t mean anything if the quality of article is not high. I’m not a microscopist, so I am not a good person to comment on that. I will note, however, that the reviewers of the journal appear to be in The McCrone Group, making this something less than a peer-reviewed journal. Is Modern Microscopy worth saving? I’ll let you be the judge.