Editorial

The priority of the Société Botanique de France is to contribute to the progress of both fundamental and applied botany. The international journal Botany Letters (formerly known as Acta Botanica Gallica and Bulletin de la Société Botanique de France) launched in 1854 and published on behalf of this learned society, is an outstanding medium for promoting such scientific progress. We do not charge Article Processing Charges (APCs) for ordinary submissions, depend on the volunteer work of our editors and reviewers, and encourage submissions from early-career researchers from all over the world.

In 2023, our journal has received a total of 239 manuscripts submitted, with an acceptance rate of 20% resulting in 52 articles (including editorials, original research articles, reviews, or research notes) published online shortly after acceptance (two weeks average). The manuscripts are examined within five days average from submission and either rejected immediately with recommendations (re-submit a thoroughly revised version of the manuscript or submit the article to a more suitable journal) or forwarded to one of our editors and reviewed by two or three experts within 5 weeks average. Our journal is now ranking 148/264 (Journal Citation Indicator) in the Plant Sciences-SCIE JCR¹ category, and the impact factor has been stable since 2021 (1.5). We wish to thank all the authors that help us make our journal a steady reference in botany in the broad sense, and of course our readers.

Fifty-two articles have been published in the past year in Volume 170, covering fields as diverse as systematics and taxonomy, history of botany, ecology, ethnobotany, genetics, physiology, anatomy and morphology, and paleobotany. Three of the four issues contained special article collections. In the first issue, a collection of seven articles organized by our editor Sylvie Baudino and the guest editor Jean-Claude Caissard were dedicated to plants and perfumes, viewed by 1320 readers. The second issue contained the continuation of an article collection initiated in the fourth issue of Volume 169 in 2022, dedicated to paleobotany. This successful collection, gathering 16 articles totalizing 6705 views and 25 citations, was orchestrated by our editor Christine Strullu-Derrien and two guest editors, Thomas Servais and Paul Kenrick. The third article collection was co-organized by the guest editor Yohan Pillon, Sandrine Isnard and Lydiane Mattio, and consisted of 12 articles dedicated to the floral of New Caledonia. It has to be noted that three of these articles are adapted from the PhD thesis of Tanguy Jaffré, originally published in French in 1980. The financial support from the Société Botanique de France for the translation in English has made it accessible for the first time to international readers. This article collection has already received 2093 views and 27 citations. The four most viewed articles belong to these collections (Strullu-Derrien et al. (2023), Strullu-Derrien, Servais end Kenrick (2023), Pillon et al. (2023), and Kheloul et al. (2023)). Our warmest thanks go to the editors and authors of these three article collections for their invaluable and much appreciated contributions to our journal.

The year 2024 will be the opportunity to shed light on photosynthetic microorganisms, with a special article collection dedicated to ecology of glacier microalgae facing global changes, and another one dedicated to the proceedings of the last ADLaf meeting, which took place in September 2023. ADLaf stands for “Association des Diatomistes de Langue Française”, which is the French-speaking society dedicated to diatom science (http://www.adlaf.fr).

In addition to our proficient editors, the success of Botany Letters relies also very much on the major contribution of the many experts, anonymous for most of them, who help us select the best articles and help the authors improve their manuscripts. On behalf of the Société Botanique de France, we wish to warmly thank them all for their contribution in 2023. The list of experts is published as an online-only document on the website of Botany Letters (https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/tabg21/current). Those who need a certificate to testify to this activity may contact Sara Ceci ([email protected]) to obtain a reviewer certificate from Taylor & Francis.

The Jussieu prize

To support research in botany, Botany Letters and the Société Botanique de France award every year a prize of 5000 euros to the best article published during the previous year. For 2023, the Jussieu prize has been awarded to the article “How much do we know and how much do we care about genetic diversity of threatened plants? A case study from the French flora” (Ducrettet et al. 2023). By examining 25 threatened plant species, this study reveals that threatened species in France have on average a lower within-population genetic diversity than non-threatened controls and thus are exposed to risks linked to genetic erosion. Based on this result, the authors provide guidelines to collect biological traits impacting within-population genetic diversity, and specific recommendations for a better incorporation of population genetic concepts into conservation actions. Our warmest thanks and congratulations to the authors for their contribution to Botany Letters.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. SCIE: Science Citation Index Expanded; JCR: Journal Citation Reports. For more information on the journal metrics see here: BotanyLetters journal metrics (tandfonline.com).