Editorial Note

NIGERIAN JOURNAL OF LIFE SCIENCES GOES OPEN ACCESS

From the Editor-in-Chief

For every organization, there comes the time when it must embrace change for better performance, visibility and profitability. Since its inception, the Nigerian Journal of Life Sciences (NJLS) has published 10 volumes of high quality scientific manuscripts in hard copies. Access to these great publications has been by subscription, available only to a restricted audience. I pay tribute to the founding Editor-in-Chief, Professor Geofrey Obi Anoliefo and the immediate past Editor-in-Chief Professor Christopher E. Okaka and their editorial teams for successfully steering the affairs of the journal to its present level. Without gainsaying, we must admit that they made enormous sacrifices to keep the journal in production. The truth is that a lot goes on backstage that are privy only to the editorial team. It involves many hours of sieving through scores of manuscripts to select the best, in order to provide an interesting “reading menu” for the journal’s teeming subscribers. Often, it involves waiting patiently to get responses from reviewers, who are equally saddled with other responsibilities. In the mean time, the authors are anxious to know the fate of their manuscripts. Despite these challenges you ensured that each journal volume made it to the finishing line. I salute your commitment. As we move into this new phase, I count on your support and promise on behalf of the current editorial team, that the flag of NJLS will continue to be hoisted at full mast.

To the researchers that have chosen to publish with the Nigerian Journal of Life Sciences in the past, we say a big thank you and solicit your continued patronage. We also welcome on board new subscribers and promise to give you an exciting publishing experience. We use this medium to intimate you of the paradigm shift in our publication format. From volume 11, the Nigerian Journal of Life Sciences will become Open Access, making all published articles available to a wider reading audience, thereby showcasing the research efforts of researchers in life sciences and related disciplines. Open Access is the current trend and we must embrace it to achieve greater visibility and relevance. It is our goal to have this journal indexed by the relevant bodies in the shortest time possible. We have established a journal website to power this vision. To this end the journal will henceforth adopt the “continuous publication model” in which manuscripts are published immediately online as they are accepted, aiming still to publish two volumes per year.

We deeply appreciate the Dean, Faculty of Life Sciences, Professor Noghayin Jerry E. Orhue for his unflinching support toward actualising the new direction and thrust of the journal. I salute your visionary and innovative leadership.

Prof. Martins S.O. Aisien, Ph.D., FPPSN, FZSN
Editor-in-Chief
Past President: Parasitology and Public Health Society of Nigeria
Member: Amphibian Specialist Group, International Union for the
Conservation of Nature (IUCN)
ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7267-6734  
Research Gate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Martins Aisien