I. Directions of Laboratory’s work and current projects

1. Analysis of Russian and international ways and methods of electronic publishing of scientific information, problems of iteration of data processing and presentation of scientific results. Laboratory provides efficient collaboration with international organizations, playing the key part in this domain, in particular, with ICSU, UNESCO, AGU etc.

2. Development of specialized programs for data processing and online electronic publications, creation and support of electronic publications’ servers and specialized information systems.

3. Publication of two scientific journals in English:
- International Journal of Geomagnetism and Aeronomy (according to the agreement between AGU and GC RAS) http://www.agu.org/journals/gi/ and http://elpub.wdcb.ru/journals/ijga/;
- Russian Journal of Earth Sciences (to the agreement between the journal’s editorial board and AGU) http://elpub.wdcb.ru/journals/rjes/ and http://www.agu.org/WPS/rjes/.

The work’s technical part is financed by AGU in the framework of the CRDF (US Civilian Research & Development Foundation) Grant Assistant Program.

4. Actualization and support of the ICSU Navigator for Primary Scientific Publication for Earth sciences, developed by the laboratory in cooperation with BEN RAS Library at the initiative and with financial support of ICSU Press.

5. In relation to GC RAS joining the PILA (Publishers International Linking Association) and its participation in CrossRef (http://www.crossref.org) the work has started aimed at translation of published materials and accompanying metadata into formats, compatible with CrossRef specifications.

II . Main achievements

1. On the basis of the accomplished scientific-technical work the laboratory in 1996 started publishing electronic versions of English translations of the five Russian geophysical magazines. It was a first in Russia and one of the first in the world successful projects of translating scientific publications into electronic format with online access - http://eos.wdcb.ru/transl/.

2. According to the request of the organizing committees of the first (1996) and second (2001) Conferences of experts of UNESCO and ICSU on electronic publications for science the laboratory has prepared online publications of the conferences materials: http://eos.wdcb.ru/eps1/ and http://eos.wdcb.ru/eps2/. The versions of these sites on laser disks are included into UNESCO and ICSU depositaries.

3. Developed by the laboratory ICSU Navigator from the starting point of its use in 2000 has the highest rating of the search system Google at searching in category "primary scientific publications", comprising over 22 mln of documents.

4. Modern technologies of electronic publications can significantly improve the process of presenting scientific results, due to a use of multimedia methods. Demonstration pages for authors, developed by the laboratory mainly according to the materials of the Russian journal of Earth Sciences - http://elpub.wdcb.ru/journals/rjes/demo.htm) were highly appreciated and recommended for wide use by AGU.

5. Laboratory publishes a Scientific journal – “Herald of Earth Sciences Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences” “Vestnik ONZ RAS” in electronic multimedia journal format from September 2009 (http://onznews.wdcb.ru/). The journal is published by GC RAS, news being renewed every month.

Scientific Activity

A new original set of software for scientific online publications was developed in 2004-2005, providing the generation of online version as the main version for long-time storage (version of record), and compatibility with XML schemes of bibliographic databases of CrossRef (http://www.crossref.org) and AGU (http://www.agu.org).

The scientists of the laboratory took an active part in developing one of the basis documents of ICSU - “Scientific Data and Information. A report of the CSPR Assessment Panel”.

The electronic publications’ database is constantly augmented, and the demonstration pages for authors on integration of multimedia components into online publications (mainly according to the materials of the Russian journal of Earth Sciences - http://elpub.wdcb.ru/journals/rjes/demo.htm), which, in particular, were recommended for wide use by AGU, are being developed.