The American Meteorological Society is excited to announce the launch of a new journal for short-form articles. To be launched early in 2027, this yet-to-be-named journal will publish high-quality, concise, self-contained technical papers. It will leverage the reputation of AMS publications for rigorous peer review as well as the expertise of AMS as a lead authority in the weather, water, and climate (WWC) community. It will be broad in scope, covering all AMS topical areas, including some that fall in gaps within the current suite of AMS technical journals.
As AMS begins its search for an editor-in-chief to shape this new journal’s editorial direction and board, AMS Publications Commissioner Walt Robinson shares insight into the decision to launch the new journal, describing the strategic initiative to deliver timely, reliable science to communities worldwide.
Headlines: Why is AMS launching a short-form journal?
Robinson: Researchers like to write short articles when they’ve found something new – a cool, stand-alone result – that they want to share with their communities. It could be that they plan to build and elaborate on it but aren’t there yet, or it could be that the implications aren’t clear and they want to open it to the community to try to figure it out. Either way, a short article says, ‘Look at this neat thing I’ve found! Here’s what I think it might mean. What do you think?’ Short articles offer a measure of timeliness. These short-form articles take less time to write than a traditional long paper, allowing new findings to ‘hit the street’ sooner. Additionally, researchers, and those who use results of research in their work, like to read short articles because they provide access to exciting and timely new findings. In less than an hour, they provide the opportunity to learn something that is interesting and, importantly, may impact one´s own research or professional practice.
Headlines: What will this new journal offer the weather, water, and climate community, and what gap does it fill in AMS’s existing portfolio?
Robinson: The weather, water, and climate community is already writing and reading papers in short-form journals, but those that exist are broader than the WWC enterprise—all of geoscience, for example—while, at the same time, excluding some of what we do, especially on the operational side. This indicates there is space for an AMS WWC-focused short-form journal. My hope is that everyone in our community will scan its table of contents now and then, and, when they do, they will find one or two papers they want to read (and, since they’re short, they’ll actually read them!). This journal will build on the superb reputation of our existing suite of journals, notably our amazing community of peer reviewers. Authors and readers alike will benefit from the rigorous review of papers in the journal by experts in their content area, and, based on our experience across our journals, we are confident we will recruit a distinguished editorial board to handle the review process, with, of course, great support from AMS’s highly professional Publications staff.
Headlines: What motivated the Publications Commission to launch the new journal right now?
Robinson: Timing of this new short-form journal is a response to an ongoing process rather than a reaction to current events. The AMS Publications Commission has been talking about possible venues for short-form articles for years, especially since we ended the expedited contribution article type several years ago. What’s different now is that we have independent quantitative market research showing strong community interest, from authors and readers, in a short-form article journal. Also, it’s worth noting that most of the recent challenges have been in the U.S., and we anticipate and welcome submissions from around the world.
Headlines: The new journal will span the AMS disciplines; how will it provide a “home” for some that don’t necessarily fit into existing AMS journals, such as climate services, meteorological operations, or atmospheric chemistry?
Robinson: This new short-form journal aims to publish timely results in these ‘gap’ areas. Imagine a group has new observations of impacts from a wildfire smoke plume. A short paper on this would get them in front of a broad, potentially interested WWC community, including individuals, such as operational meteorologists, who might never look at [longer-form specialty journals in this topic area]. Other hypothetical examples might include analysis of the performance of a new version of a numerical weather prediction model in a severe flooding event, or soil moisture observations during a recent flash drought episode.
Headlines: Building a standalone journal from scratch is a rare opportunity. What key qualities, vision, or leadership style are you looking for in the inaugural editor-in-chief?
Robinson: The new journal’s editor-in-chief (EiC) will have a unique opportunity to build the journal and make a lasting contribution to AMS and the WWC enterprise. The editor-in-chief will have the opportunity to develop many details about the new journal, in collaboration with the editorial board, which the EiC will have a leading role recruiting. It has to be someone who is really excited by this project. We need someone with broad familiarity of what goes on across WWC research and operations and with an open-minded appreciation of those elements they know less about. It will be helpful, in recruiting editors and then soliciting manuscripts, if they are well known and well respected, with a history of engagement with AMS constituencies, especially in the publications space. As for leadership style, this project will succeed only as a collaboration — with the editorial board, obviously, but also among the Publications Commission, AMS publications staff, and AMS leadership. This points to someone who listens well and is open to good ideas, whatever their source.
Read about the Editor-in-Chief role and apply or nominate someone for the position by 18 September. Stay tuned for additional opportunities to learn more about the short-form journal at the AMS Annual Meeting in Denver, 10–14 January 2027.
