PIXABAY, HOLDENTRILSThe scientific journal article—or “paper”—is 351 years old. Papers have had an incalculable impact on science, increasing collective engagement and the rate of knowledge dissemination.
In 1665, the Royal Society commissioned its secretary, Henry Oldenburg, to publish and edit the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society—arguably the first peer-reviewed scientific journal. Before then, scientific knowledge was disseminated through two approaches: oral communication or the publication of lengthy, esoteric books.
Journals filled the gap between these two extremes; they were a hybrid medium for scientific communication, offering both the sense of urgency conveyed by oral communication and the public recognition associated with book publication. The restructuring of scientific knowledge into periodical journals also led to the birth of the paper as the foundational unit in reporting new scientific findings.
In its original conception, the paper described a specific observation or experiment. The publication of papers in journals shortened the time between ...
