''Annalen der Physik'' (English: ''Annals of Physics'') is one of the oldest

scientific journal In academic publishing, a scientific journal is a periodical publication designed to further the progress of science by disseminating new research findings to the scientific community. These journals serve as a platform for researchers, schola ...

s on

physics Physics is the scientific study of matter, its Elementary particle, fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge whi ...

; it has been published since 1799. The journal publishes original,

peer-reviewed Peer review is the evaluation of work by one or more people with similar competencies as the producers of the work ( peers). It functions as a form of self-regulation by qualified members of a profession within the relevant field. Peer review ...

papers on

experimental An experiment is a procedure carried out to support or refute a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of something previously untried. Experiments provide insight into cause-and-effect by demonstrating what outcome occurs whe ...

, theoretical, applied, and

mathematical physics Mathematical physics is the development of mathematics, mathematical methods for application to problems in physics. The ''Journal of Mathematical Physics'' defines the field as "the application of mathematics to problems in physics and the de ...

and related areas. The

editor-in-chief An editor-in-chief (EIC), also known as lead editor or chief editor, is a publication's editorial leader who has final responsibility for its operations and policies. The editor-in-chief heads all departments of the organization and is held accoun ...

is Stefan Hildebrandt. Prior to 2008, its ISO 4 abbreviation was ''Ann. Phys. (Leipzig)'', after 2008 it became ''Ann. Phys. (Berl.)''. The journal is the successor to , published from 1790 until 1794, and ', published from 1795 until 1797. The journal has been published under a variety of names (', ', ', ''Wiedemann's Annalen der Physik und Chemie'') during its history.

History

Originally, was published in German, then a leading scientific language. From the 1950s to the 1980s, the journal published in both German and English. Initially, only foreign authors contributed articles in English but from the 1970s German-speaking authors increasingly wrote in English in order to reach an international audience. After the

German reunification German reunification () was the process of re-establishing Germany as a single sovereign state, which began on 9 November 1989 and culminated on 3 October 1990 with the dissolution of the East Germany, German Democratic Republic and the int ...

in 1990, English became the only language of the journal. The importance of unquestionably peaked in 1905 with

Albert Einstein Albert Einstein (14 March 187918 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist who is best known for developing the theory of relativity. Einstein also made important contributions to quantum mechanics. His mass–energy equivalence f ...

's Annus Mirabilis papers. In the 1920s, the journal lost ground to the concurrent '' Zeitschrift für Physik''. With the 1933 emigration wave, German-language journals lost many of their best authors. During

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German Reich, German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a Totalit ...

, it was considered to represent "the more conservative elements within the German physics community", alongside '' Physikalische Zeitschrift''. Between 1944 and 1946 publication ceased due to

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. Granted permission to restart by Soviet military authorities in August 1946, the journal subsequently maintained a policy until 1992 of co-editorship by one person from East Germany and one from West Germany. After German reunification, the journal was acquired by

Wiley-VCH Wiley-VCH is a German publisher owned by John Wiley & Sons. It was founded in 1921 as Verlag Chemie (meaning "Chemistry Press": VCH stands for ''Verlag Chemie'') by two German learned societies A learned society ( ; also scholarly, intellect ...

. A relaunch of the journal with new editor and new contents was announced for 2012. As a result of the 2012 relaunch, changed scope and updated the membership of the editorial board.

Editors

The early editors-in-chief were: * Friedrich Albrecht Carl Gren (1790–1797) (as and ) * Ludwig Wilhelm Gilbert (1799–1824) (as and ) *

Johann Christian Poggendorff Johann Christian Poggendorff (29 December 1796 – 24 January 1877) was a German physicist born in Hamburg. By far the greater and more important part of his work related to electricity and magnetism. Poggendorff is known for his electrostatic mo ...

(1824–1876) (as ) * Gustav Heinrich Wiedemann (1877–1899) (as ) * Paul Karl Ludwig Drude (1900–1906) (as ) With each editor, the numbering of volumes restarted from 1 (co-existent with a continuous numbering, a perpetual source of confusion). The journal was often referred to by the editor's name: ''Gilberts Annalen'', ''Poggendorfs Annalen'', ''Wiedemanns Annalen'' and so on, or for short ''Pogg. Ann.'', ''Wied. Ann.'' After Drude, the work was divided between two editors: experimentalists Wilhelm Wien (1907–1928) and Eduard Grüneisen (1929–1949) and theoretician

Max Planck Max Karl Ernst Ludwig Planck (; ; 23 April 1858 – 4 October 1947) was a German Theoretical physics, theoretical physicist whose discovery of energy quantum, quanta won him the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1918. Planck made many substantial con ...

(1907–1943, who had been associate editor from 1895). In these times, peer-review was not yet standard. Einstein, for example, just sent his manuscripts to Planck, who then published them.

Notable published works

Some of the most famous papers published in ''Annalen der Physik'' were: * on solving for the currents in an

electronic circuit An electronic circuit is composed of individual electronic components, such as resistors, transistors, capacitors, inductors and diodes, connected by conductive wires or Conductive trace, traces through which electric current can flow. It is a t ...

Gustav Kirchhoff Gustav Robert Kirchhoff (; 12 March 1824 – 17 October 1887) was a German chemist, mathematician, physicist, and spectroscopist who contributed to the fundamental understanding of electrical circuits, spectroscopy and the emission of black-body ...

(1847), * on stretched exponential relaxation by Rudolf Kohlrausch (1854), * on stretched exponential relaxation by Friedrich Kohlrausch (1863,1876), * on the

photoelectric effect The photoelectric effect is the emission of electrons from a material caused by electromagnetic radiation such as ultraviolet light. Electrons emitted in this manner are called photoelectrons. The phenomenon is studied in condensed matter physi ...

Heinrich Hertz Heinrich Rudolf Hertz (; ; 22 February 1857 – 1 January 1894) was a German physicist who first conclusively proved the existence of the electromagnetic waves predicted by James Clerk Maxwell's equations of electromagnetism. Biography Heinri ...

(1887), * on the theory of blackbody radiation by

(1901), * on capillarity by

(1901), * the Annus Mirabilis papers by Albert Einstein on

photon A photon () is an elementary particle that is a quantum of the electromagnetic field, including electromagnetic radiation such as light and radio waves, and the force carrier for the electromagnetic force. Photons are massless particles that can ...

s, on Brownian motion, on

mass–energy equivalence In physics, mass–energy equivalence is the relationship between mass and energy in a system's rest frame. The two differ only by a multiplicative constant and the units of measurement. The principle is described by the physicist Albert Einstei ...

, and on the special theory of relativity, (1905) * on the heat capacities of solids with quantized energy levels by Einstein (1907), * on molecular motion near

absolute zero Absolute zero is the lowest possible temperature, a state at which a system's internal energy, and in ideal cases entropy, reach their minimum values. The absolute zero is defined as 0 K on the Kelvin scale, equivalent to −273.15 ° ...

by Einstein and Otto Stern (1913), * on the general theory of relativity by Einstein (1916)

Abstracting and indexing

The journal is abstracted and indexed in: According to the ''

Journal Citation Reports ''Journal Citation Reports'' (''JCR'') is an annual publication by Clarivate. It has been integrated with the Web of Science and is accessed from the Web of Science Core Collection. It provides information about academic journals in the natur ...

'', the journal has a 2015

impact factor The impact factor (IF) or journal impact factor (JIF) of an academic journal is a type of journal ranking. Journals with higher impact factor values are considered more prestigious or important within their field. The Impact Factor of a journa ...

of 3.443, ranking it 11th out of 79 journals in the category "Physics Multidisciplinary".

References

External links