According to the 2019 Journal Citation Reports (JCR) updated by Clarivate on June 29th, the International Journal of Minerals, Metallurgy and Materials   (IJMMM), sponsored by USTB, has seen new growth. Its impact factor increased to 1.713, up 40.3% from the previous year. In the field of metallurgy and metallurgical engineering, the ranking began in Q2, with 2,313 citations in total with a year-over-year increase of 29.7%. Additionally, in the 2019 CiteScore released by Elsevier on June 23th, IJMMM scored 2.6 points, ranking 43rd in 152 journals on materials science, metals and alloys.  

IJMMM is an English academic journal that is mandated by the Ministry of Education of China, sponsored by USTB, and jointly published by the Springer publishing group. It was established in 1994, and was indexed in Ei-Compendex in 1995 and then SCIE in 1999, making it among the first batch of university-supported journals to be indexed by SCI. Based on three national first-level key disciplines of mining engineering, metallurgical engineering and material science and engineering of USTB, IJMMM welcomes original research articles (and occasional invited reviews) on all aspects of minerals processing, metallurgy, and materials science and processing. Coverage is well-rounded and includes mining, mineral processing, metallurgical physical chemistry, metallurgical technology and equipment, metal processing, material preparation, material structure and performance, corrosion and protection of materials.    

IJMMM adheres to a content-first principle to ensure quality, and promotes research in mining, metallurgy and materials. It has been awarded the Excellent Scientific Journals of Chinese Universities Award, Top 100 Newspapers and Periodicals Award, Chinese Internationally Influential Academic Journals Award (placing in the top 5%), the first prize of China's Nonferrous Metal Publications, the first session Excellent English journals of Chinese Universities Award, Outstanding Scientific Journals of Chinese Universities in 2016, Top 100 Scientific Journals of Chinese Universities in 2018, and more. It was made part of the excellent journals exhibition for the celebration of the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China at the 2019 Beijing International Book Expo, and was funded by China scientific journals international influence promotion plan for two consecutive issues.    

IJMMM has made steady progress in publication quality and international academic influence, thus providing a good platform for experts and scholars in the fields of minerals, metallurgy and materials to publish original research results. The journal is committed to optimizing its service through internationalized and digitized efforts. It now takes 52 days from submission to acceptance on average. Accepted papers will be on the website of IJMMM in 3 days, and can be found by SpringerLink. In order to strengthen the construction of peer review and promise the objectivity and fairness, a double-blind evaluation mode has been officially launched. 

With the purpose of serving the promotion of scientific research results, the USTB Journal Center adheres to a service-oriented and quality-first principles, strengthens innovative reform and opens cooperation to create a digital publishing-and-service integrated platform. The center will continue to improve its service standards and influence of USTB supported journals by promoting the intensified, digitized and integrated development so as to boost USTB’s Double First-Class construction.