Welcome to agriengineering—a new open-access, open-source, open-hardware journal for the growing multidisciplinary scientific and engineering agricultural research community

Authors: Pelletier, Mathew

Submitted to: AgriEngineering
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 6/27/2018
Publication Date: 8/21/2018
Citation: Pelletier, M.G. 2018. Welcome to agriengineering—a new open-access, open-source, open-hardware journal for the growing multidisciplinary scientific and engineering agricultural research community. AgriEngineering. 1(1), 1-3. 10.3390/agriengineering1010001.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/agriengineering1010001

Interpretive Summary: This article is the first introductory article for a new journal, AgriEngineering, conceived, founded and launched by the author. AgriEngineering is a journal with significant multi-disciplinary features broadly relating engineering as applied to agricultural sciences. AgriEngineering is an international and cross-disciplinary scholarly and scientific open access, open-source, open-hardware journal on the engineering science of agricultural and horticultural production. The journal's aim is to encourage engineers and scientists to publish their experimental and theoretical research, along with the full set of schematics, source-code and mechanical designs and simulation models leading to accelerated and rapid dissemination of leading edge technologies emerging in agricultural, biological, environmental and agronomic engineering. This makes this journal the first of its kind to promote the engineering behind the scientific papers to the fore-front. This new paradigm is expected to significantly reduce the adoption time for new technology as it removes a critical barrier to adoption, that of the learning curve by removing the need to develop the supporting infrastructure behind each scientific paper. This article describes the scope, practice and expectations and founding principles of this new journal and it's unique format.

Technical Abstract: This article is the first introductory article for a new journal, AgriEngineering, conceived, founded and launched by the author. This introductory article represents the culmination of over a year of planning and work conceptualizing, designing and now launching this new format journal; AgriEngineering is the first open-access, open-source, open-hardware journal anywhere in the world that provides both scientific journal paper and the full hardware designs and specifications behind the technology utilized and developed during the implementation phase of the scientific research behind the scientific paper. This new paradigm provides the resources for any scientist, new to the field, to rapidly come up to speed without having to build the tools, software and development time that is currently the status quo. As such, this approach is expected to dramatically accelerate progress as it will greatly shorten the time it takes for our graduate students and new scientists to immerse themselves into new fields. Hence this approach shortens the typical learn/explore/innovate cycle and leads to faster development and eventual adoption of the technology. In technology disciplines with limited research funding, such as agriculture, this new approach will be particularly beneficial. This article describes the scope, practice and expectations and founding principles of this new journal and it's unique format.