SEARCH FOR EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY IN BIOMEDICINE

The IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBS) is undertaking a search for Editor-In-Chief for IEEE Transactions on Information Technology in Biomedicine that publishes papers on the applications of information technology to biomedicine.

The Editor position is for a three-year term and is renewable for an additional three years. The term of appointment would start January 2008. At the time of appointment, the successful applicant must be a member of the IEEE EMBS.

Successful candidates are expected to demonstrate scientific visions for a leading journal, editorial experience, and management skills to enhance and run a journal. A strong interest and understanding of the day-to-day management of a journal is preferred. Nominations and applications will be accepted until a suitable candidate is selected. Review of applications by the Search Committee will commence immediately and conclude by March 2007. Nominations/applications should include the following in electronic format (pdf):

• Goals and strategy for expanding and improving the Transactions
• Detailed curriculum vitae demonstrating expertise in the technical area within the scope of the Journal

Presubmission professional editing services available to IEEE authors

IEEE Publishing Operations has partnered with one of our established vendors, SPi Publisher Services, to offer presubmission professional editing services to IEEE authors, beginning immediately.

SPi provides scientific, technical and medical publishers with a high quality, end-to-end outsourcing solution. Their multi-country delivery platform harnesses the talent of more than 3,500 content and BPO specialists. Located in the US, Europe and the Philippines, these specialists copyedit and typeset more than 1 million pages per year for over 600 journals. SPi has provided content tagging and editing services to IEEE Publishing Operations since 2002.

An author who would like assistance with English grammar and usage prior to submitting their manuscript to an IEEE publication for review or during the review process can now go directly to www.prof-editing.com/ieee/ to submit a manuscript for copy editing. The SPi copy editors will edit for grammar, usage, organization, and clarity, querying potentially substantive revisions as necessary. An author can use the service, at their own expense, as often as desired. Cost estimates are available immediately on line. Edited manuscripts will generally be returned to the author within two weeks of submission.

Outstanding Paper Award 2005

Founding Editor-in-Chief, Dr. Swamy Laxminarayan passed away The Founding Editor-in-Chief of this journal, Dr. Swamy Laxminarayan, passed away unexpectedly end of September 2005.

Swamy was the person who created T-ITB and served as its first and founding editor. He was the champion of it and always so enthusiastic about the journal and, more importantly, about IT in healthcare and biomedicine. I learned to know Swamy gradually in a number of roles. Our paths crossed first time in the late 80's early 90's when Swamy together with the President of IEEE-EMBS, Charlie Robinson, built relations with the international medical and biological engineering community, and as part of that with the International Federation of Medical and Biological Engineering, IFMBE. This culminated in the world congress that took place in Kyoto, Japan in 1991, where the bylaws of IFMBE were changed to include also transnational members. The first of these was IEEE-EMBS. The EMBS annual conference a year later in Paris was a second milestone for Swamy in internationalizing EMBS. During those years I worked quite closely with Swamy as I was at that time first the Vice-President then the President of IFMBE. The second time we collaborated closely was when I was elected Editor-in-Chief of this journal and we changed shifts in the end of 2001. I don't know easy these changes of offices usually are but in this particular case Swamy really did everything to enable me to follow in his tracks. I have fond memories of Swamy from all of these years and valued his friendship. In addition to these personal notes I've invited two other persons to write a few words of Swamy with the intent to highlight the central role he has played in championing this journal. Both of them have a long relationship with Swamy.

Niilo Saranummi, December 2005

• Obituary by Luis Kun
• Obituary by Charlie Robinson