OpenJournalRank

Journal rankings · indicator year 2014

Choose a field to open its ranking, or a journal to find its row in its subfield’s list.

Domain ranking · 2014

Life Sciences journal rankings 2014

2,705 ranked journals · Domain

Life Sciences has 2,705 ranked journals in 2014. The median journal has an OJR of 0.87, below the world average of 1.00, down 0.01 on 2013; Q1 starts at OJR 1.43. The top three are The Journal of Peasant Studies, Cell, and Nature Genetics.

Ranks and citation indicators: 2014. Journal access status and listed APC: source snapshot September 23, 2026.

Ranked journals

Journals whose main subfield sits in this category and that published at least 30 citable documents (articles, reviews and conference papers) in 2011–2013, the window the 2014 score is computed on.

2,705
15% of all ranked journals
Median OJR

The OpenJournalRank Indicator (OJR) is a free, publicly available metric of a journal’s field-normalized citation impact, computed from open OpenAlex citation data. It compares citations to a journal’s papers from the previous three years with the world average for papers of the same subfield, year and type, so 1.00 is the world average and values can be compared across fields. It is computed with the NCI3 method.

The middle OJR among ranked journals in this category: half score higher, half lower. 1.00 is the world average for papers of the same subfield, year and type.

The dot is this category, the solid tick is the median of all ranked journals and the dashed line is the world average.

0.87-0.01 vs 2013
This domainAll 0.90World 1.00
Open-access journals

Share of ranked journals in this category that are fully open access, so every paper is free to read. Hybrid journals, which sell subscriptions and open single papers for a fee, are not counted.

35%
All fields: 27%
Median listed APC

Median list price of the article processing charge, in US dollars, among ranked journals in this category that list a price above zero. Journals with a listed APC of $0 and journals with no known price are left out of this median. The At a glance table below gives a second median that includes the $0 prices.

$3,500
Median positive listed APC: $3,500 among 1,442 journals. Another 13 list $0; 1,250 have no known price. All fields: $3,400.

Fields in Life Sciences (5)

Up to All journals

2,705 ranked journals

Filters

Quartile

Quartiles split the ranked journals of the list you are viewing into four equal groups by OJR. Q1 is the top quarter and Q4 the bottom quarter.

They are computed within the list on screen, so a journal can be Q1 in its subfield and Q2 in the global ranking.

Access
APC (list price)
Loading every ranked journal in this list…
Life Sciences ranking, 2014

Rank is the position by OJR within the list on screen; 1 is the highest.

OJR is field-normalized 3-year citation impact: 1.00 is the world average for papers of the same subfield, year and type, so values compare across fields.

The badge is the journal’s quartile in this list.

OJR

Citations per paper over a two-year window, counted from OpenAlex. It is not field-normalized, so compare it only between journals of the same field.

▲ or ▼ is the change from 2013. This is OpenJournalRank’s own count, not Clarivate’s Journal Impact Factor.

Citable documents (articles, reviews and conference papers) published in 2011–2013, the window the 2014 OJR is computed on. A journal needs at least 30 to be ranked.

Share of the journal’s 2011–2013 papers that are free to read in any open-access form. The green OA tag next to a title marks a fully open-access journal.

List price of the article processing charge in US dollars. “$0 listed” means the listed price is zero; a dash means no price is listed.

The line is the journal’s OJR from 2005 to 2014.

Compare
1The Journal of Peasant StudiesTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom
11.02Q16.19 2.94 down from 201318327%—
2CellCell Press · United States
10.17Q127.25 0.40 down from 20131,75799%$11,400
3Nature GeneticsNature Portfolio · United States
9.69Q123.05 2.05 down from 201395955%$12,690
4Pharmacological ReviewsAmerican Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics · United States
9.48Q121.83 0.78 down from 201311255%$4,500
5Ecology LettersWiley · United Kingdom
8.51Q112.59 0.30 up from 201351735%$5,300
6Molecular Biology and EvolutionOAOxford University Press · United States
7.53Q110.86 5.88 down from 201386385%$3,418
7NatureNature Portfolio · United Kingdom
7.30Q113.61 0.33 down from 20139,74333%$12,690
8FEMS Microbiology ReviewsOAOxford University Press · Netherlands
6.44Q112.73 2.46 down from 201314672%$3,297
9Journal of Rural StudiesElsevier BV · United Kingdom
6.34Q13.92 0.10 up from 201319926%$4,090
10GigaScienceOAUniversity of Oxford · United Kingdom
6.23Q114.91 7.72 up from 201332100%$2,638
11ImmunityCell Press · United States
6.19Q119.12 1.47 up from 2013698100%$10,400
12Nature CommunicationsOANature Portfolio · United Kingdom
6.14Q113.86 0.56 up from 20132,75999%$6,990
13Systematic BiologyOxford University Press · United States
6.05Q112.57 2.49 up from 201329451%$2,166
14Current Directions in Psychological ScienceSAGE Publishing · United Kingdom
5.83Q19.18 0.68 up from 201322132%$3,900
15Nature NeuroscienceNature Portfolio · United States
5.75Q116.79 1.74 up from 201386165%$12,690
16Nature BiotechnologyNature Portfolio · United States
5.69Q112.34 1.15 up from 20131,12132%$12,690
17ScienceAmerican Association for the Advancement of Science · United States
5.65Q18.97 0.47 up from 201311,81122%—
18Cell MetabolismCell Press · United States
5.57Q116.39 1.26 up from 2013600100%$10,400
19Molecular Systems BiologyOASpringer Nature · United Kingdom
5.55Q112.30 3.55 down from 2013253100%$7,990
20Cell stem cellElsevier BV · United States
5.53Q115.46 0.52 down from 2013603100%$10,400
21Nature Cell BiologyNature Portfolio · United Kingdom
5.52Q114.19 0.65 down from 201368556%$12,690
22NeuronCell Press · United States
5.37Q114.58 1.35 down from 20131,37799%$10,400
23Journal of Clinical InvestigationOAAmerican Society for Clinical Investigation · United States
5.27Q113.52 0.10 down from 20131,575100%$5,200
24Molecular Aspects of MedicineElsevier BV · United Kingdom
5.20Q111.85 0.62 up from 201315025%$5,220
25Psychological ReviewAmerican Psychological Association · United States
5.20Q19.05 0.48 down from 201311131%—
26Progress in Lipid ResearchElsevier BV · United Kingdom
5.17Q111.73 1.36 down from 20139026%$5,530
27Biotechnology AdvancesElsevier BV · United Kingdom
5.08Q110.22 0.43 down from 201340221%$5,460
28Nature MethodsNature Portfolio · United States
5.05Q113.92 2.47 up from 20131,25434%$12,690
29Nature ImmunologyNature Portfolio · United States
4.99Q112.41 3.12 down from 201375745%$12,690
30The Plant CellOxford University Press · United States
4.95Q19.64 0.72 down from 20131,10399%$4,934
31The Journal of Experimental MedicineRockefeller University Press · United States
4.94Q114.06 0.66 down from 201371798%—
32MicrobiomeOABioMed Central · United Kingdom
4.89Q110.42no 2013 value31100%$4,990—
33Critical Reviews in Plant SciencesTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom
4.84Q17.63 0.52 up from 20137028%—
34Psychological ScienceSAGE Publishing · United States
4.83Q17.34 0.10 up from 201382936%$3,900
35Proceedings of the National Academy of SciencesNational Academy of Sciences · United States
4.59Q110.75 0.25 down from 201312,647100%—
36Cell Host & MicrobeCell Press · United States
4.55Q111.18 0.25 up from 2013465100%$10,400
37Progress in NeurobiologyElsevier BV · United Kingdom
4.54Q112.76 1.63 up from 201323034%$5,190
38The American Journal of Human GeneticsElsevier BV · United States
4.51Q111.38 0.15 up from 201375997%$5,150
39Nature ProtocolsNature Portfolio · United States
4.51Q112.11 1.76 up from 201352145%—
40Journal of Agrarian ChangeWiley · United Kingdom
4.47Q12.47 0.10 up from 201312416%$3,820
41Studies in MycologyElsevier BV · Netherlands
4.44Q111.14 2.92 up from 201363100%$1,430
42Molecular CellElsevier BV · United States
4.42Q113.52 0.38 up from 20131,124100%$10,400
4.30Q16.68 0.57 up from 20139018%$5,000
44Drug Resistance UpdatesElsevier BV · United Kingdom
4.29Q111.64 0.43 down from 20135728%$5,410
45Pharmacology & TherapeuticsElsevier BV · United States
4.25Q111.38 1.64 up from 201333137%$5,660
46Trends in Food Science & TechnologyElsevier BV · United Kingdom
4.22Q16.04 0.07 up from 201323317%$5,440
47PLANT PHYSIOLOGYOxford University Press · United States
4.21Q17.53 1.01 down from 20131,51182%$3,851
48Sociologia RuralisWiley · Netherlands
4.06Q12.40 0.38 down from 20138538%$3,920
49New PhytologistWiley · United Kingdom
4.04Q16.97 0.27 up from 20131,36357%$5,790
50Cognitive PsychologyElsevier BV · United States
3.98Q17.47 2.33 up from 20136419%$3,570

Citations made in 2014. Corpus-wide, 77.7% of core-journal articles and reviews published that year have at least one matched reference; the share varies by journal and field.

937 additional Life Sciences journals with metrics are unranked under this release’s eligibility rules: a journal needs at least 30 citable documents in 2011–2013, at least 80% of them with a subfield, and a positive world-average expectation. Ranks are within the whole category; filters hide rows without re-ranking. OJR excludes self-citations.

Rising journals

At a glance

Indicator year: 2014. Publication window: 2011–2013. How these summaries are calculated

Ranked journals
2,705
Window papers (baseline)
1,547,978 +11.4% from indicator year 2011
Median OJR
0.8678 -4.1% from indicator year 2011
Rising journals (2025)
273

Window papers are the baseline paper population: citable papers (articles, reviews and conference papers) from 2011–2013 in all journals of the world-average baseline, including non-core journals, counted by each paper’s own subfield. They are not the papers of the ranked journals alone.

Category by indicator year
MeasureYear series20002001200220032004200520062007200820092010201120122013201420152016201720182019202020212022202320242025
Ranked journals1,4161,5281,6151,7121,7311,8011,8651,9562,0042,0962,2222,3552,4842,5992,7052,8382,9232,9833,0273,0373,0153,0003,0303,0323,0143,016
Window papers (baseline)681,698747,894789,157838,563854,790911,302969,9831,041,3011,106,2851,194,9951,291,8161,389,1751,451,1511,495,4991,547,9781,608,2801,646,1561,651,7901,653,5661,677,6611,731,4631,821,7341,907,3161,955,1911,960,7792,008,547
Median OJR0.590.620.630.690.710.740.7780.8100.8130.8690.86750.900.910.8730.86780.830.81770.81800.809250.8060.8140.809310.800.7840.770.79
Category context (2025)
MeasureCategory statisticEligible population
Journal self-citation shareMedian: 2.5%2,489 journals
Retracted papers per 1,000Pooled rate: 3.276 per 1,0002,252 journals
Output growthMedian: -7.1%2,737 journals
Open access shareMedian: 99.1%3,016 journals
Listed APC (USD)Median including $0 listed prices: $3,2581,900 ranked journals with a known listed price, including $0 listed prices
International collaboration shareMedian: 25.1%2,917 journals
Review shareMedian: 0.3%3,016 journals
Articles-only OJRMedian: 0.792,965 journals
Uncited shareMedian: 26.6%3,016 journals
Citation concentrationMedian: 42.9%3,011 journals

How to read these rankings

OJR, the OpenJournalRank Indicator
A field-normalized 3-year citation impact, computed from OpenAlex with the NCI3 method. It divides the citations a journal’s papers received by the world average for papers of the same subfield, year and type, so 1.00 is the world average and 2.00 means twice as many citations as expected. Because it is normalized, it can be compared across fields. Read the methodology
Quartiles
Q1 to Q4 split the ranked journals of the list you are viewing into four equal groups by OJR. A journal’s quartile depends on the list: the same journal can be Q1 in its subfield and Q2 among all journals.
Impact factor (2-year)
Citations per paper over a two-year window, counted from OpenAlex. It is easy to compare with familiar impact factors but is not field-normalized, so compare it only within a field. It is not Clarivate’s Journal Impact Factor. Why it differs from the Journal Impact Factor
Rank ranges
Each rank in the latest year carries a likely range from 1,000 resamples of the journal’s papers. Where two journals’ ranges overlap, the data cannot tell them apart, so treat neighbouring ranks as ties.