CHESTER PUBLISHING OPERATIONS. P.R. Strickland and B. McMahon, International Union of Crystallography, 5 Abbey Square, Chester CH1 2HU, England

In recent years there have been major changes in the operations of scientific publishers. The Editorial Office in Chester, whose principal function is the production of the journals Acta Crystallographica, Journal of Applied Crystallography and Journal of Synchrotron Radiation, has kept abreast of these changes and is well positioned to provide new electronic services.

The number of machine-readable submissions to the Union's journals has continued to increase markedly. The entire production of Acta Crystallographica Section C is now undertaken from machine-readable submissions in CIF format. This has proved to be an efficient method for producing Section C, and the techniques learned will be useful in the future development of other IUCr journals and publications.

Several electronic services related to the publishing of the journals are now provided by the Editorial Office. These include a full online contents service on the World Wide Web, manuscript status information, author indexes, and printcif and checkcif services for authors submitting CIF files. The web presence of the Union is expected to increase and the use of new media, such as CD-ROMs, is under consideration. This effort has been backed by increased spending on R&D.

Another development since the last congress of the IUCr, is the launch, in 1994, of the Journal of Synchrotron Radiation. The journal aims to cover all regions of the synchrotron radiation spectrum and to promote the rapid exchange of information across the whole synchrotron radiation community. Acta Crystallographica Section D, first published in 1993, has been well received and has published a number of special issues on Direct Methods, Crystallization and Drug Design.

A number of other publications are produced by the Chester Office. The International Tables for Crystallography and the World Directory of Crystallography are the most important of these. The World Directory is also accessible online.