More than seven decades of Acta Tropica: Looking back to move into the future

No Roots, No Fruits: Marcel Tanner's Scholarly Contribution, Achievements in Capacity Building, and Impact in Global Health

On 1 October 2022, Marcel Tanner celebrated his 70th birthday with his family and friends on the River Rhein in Basel. Trained in epidemiology (Ph.D.) and public health (MPH), Tanner devoted his entire working life to research, teaching, and capacity building. Indeed, he built up productive partnerships, fostered multinational consortia, served on numerous scientific and strategic advisory boards, and contributed measurably to improving people's health and well-being. We systematically searched the Web of Science Core Collection to identify Tanner's scholarly contribution and pursued an in-depth analysis of his scientific oeuvre including the main areas of research, pathogens, diseases, and health systems, and the geographical foci of his scholarly activities. Additionally, we examined Tanner's impact on personal and institutional capacity building in the arena of global health. We also invited a handful of colleagues to describe their experiences while working with Marcel Tanner. What transpires is a considerable breadth and depth of peer-reviewed publications in tropical medicine; epidemiology, environmental, and occupational health; parasitology; and infectious diseases. More than a third of the 622 peer-reviewed articles, the first piece published in 1978, focused on various aspects of the protozoan parasite Plasmodium and the disease it causes: malaria. Tanner trained, taught, and inspired generations of students, scientists, and practitioners all over the world. His unique ability to bring people and institutions together to work in partnership is at the heart of an impactful career in global health.

More than seven decades of Acta Tropica: Partnership to advance the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development

The inaugural issue of Acta Tropica has been published in 1944, at a time of utmost international isolation and uncertainty due to World War II. Now, more than seven decades later, Acta Tropica is a trusted outlet to communicate and disseminate scientific advances in the fields of parasitology and tropical medicine. As a scholarly, peer-reviewed journal, Acta Tropica contributes to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, particularly the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 3, that is "Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all of all ages". This article explores how Acta Tropica has evolved over time. Our analysis is based on a systematic review of keywords derived from all issues published in a specific year, arbitrarily selected at decadal snapshots (1950, 1960, 1970, 1980, 1990, 2000, 2010, and 2020). Results indicate a decrease in interdisciplinarity in favour of more specialised expertise in various fields of infectious diseases research and public health with a particular emphasis on low- and middle-income countries. Yet, by examining first and last authors' institutional affiliations and classifying countries by the Human Development Index (HDI), we find that most authors are affiliated with institutions in high- and very high-HDI countries. Over time, the mean number of authors on a paper has increased severalfold (from 1.35 in 1950 to 7.51 in 2020). Taken together, Acta Tropica has become increasingly globally anchored and contributes not only to SDG 3, but increasingly also to SDG 17, that is "Revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development".