PUTRAJAYA, 1 November 2016 - Three scientists from Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) received the Malaysia's Rising Star Award while 6 journals from Penerbit USM (USM Press) were awarded the CREAM status by the Malaysian Ministry of Higher Education in a ceremony presented by the Minister of Higher Education, Dato' Seri Idris Jusoh at the Marriott Hotel in Putrajaya today.

The recipients of  Malaysia's Rising Star Award were Professor Dr. Wan Saime Wan Ngah from the USM School of Chemical Sciences for  Malaysia's Rising Star Award (Clarivate Analytics) category of Highly-Cited Review; Professor Dr. Lee Keat Teong from the USM School of Chemical Engineering for Malaysia's Rising Star Award (Clarivate Analytics) category of Young Researcher and Professor Dr. Bassim H. Hameed, also from the USM School of Chemical Engineering in recognition of the researcher by Clarivate Analytics for being Malaysia's Highly-Cited Researchers Named Amongst the World's Most Infuential Scientific Minds 2015.

Clarivate Analytics was formerly known as IP & Science Business of Thomson Reuters.

Meanwhile, the 6 journals published by Penerbit USM were selected for acknowledgement under the CREAM Status Accordance Programme by the Ministry of Higher Education Malaysia also in the same ceremony.

According to the Director of Penerbit USM, Akhiar Salleh, this recognition serves to encourage in efforts to raise the quality of research and publication of scholarly journals in Malaysia which involved various local journal publishers.

"Penerbit USM is always making improvements in the publication of journals, from aspects of abiding by the publication date, ensuring that the quality of articles selected would undergo a strict evaluation process, publishing journals which adhere to international standards, and increasing the added values of publications through the latest publication methods. In addition, technology such as the Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is fully utilised to increase the 'visibility' of the journals," he said.

Added Akhiar, in Malaysia, only the journals published by Penerbit USM is in the format of ePub, other than in the pdf format for online accessibility.

The journals published by Penerbit USM are the Bulletin of the Malaysian Mathematical Sciences Society (Editor in-Chief: Professor Dato' Dr. Rosihan M. Ali) in the Journal in Web of Science category, Asian Academy of Management Journal of Accounting and Finance (Editor in-Chief: Professor Dato' Dr. Ruhani Ali) and International Journal of Asia-Pacific Studies (Editor in-Chief: Professor Dr. Ooi Keat Gin) for the Journal in SCOPUS category, while the Journal of Construction in Developing Countries (Editor in-Chief: Professor Dr. Abdul Rashid Abdul Aziz), Journal of Physical Sciences (Editor in-Chief: Professor Dr. Abdul Latif Ahmad) and the Malaysian Journal of Medical Sciences (Editor in-Chief: Professor Dato' Dr. Jafri Malin Abdullah) for the Potential Journal category.

Translation: Mazlan Hanafi Basharudin