The Zoological record (ISSN: 0144-3607)

Description

The Zoological Record (ZR) is a print and electronic index of zoological literature that also serves as the unofficial register of scientific names in zoology.
It was started as a print publication in 1864 by the Zoological Society of London, as The Record of Zoological Literature, and changed its name to the Zoological Record in 1870. From 1980 to 2004, the ZR was published by BIOSIS, and from 2004 to the present it has been published by Thomson Reuters.
History
In 1864, Albert Günther and a group of zoologists associated with the British Museum and the Zoological Society came together to begin work on The Record of Zoological Literature, the first volume of which was published in 1865 by John Van Voorst, covering zoological literature that had been published in 1864. This work was intended to be an English language counterpart to the German language zoological index Archiv für Naturgeschichte, but without the Archiv's publication delays. After the first six volumes were published, Van Voorst withdrew as publisher due to a lack of profits from the work. Concerned zoologists then formed the Zoological Association and published volumes 7-22 (1870-1885) as the Zoological Record. In 1886, the Zoological Association passed the publication duties on to the Zoologial Society. In 1900 a competing publication, the International Catalogue of Scientific Literature, began publication. Section N of the Catalogue was intended to cover zoology, which caused subscription losses for the Zoological Record despite reviews stating that the Zoological Record was a superior publication. However, after negotiations, the Zoological Record itself became section N of the Catalogue. This arrangement ended with the advent of World War I.[1]
In 1980, the Zoological Society of London joined forces with BIOSIS to co-produce the Zoological Record. This co-production helped get rid of the three year lag in the publication of the index by instituting a "catch up" program to bring The Zoological Record up-to-date. This program was completed in 1988.[2] In January 2001, BIOSIS partnered with Cambridge Scientific Abstracts to produce a related database, Zoological Record Plus, which included abstracts from the Biological Sciences database produced by CSA.[3] February 2004 saw the acquisition of BIOSIS by Thomson ISI, again changing the producer of The Zoological Record.[4] Following the merger of Thomson and Reuters, Zoological Record is now produced by Thomson Reuters.