Science is the academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and is one of the world's top scientific journals.

The peer-reviewed journal, first published in 1880, is circulated weekly and has a print subscriber base of around 130,000. Because institutional subscriptions and online access serve a larger audience, its estimated readership is one million people.

The major focus of the journal is publishing important original scientific research and research reviews, but Science also publishes science-related news, opinions on science policy and other matters of interest to scientists and others who are concerned with the wide implications of science and technology. Unlike most scientific journals, which focus on a specific field, Science and its rival Nature cover the full range of scientific disciplines. Science's impact factor for 2010 was 31.364 (as measured by the Institute for Scientific Information).

Although it is the journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, membership in the AAAS is not required to publish in Science. Papers are accepted from authors around the world. Competition to publish in Science is very intense, as an article published in such a highly cited journal can lead to attention and career advancement for the authors. Fewer than 10% of articles submitted to the editors are accepted for publication and all research articles are subject to peer review before they appear in the journal.

In academic publishing, a scientific journal is a periodical publication intended to further the progress of science, usually by reporting new research. There are thousands of scientific journals in publication, and many more have been published at various points in the past (see list of scientific journals). Most journals are highly specialized, although some of the oldest journals such as Nature publish articles and scientific papers across a wide range of scientific fields. Scientific journals contain articles that have been peer reviewed, in an attempt to ensure that articles meet the journal's standards of quality, and scientific validity. Although scientific journals are superficially similar to professional magazines, they are actually quite different. Issues of a scientific journal are rarely read casually, as one would read a magazine. The publication of the results of research is an essential part of the scientific method. If they are describing experiments or calculations, they must supply enough details that an independent researcher could repeat the experiment or calculation to verify the results. Each such journal article becomes part of the permanent scientific record.

John Craig Venter (born October 14, 1946) is an American biologist and entrepreneur. He is known for being one of the first to sequence the human genome and for creating the first cell with a synthetic genome. Venter founded Celera Genomics, TIGR (The Institute for Genomic Research) and the JCVI (J. Craig Venter Institute), and is now working at JCVI to create synthetic biological organisms. He was listed on Time magazine's 2007 and 2008 Time 100 list of the most influential people in the world. In 2010, the British magazine New Statesman listed Craig Venter at 14th in the list of "The World's 50 Most Influential Figures 2010".

Venter was born in Salt Lake City, Utah. In his youth, he did not take his education seriously, preferring to spend his time on the water in boats or surfing.^{[citation needed]} According to his biography, A Life Decoded, he was said to never be a terribly engaged student, having Cs and Ds on his eighth-grade report cards.

Although he was against the Vietnam War, Venter was drafted and enlisted in the United States Navy where he worked in the intensive-care ward of a field hospital. While in Vietnam, he attempted to commit suicide by swimming out to sea, but changed his mind more than a mile out. Being confronted with wounded, maimed, and dying soldiers on a daily basis instilled in him a desire to study medicine — although he later switched to biomedical research.

Egbert (Bert) W. Meijer (born 1955 in Groningen, The Netherlands) is a distinguished Dutch professor of Chemistry in the Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e). He is active in the fields of supramolecular chemistry, materials chemistry and polymer chemistry.

He studied Chemistry at the University of Groningen, graduating in 1978 and obtaining his doctorate in 1982. Between 1982 and 1992 he worked in the Philips Natuurkundig Laboratorium, and from 1989 to 1992 he was the head of the research department at DSM. Since 1991, he has been Professor of Chemistry at the TU/e. He is also an adjunct and distinguished visiting professor at the University of Nijmegen.

Bert Meijer received numerous prestigious awards, including the Spinozapremie in 2001, the Arthur K. Doolittle Award from the American Chemical Society in 1995, the Gold medal from KNCV in 1993, among others. He is the editor of the Journal of Polymer Chemistry, and is in the editorial board of several journals.