60 years of development of the journal of integrative plant biology.

In celebration of JIPB's 60(th) anniversary, this paper summarizes and reviews the development process of the journal. To start, we offer our heartfelt thanks to JIPB's pioneer Editors-in-Chief who helped get the journal off the ground and make it successful. Academic achievement is the soul of academic journals, and this paper summarizes JIPB's course of academic development by analyzing it in four stages: the first two stages are mostly qualitative analyses, and the latter two stages are dedicated to quantitative analyses. Most-cited papers were statistically analyzed. Improvements in editing, publication, distribution and online accessibility--which are detailed in this paper--contribute to JIPB's sustainable development. In addition, JIPB's evaluation index and awards are provided with accompanying pictures. At the end of the paper, JIPB's milestones are listed chronologically. We believe that JIPB's development, from a national journal to an international one, parallels the development of the Chinese plant sciences.