Significant changes to Annals of Applied Biology from 2025

We start 2025 looking forward to a number of changes that are being introduced since the second part of 2024, with a few more to come within the next few months. As a matter of fact, 2024 was a year in which many decisions were made in order to introduce changes to the Annals of Applied Biology, always looking for a more interesting format, style, and ways to make the submission and the reviewing processes more friendly, quick and efficient.

The first change is that Annals has been rebranded with a new strapline of ‘Biosciences for Sustainability’. If you want to know more about it, read the Parry and Azevedo (2025) Editorial (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/aab.12952), published jointly in this January issue of 2025. There is actually quite a lot more information in the editorial about conferences/events and special issues.

Wiley (https://www.Wiley.com/en-us) has launched a new platform that will replace ScholarOne. In 2025, this new platform will be used by the editorial board for processing and editing all submissions to the journal. Our editors will have the opportunity to be trained and get used to it. It is important to remember that in 2023, the Research Exchange submission portal (ReX, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/page/journal/17447348/homepage/forauthors.html) Wiley online submission platform was launched; some adjustments have been made, and it seems to be working nicely.

Perhaps the most significant change is related to the structure of the Editorial Board. Discussions among the Association of Applied Biology (AAB – https://www.aab.org.uk) Council, Editors and Wiley have taken place during 2024, and a new editorial board structure and the way it works should be implemented during the first quarter of 2025. Annals currently has an Editor-in-Chief (EiC), who is also a Senior Editor (SE), a group of Senior Editors for selected subject areas, and a large number of Associate Editors (AEs) covering the wide range of subjects/areas published by Annals. We noticed that, in many cases, the time taken from manuscript submission, assigning the manuscript to a SE, then to an AE and only then to the reviewers, was far too long and caused delays and even communication issues. Hopefully, the new structure will be more efficient and allow faster manuscript handling and sending decisions to the authors. We truly appreciate the help, dedication and commitment of all editors currently on the Board of Annals.

I must also inform that I am completing my term as EiC on the 31st of December 2025. I have decided to step down and retire from my editorial activities, but I will stay on as SE for 1 extra year (2026) during the transition period and implementation of the new structure of the editorial board. I am actually retiring from research. Therefore, very soon AAB will be selecting a new person for the EiC position from January 2026.

Further changes will be implemented during 2025, and they will be presented to our readers in the Annals' website.

In a way, all these changes introduced to the editorial board structure, the Wiley Publication workflow (in brief: Article acceptance – Export to Production – Copy editing and layout – Proofing – Online publication) and others planned for 2025, will ensure a much better experience for the authors with rapid publication, and keeping the quality of the entire process at its highest.

Another aspect that was very important in 2024 was that the SEs, the AAB office and Wiley (several teams) maintained a much closer contact with the quarterly catch-up periodic meetings and a tremendous support of the Wiley's marketing team. The latter should have a major impact in the coming months since we have been working very closely to find ways and using the Wiley tools to market the journal and the articles, so they gain more visibility. I am sure the authors will appreciate this extra effort to market their work through a number of platforms available to us.

When it comes to special issues, I would like to mention our Volume 185, Issue 2 (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/toc/17447348/2024/185/2), which is a “Tribute to Simon Leather”, our former SE and EiC. The issue has 12 research papers on Entomology and an Editorial on the work and life of Prof. Simon Leather (Azevedo et al., 2024), a Forum paper, a Review paper and an Opinion paper, all very exciting and obviously related to the field of entomology.

We are also beginning the year with an Interview article with Professor Fernanda Fidalgo, Faculty of Sciences, University of Porto, Portugal (Azevedo, 2025 – https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/aab.12953). Please, don't miss it!

But 2024 was also a sad year for the journal and our colleagues at AAB. Our former SE and former AAB President, Professor Peter J. Lea, passed away in June. He has received many tributes during 2024, and we have prepared a special Editorial Tribute to him, published in this January issue of Annals (Azevedo et al., 2025 – https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/aab.12956). He was an extraordinary man and scientist. Do read the article!

Please, check us on social media. Check our Facebook® page, Twitter (Twitter accounts: @Annapplbiol, @AABiologists), etc., and also those of our editors and collaborators. We can create a nice network for the dissemination of research published in Annals by our editors, authors, readers and collaborators as well.

As one can see, it was a pretty busy year for us, and we can only hope that the changes and adjustments will result in a better experience for our authors, reviewers and readers.

I would like to wrap up this editorial by thanking lots of people: Carol Millman (Annals Editorial Officer), Geraint Parry (AAB's Executive Officer): you have been terrific! Thank you so much! Thanks to all editors, authors, reviewers and readers. We have managed to have a tremendous Senior Editor's meeting in May in London with editors, AAB and Wiley members. It was very productive, and many discussions and ideas turned into actions taken during the following months. Thanks to Wiley's team members, especially Andreas Petersen, Rosie Trice, Katy Griffiths, Devvie Miranda and Pavithran Narayanan, with whom we have had very close contact in 2024. My thanks to Martin Parry, AAB Publications officer and now AAB President-Elect, Mike Gooding AAB former President and Dale Sanders AAB President: They have been in close contact with the editorial board of Annals and provided the support needed so we can work in the best possible way and deliver a journal that brings innovative quality research in the field of Agriculture. I must say that it was no stress at all working with them since our meetings were filled with ideas and with lots of people working together with the one objective of making Annals a better journal in every sense for our community and society.

I wish you all the best for 2025 and keep on checking Annals publications and visit our website (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/17447348) and social media pages (@AABiologists; aabiologists; https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100068738984850) for more news and updates, and also the AAB website (https://www.aab.org.uk).

Take care and peace!

Ricardo