Welcome aboard!

Abstract

Editorial decisions at the European Journal of Immunology (EJI) are made by active scientists, leading their field and aware of the scientific frontiers. Fifteen such scientists form the Journal's Executive Committee (ExCo) and they oversee the process of reviewing of manuscripts, driving a friendly and competent, fast, fair and rigid review process. It is a pleasure for me to welcome three new members to the ExCo: from the Weizmann Institute in Rehovot, Steffen Jung, a preeminent expert on dendritic cells, macrophages, antigen presentation and mucosal immunity 1; Francesco Annunziato from the University of Florence, who is known for his work on human T cells in allergy and inflammatory diseases, and most recently the detailed characterization of Th17 cells in inflammation 2; and Annette Oxenius from the Technical University (ETH) in Zürich with her expertise in CD8+ T-cell biology and the interplay between viruses and the immune system 3. All have contributed to EJI over the years, including publishing their research in the Journal 4-6, and are therefore aware of the standards and peer review process at EJI. I personally feel honored that these great scientists accepted the invitation to join the ExCo. Three members have rotated off the ExCo, as determined by the bylaws, after having served for many years. Rikard Holmdahl, Reinhold Förster and Andrew McMichael have invaluably contributed to the development of EJI, and we will miss their competence and expertise. A big “thank you” to them! They will nonetheless stay connected with EJI as alumni editors, supporting us with advice on the direction their fields of research are taking, and in the acquisition of manuscripts. One goal of EJI is to support authors as far as possible and, to this end, we will further develop our author guidelines, building a resource that will enable authors to assure the quality of their data and the information provided in their article, even before the review process has started. Furthermore, we will endorse and recommend standards developed externally, by experts in the field. As such we endorse, in order to provide the minimal information necessary to describe cytometric data, the MIFlowCyt standard 7, 8. This has been developed by the International society for the advancement of cytometry (ISAC), and is accessible at www.flowcyt.sourceforge.net. We will soon also endorse the MIATA standard, developed by a consortium of scientists involved in the analysis of T cells. MIATA stands for “Minimal Information about T-cell Assays 9. Details about MIATA standards and how to comply can be accessed at www.miataproject.org. Compliance with these standards are, for the time being, voluntary for authors; however, I am curious to learn whether you, our authors/readers/reviewers, find these recommendations useful, and I would be grateful for any feedback not only on how to improve these guidelines, but also in pointing out other technologies, where analogous external guidelines would be useful and are available. Finally, let me draw your attention to a series of reviews in EJI, covering recent progress in selected fields in immunology and presented at the International Congress on Immunology (ICI) in Milan (Italy) in 2013 10. The first two articles of this series were published in our February 2014 issue, and cover the role of Th17 cells in arthritis 11 and the manipulation of host immunity by a “keystone” pathogen 12. We will publish more of these ICI-based reviews throughout the year, and assemble them in a virtual issue on the EJI website. You can read the first ones at http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1002/(ISSN)1521-4141/homepage/icireviewseries.htm. So watch this space!