Dear Colleagues,

This year we launched a Travel Scholarship to be awarded to a PhD student or early career postdoctoral student. It attracted a large number of applicants, 78 in total, of generally very high quality. The applications were assessed by an international team of four Animals editors, Dr. Serdar Izmirli, Prof. Darryl Jones, Prof. John McGlone and myself. The winner of the award is Angie Johnston, a PhD student from Yale University who will receive 800 Swiss Francs towards travel expenses to participate at the Canine Science Forum in Hungary and present her paper entitled: The double-edged sword of domestication: Dogs are less adept than dingoes at independent problem solving.

Two other applicants that were highly commended will receive the opportunity to publish a paper free of charge in Animals; these are Dr. Irene Camerlink of Scotland’s Rural College (SRUC) and Dr. Eija Kaukonen from the University of Helsinki. An additional nine short-listed candidates will receive a reduction of half the fee for publication in Animals.

It was a difficult decision with such high quality applications for the awards and we would like to thank all applicants for submitting their diverse and fascinating range of research topics. We congratulate the winners for their accomplishments! Animals is happy to support our young scientists, who represent our future leaders in animal science. We hope that all manage to get to the conferences and meetings that they applied to attend and that they enjoy Animals as a source of inspiration and information about the latest findings in animal science.

Prof. Dr. Clive J. C. Phillips
Editor-in-Chief