Igniting stage two in Endocrine Connections

Now in its sixth year, Endocrine Connections was the first Open Access journal devoted to hormones. The journal is owned by two well-established endocrine learned societies, the European Society of Endocrinology (ESE) and the Society for Endocrinology (SfE). In 2016, Endocrine Connections was included in the Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE) and expects its first impact factor in Thomson Reuters’ listing this summer! Under the late Editor-in-Chief, Jens Sandahl Christiansen, Endocrine Connections gained significant momentum: submissions and published articles increased from two issues published in 2012 to four issues published in 2015. Under my editorship, Endocrine Connections has continued to grow to eight issues per year; fast review and processing times continue to be combined with an ambitious acceptance rate. Endocrine Connections covers original high-quality basic, translational and clinical research or review articles, covering all aspects of endocrinology and hormone science. We also publish guidelines and guidance: in 2016, five Society for Endocrinology Endocrine Emergency Guidance publications appeared in the journal. The Endocrine Connections open access scheme offers authors immediate and high visibility of their work among the membership of its two parent societies. Beyond this European endocrine network, intersecting hormonerelated disciplines and the wider biomedical community have instantaneous free access to published content, facilitated by the best discovery methods. Starting with this issue, several changes to the editorial board, the format of the presented content and the appearance of this open access journal have been implemented in order to further increase the quality and range of published content. In anticipation of the expected important milestone of the first impact factor for Endocrine Connections, the editorial board has decided to develop three key emerging areas: (1) Endocrinology of Chronic Disease; (2) Endocrinology of the Nervous System and Behaviour; and (3) Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals. The journal will now contain these three independent sections aiming to provide a home for the excellent work published in these fields. These sections will be championed by expert Strategic Editors, who are key members of the respective scientific communities. They will be supported by newly assigned members of the editorial board, who are leading scientists active in these focus areas. Chronic widespread and pandemic diseases (‘Volkskrankheiten’) such as obesity, diabetes, hypertension or musculo-skeletal disorders exhibit a major endocrine and hormonal component. However, several rare diseases, many of which are accessible via geneticsbased diagnostics, involve impaired hormone production, signalling, action or metabolism and as such are of genuine interest to endocrinologists. Remarkable progress in genome-based research, innovative powerful imaging techniques, and extremely speedy advances in IT and data processing are tackling the key issues of hormone action in the nervous system and on behaviour. Therefore, it is timely to address this focus area in the journal. Political decisions and debates on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean are now highlighting the controversial subject of endocrine disruptors, which should be a concern at the heart of each endocrinologist. While the European Union implemented the REACH process, which depends on a major research effort into the potential adverse effects of endocrine-disrupting compounds in mankind, terrestrial and aquatic life forms, the new US government threatens to cut its research funds for this research area. High-quality research and fact-based scientific debate is required to