The centenary of Annals of Applied Biology in 2014

Annals of Applied Biology (Annals)  has  published the results of original research in applied biology for 100 years. The journal was established because of the need for a more efficient distribution of scientific information of applied importance, especially in agriculture and horticulture. Over the years, most papers in Annals have reported on crop science, horticulture, pests and diseases of field crops and horticultural plants, and plant breeding. The scope of the journal has remained consistent, although currently the research fields covered in Annals can also be described using the terms agriculture and the environment, crop improvement, pest and invertebrate biology, and plant–pathogen interactions. Maintaining high standards of statistical analysis in the papers published has always been emphasised in Annals.

The Centenary of Annals in 2014 will be celebrated by highlighting some of the most influential papers published in the journal over the 100 years. These papers have been selected by the Senior Editors (the authors of this editorial), following consultation of the Editorial Board of Annals, which consists of scientists from all parts of the world. Each issue of Annals in 2014 will contain at least one Centenary editorial that introduces an influential paper. Furthermore, the same issue will contain a solicited review article related to the influential paper. The first influential paper introduced in this issue is the study by Chester I. Bliss (1935) on the calculation of the dosage‐mortality curve, which has been cited over 850 times and is still regularly referred to today. The editorial has been written by David Finney, who knew Bliss personally and who acted as an unofficial statistical editor of the journal during the period 1942–54. It is noteworthy that this editorial marks 76 years since David Finney's first publication in 1938 (Finney, 1938). The review article has been written by Roger Payne, who was the Senior Statistical Editor of Annals from 1980 to 1989. The editorials, influential papers and review articles will be made available for free access on the home page of Annals (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1744‐7348).

The Association of Applied Biologists (Association) will organise a Centenary conference under the title ‘Sustainable Intensification’ in December 2014. For details of the programme and other details, please refer to the home page of the Association in the near future (http://www.aab.org.uk/).

In the following sections we provide some perspectives as to the development of Annals as a scientific journal and statistical data on its impact in the field of applied biology.