Starting 1 June 2021, the WPSA Board has appointed Dr Tom Porter, University of Maryland, USA, as the editor of the World’s Poultry Science Journal.

Dr Tom Porter received his PhD in Animal Physiology from the University of Minnesota in 1988. He conducted research as a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Anatomy & Cell Biology at the Medical University of South Carolina. In 1993, he joined the Department of Poultry Science at Texas A&M University as an Assistant Professor, and in 1997, he was recruited to the Department of Animal and Avian Sciences at the University of Maryland, where he was subsequently promoted to Associate Professor and Professor. He served two terms as Chair of the Department ofAnimal and Avian Sciences at the University of Maryland. Dr Porter served for six years as Editor-in-Chief of thejournal Poultry Science, and he was named Fellow of the Poultry Science Association in 2016.

Dr Porter’s research interests centre on molecular and cellular endocrinology in poultry. Early in his career, he demonstrated that the production of steroid hormones in the ovaries of birds requires three different cell types, a situation which is different from that in mammals. One major focus of his research over the past 28 years has been on the mechanisms controlling cellular differentiation within the anterior pituitary gland during chick embryonic development. The overall goal of this research is to improve growth characteristics in broiler chickens through anincreased understanding of the regulation of the bird’s own growth hormone production. A second major focus in Dr Porter’s laboratory has included genome-wide analysis of gene expression in the neuroendocrine system. The long-term goal of this research is to increase our understanding of global patterns of gene expression in the hypothalamus and pituitary gland and to identify the genes and gene networks controlling growth rate, body composition and feed intake in broiler chickens. Dr Porter is the author of 107 refereed scientific papers, 23 book chapters or reviews, and 155 abstracts. His publications have been cited more than 3,200 times.

The WPSA Board want to thank Prof Julie Roberts for stepping in as Interim Editor for the past months.