Editorial

One of the central goals of EPJ E SOFT MATTER is to provide a meeting place for exciting, highly relevant, and sometimes also controversial discussions amongst our community.In this context, EPJ E SOFT MATTER publishes the work of Raviv, Klein and Witten (this issue, p.405) on the relaxation behaviour of compressed layers of adsorbed polymers.As shown by the accompanying texts (this issue: Joner and Semenov, p.413; Sommer, p.417; Granick, p.421; Raviv, Klein and Witten, p.425), the interpretation of the intriguing experimental results has led to intensive discussions in the community, with still some questions left open.Complemen tary experiments and further theoretical works probably will follow.

EPJ E SOFT MATTER takes this fascinating example to renew its invitation to authors, referees, and readers (see Eur.Ph ys.J.E 4, 3 (2001)) to point out to the Editors-in-Chief potentially exciting -or controversial- topics and questions, so that the possibility of additional commentaries, perspectives or editorial comments can be considered. The main purpose is to encourage debate.The authors of the above-mentioned articles have excellently demonstrated that even in the case of controversial opinions such a debate can be remarkably fruitful and of high interest to the readers of EPJ E SOFT MATTER.

A fair and well-argued presentation of di.erent points of view, even if there is disagreement and criticism, presents a promising and e.cient way for improving and advancing our understanding of "Soft Matter".

G.Reiter

(Editor-in-Chief)