We are just about at the end of this year, and my kind responsibility is to summarize the most important events of 2011. May I start with a Latin proverb “Panta rhei”, which means everything is changing. This is what has happened with the Journal of Thermal Analysis and Calorimetry during the past 1 year.

The first change relates to the geographical distribution of submitted manuscripts. The number of papers coming from Brazil, China and India reached a leading position surpassing all other countries. The above-mentioned process started a couple of years ago, but by now it has become dominant.

The second phenomenon was the significant increase of papers dealing with bio/life pharmaceutical and environmental topics. These facts demand for an alteration in the leading body of the journal and currently we are searching for the best experts in these fields.

We would like to warmly welcome the following new members of the Board: Professors Farhad Gharagheizi, Cheila G. Mothé, Luis A. Pérez-Maqueda, Andrei Rotaru, Tiit Kaljuvee, and Katalin Mészáros Szécsényi.

Let us express our gratitude to the following members leaving the Board: Professors J. P. E. Grolier, Valter José Fernandes Jr, Vicenc Torra, Amadeo Marini, Alberto Schiraldi, Lauri Niinistö, Samuel Petit, Yuko Nishimoto, Adam Danch, Abhi S. Ray. We still count on their advice in the Journal’s matters in the future.

Special thanks are due to the Guest Editors of the special chapters/issues published in 2011, namely Professors Attilio Cesaro, Stefano Vecchio, Nieves Barros Pena, José Antonio Rodriguez Anón, Josefa Salgado Carballo, Marianne Odlyha, Subhash C. Mojumdar, G. Liptay, G. Pokol, Wim P. C. de Klerk, Paul van Ekeren, Joe Menczel, Eric Schoch, Jivaldo do Rosário Matos.

Last but not least, may I take this opportunity to express my sincere thanks and appreciation to the vast number of peer reviewers who have volunteered their knowledge without gaining any position or financial compensation. Without their assistance the high quality of the journal would not have been possible to attain. The level of the Journal is reflected in its impact factor which has constantly been increasing with the latest reaching 1.752 for 2010. It is worth mentioning here that the number of papers downloaded daily from the Springer website (http://www.springer.com/journal/10973) is between 2,000 and 3,000.

Due to the increased number of papers the page number of the journal will be extended to 4,800 pages/year keeping the monthly frequency in 2012. Regarding the technical preparation of the Journal, we are pleased with the efforts of the Publishers. The issues (both the electronic and paper ones) are published on time; in addition, the processing of the accepted articles is going fairly quickly.

On the last day of 2011, please close your eyes, make a wish, and do believe that our hopes will come true and a better world will arrive.