Today we are pleased to announce that to Daniel J. Becker has won the second Sidnie Manton Award for his paper ‘Macroimmunology: The drivers and consequences of spatial patterns in wildlife immune defence’. Daniel is a postdoctoral fellow at Indiana University. His research explores the ecological and evolutionary factors that shape infectious disease dynamics in wildlife and cross-species transmission.

Daniel’s paper was selected as a winner from a shortlist of four excellent papers. All the shortlisted papers were excellent, topical examples of top-quality Reviews.

Daniel’s paper provides both a synthesis and a primer on the application of macroecological techniques to the study of eco-immunology, coining the term for an emerging field of ‘macroimmunology’, and providing new guidance for spatially-replicated and spatially-controlled approaches to discovering patterns and identifying large-scale ecological drivers of variation in animal disease burden and immunity. Furthermore, the Editors were impressed by the very clear research directions and priorities presented in the paper.

In light of global challenges highlighted by emerging diseases, and to celebrate Daniel’s winning paper, Journal of Animal Ecology has collated this Virtual Issue many of the journals numerous contributions to disease ecology in the context of habitat variation and environmental change.

Third Sidnie Manton Award

To be considered for the next round of the Sidnie Manton Award Early Career researchers should simply submit their Synthesis or Review paper directly to the journal and mention in the cover letter that it is to be considered for the Award. Early Career Researchers are welcome to send presubmission enquires for potential submissions to be considered by a Senior Editor but it is not necessary to do so. We are simplifying the process to enter the award to allow us to present the Sidnie Manton Award annually.

Submit here