Each year Journal of Animal Ecology awards the Elton Prize to the best Research Article in the journal by an early career researcher. Today we present the shortlisted papers for this year’s award, based on the 2021 (90^th) volume of the journal.

The winner will be selected in the coming weeks so follow the blog and watch this space for future announcements!

This year’s shortlisted candidates are:

Cristina Botías, Multiple stressors interact to impair the performance of bumblebee Bombus terrestris colonies

Ellen Brandell, Group density, disease, and season shape territory size and overlap of social carnivores

Joseph Burant, Early warning indicators of population collapse in a seasonal environment

Félicie Dhellemmes, Personality-driven life history trade-offs differ in two subpopulations of free-ranging predators

Phoebe Edwards, A mechanism for population self-regulation: Social density suppresses GnRH expression and reduces reproductivity in voles

Emily Le Sage, Preparatory immunity: Seasonality of mucosal skin defences and Batrachochytrium infections in Southern leopard frogs

Tamika Lunn, Spatial dynamics of pathogen transmission in communally roosting species: Impacts of changing habitats on bat-virus dynamics

Kate Pereira Maia, Interaction generalisation and demographic feedbacks drive the resilience of plant–insect networks to extinctions

Allison M. Roth, Sexual selection and personality: Individual and group-level effects on mating behaviour in red junglefowl