Journal subject areas
The journal subject areas are defined by the following index terms below. These terms represent the keywords to be chosen for assignment of submitted manuscripts to individual topic editors.
| Anatomy and embryology | Wolfgang Knabe, Hans-Jürg Kuhn, Ulrich Zeller |
| Animal welfare and husbandry | Augusto Vitale, Sarah Wolfensohn |
| Behaviour | Julia Ostner, Ute Radespiel |
| Cognition and communication | Julia Fischer |
| Conservation | Jonah Ratsimbazafy, Christian Roos, Dietmar Zinner |
| Ecology and biogeography | Russell Hill, Christian Roos |
| Evolution, phylogeny and palaeontology | Rebecca R. Ackermann, Sarah Elton, Christian Roos |
| Genetics | Christian Roos, Jenny Tung, Linda Vigilant |
| Immunology | Peter Horn |
| Infection biology | Heinz Feldmann, Frank Kirchhoff, Sascha Knauf, Fabian Leendertz |
| Neurosciences | Eberhard Fuchs, Angela Roberts, Stefan Treue |
| Pathology | Anne Lewis, Keith G. Mansfield |
| Physiology | Catherine Crockford, Gerhard Weinbauer |
| Reproductive biology | Stefan Schlatt |
| Stem cell biology | Rüdiger Behr, Ulrich Martin, Erika Sasaki |