With this issue, we are starting our second year as Editors of Biometrical Journal. The reorganization of the editorial and reviewing system as well as the implementation of the new concept of Biometrical Journal into practice kept us busy all over the past year. We will give a more detailed report in the next issue. The successful work of editors very much depends on the people: authors, reviewers, associate editors and editorial staff. We have been in a very splendid situation in that we received generous support from many colleagues and we would like to thank them all for their help and their tremendous efforts to further improve the quality of articles to be published in Biometrical Journal.
The first issue of the year 2005 is devoted to a special topic of particular interest, namely on "Therapeutic Equivalence". In this issue, carefully selected and edited by the guest editors Axel Munk and Hans Joachim Trampisch, new methodological developments in this field are presented and put into perspective with special emphasis on regulatory aspects. We hope that with this new form of presenting special topics in a comprehensive and concise manner, we can further improve the attractiveness and international recognition of Biometrical Journal as an application-oriented forum for the publication and discussion of methodological developments.
This issue is connected with the name of our colleague Joachim Raehmel in a very special way: As a biostatistician he provided a series of outstanding methodological contributions to this particular field, as the statistical expert and representative of the German regulatory authorities (BfArM) he ensured that statistical principles were observed and integrated into regulatory processes and, last but not least, as the President of the German Region of the International Biometric Society he was one of the initiators and promoters of the new concept of Biometrical Journal. As he retired recently from his position at BfArM we think that it is just the right time to express our sincere thanks in dedicating this issue to him as some kind of "Festschrift" honouring his contributions. We would also like to wish him all the best for the years coming and we hope that he will continue in supporting our journal in the future as author, discussant and Associate Editor.