We have published the first two issues of volume 33 and are completing the June issue. Although it appears that we cannot repeat the record size of volume 32, we should meet or exceed our goal of 720 printed pages. Volume 32 (2016) was the first year with Elsevier as publisher, and I express appreciation to Emma Bruun for providing usage information. I am pleased that ARPAS members increased usage from a monthly average of 989 downloads in 2016 to 1,392 downloads per month thus far in 2017.

Institutional subscribers access PAS differently using Science Direct, and during February 2017 full-text downloads totaled 1,170. Institutional usage is increasing, and we expect the trend to continue. The articles most-often downloaded during February were “Symposium Paper: Transportation issues affecting cattle well-being and consideration for the future” and “Management characteristics of beef cattle production in the Northern Plains and Midwest regions of the United States,” from the December issue of PAS. Third ranked was the recent (February issue) article “Feeding vitamin E may reverse sarcoplasmic reticulum membrane instability caused by feeding wet distillers grains plus solubles to cattle,” and seven other articles were downloaded 20 or more times during February.

In March Elsevier began a marketing campaign to promote the five most-downloaded articles from PAS volume 32:

•   The roles of forage management, forage quality, and forage allowance in grazing research;

•   Getting more information from your grazing research beyond cattle performance;

•   Designing a grazing experiment that can reliably detect meaningful differences;

•   Comparison of 3 alternatives for large-scale processing of animal carcasses and meat by-products; and

•   Effects of growth promoting implant strategies on performance of pre- and postweaned beef calves.

It will be awhile before specific results of the marketing effort are available, but DOI reported that access to the PAS journal during March increased 3-fold (6,394 compared to ~2,130) over recent months.

To denote National Autism Awareness Month (and in support of PAS), Elsevier interviewed Temple Grandin and placed the news story on the front page of their main website in April. The full news story is available here: https://www.elsevier.com/connect/temple-grandin-on-the-kinds-of-minds-science-desperately-needs.

I invite scientific research papers, technical notes, and case studies along with reviews that provide updated information and insight into topics of interest to our readers. To submit an article, go to the PAS Scholar One website. (http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/pas). I believe the above paragraphs demonstrate that the resulting articles will receive the desired exposure to scientists via Science Direct as well as to ARPAS members who have free access to all the articles published in PAS. If you, or another member, have difficulty accessing the articles in previous issues, please contact the FASS office.