JASB is supported by the Chinese Association of Animal Science and Veterinary Medicine and it will cover the article-processing charges (APCs), levied for each accepted article, for all authors. It will continue to deliver a selection of original research, reviews, methods, short reports, letters and protocols.

The first articles published on the BioMed Central platform have been chosen to reflect the scope and standard of the journal. They include a study from Watford et al., which provides support for the glutamine supplementation in lactating gilts; Davis et al. look at the role of leucine and mTORC1-dependent pathway in the differentiation of skeletal muscle protein synthesis; a review by Kang et al. discusses a recent method used in research on miRNA biomarkers; Kang and Gao review pluripotency of induced pluripotent stem cells. Their review includes discussion of the potential clinical use of iPS cells to cure numerous diseases due to the direct reprogramming of differentiated somatic cells into iPS cells.

Excited by the re-launch, Editor-in-Chief Defa Li said in his editorial:

"We are fully committed to conducting thorough peer review and strive to keep the high standards of the journal.  We also hope to provide our authors, reviewers and readers a better publishing and reading experience with this new platform. Journal of Animal Science and Biotechnology welcomes your best work for rapid open access publication!”