After reading and enjoying so many Wisenet journals over the years, it has been a pleasure and privilege to co-ordinate the production of this issue from the Sydney Link group. The Journal is a marvellous resource that Wisenet contributes to its members, and beyond, through making this available on the Wisenet website after publication. Like most readers, I’m also a member of other organisations, some of which provide newsletters to their members. However, I look forward to the arrival of my Wisenet journal like no other. It goes home with me the day it arrives, and is read from cover to cover the same night. However, when it came to editing an issue, these same past journals became a source of anxiety. Would we be able to produce something that I would also want to tear the wrapper off, and read cover-to-cover?? Thanks to our dedicated and inspired contributors, I hope you’ll find this to be the case.

The title of this issue, “Seeds of change”, was inspired by the beautiful images provided by one of our editors, Amelia Martyn, from the Mount Annan Botanic Garden. Seeds seemed to also represent many of the articles in this issue, which celebrate the work of Sydney women, discuss remaining difficulties for women working in science, and provide concrete examples of how we can collectively promote change. Sometimes my colleagues raise their eyebrows when I mention that I’m a member of Wisenet, murmuring that perhaps such an organisation isn’t really necessary today. I say by reply that I really wish it weren’t necessary. I don’t like to think that I have any disadvantage in my chosen field due to something as immutable as my gender, but as highlighted in this issue, inequities for women do remain. For these to ultimately disappear, we must continue to speak out against gender bias, and work in constructive ways to ensure equal opportunity for all scientists. We know, after all, that this is in everyone’s best interests, as we need the best talent available, fuelled by diversity in all its forms, to produce better and faster answers to the problems confronting life on earth today.

The Sydney link group has shown marvellous enthusiasm towards this journal project, and I thank all of the contributors for their time and inspiration. I would also like to sincerely thank Amelia Martyn and Gabi O’Sullivan for their dedicated editorial work, Sue Henderson for her lay-out work, and Anna Robinson, Diana Temple, Rosemary Sutton and Rosemary White for their advice and encouragement.