Many congratulations to our colleague Dr. Jitka Cejkova for receiving the 2021 International Society for Artificial Life (ISAL) Distinguished Early Career Researcher Award. Jitka is one of the most active researchers in the Artificial Life community, recently also winning the Best Paper Award and being entrusted with organising the ALIFE 2021 conference, which was a huge success. Congratulations for this well-deserved award!