The 5th Palaeontological Virtual Congress: Building a Global Community Without Borders (1st part)

books of previous editions (Crespo et al., 2018; Vlachos et al., 2020, 2021, 2023). The books are available on the PalaeoVC website (https:// www. palae ovc. org/). In all the editions of the congress, there has been a spe- cial publication for the contributors. The prestigious journal Paläontologische Zeitschrift (PalZ) compiles the contribu- tions of the 5th PVC. This year, due to the large number and high quality of articles, full-length articles will be published in multiple volumes throughout the year, with this being the first part. The articles in this volume belonging to the 5th PVC are: Dankina et al. (2026), in which the authors revise the Devonian ichthyofauna of the Valiukevičius collection from Belarus and Lithuania, documenting several taxa for Fig. 1 Logo of the 5th Palaeontological Virtual Congress, designed by Hugo Salais Fig. 2 The international organizing team of the 5th PVC; a Vicente D. Crespo; b Alba Sánchez-García; c Arturo Gamonal; d Javier González-Dionis; e María Ríos Ibáñez; f Rosalía Guerrero-Arenas; g Fernando Antonio Martín Arnal; h Eduardo Jiménez-Hidalgo; i Evangelos Vlachos; j Aylen Allende Mosquera 3 The 5th Palaeontological Virtual Congress: Building a Global Community… the first time in these regions and significantly refining their palaeogeographic distribution and biostratigraphic correla- tions across Laurasia; and Aftab et al. (2026), in which the authors describe new Mio–Pliocene bovid material from the Middle Siwalik Subgroup of Pakistan, refining the anatomi- cal and morphometric characterization of Selenoportax vex- illarius, Tragoportax punjabicus, and Pachyportax latidens and highlighting the presence of derived endemic bovids between 10.2 and 3.4 Ma. Accessibility, however, is not only about format. Con- tinued efforts have been made to reduce economic barriers, particularly for researchers from low- and middle-income countries. Fee waivers and the support of an active network of ambassadors contribute to widening participation and extending the reach of the congress to communities that are often underrepresented in global academic events, resulting in 165 fee waivers and an ongoing effort to reach partici- pants in