During the course of 2009 the Nature Reviews Cardiology editorial team were shocked and saddened to learn of the deaths of two of our esteemed advisory board members, Philip Poole-Wilson and Helmut Drexler. In addition to interactions with them in their roles on the journal's advisory board, we had the privilege of working with them on several articles over the past 5 years.

Philip Poole-Wilson was a world renowned expert on heart failure and coronary heart disease, and his work covered the whole spectrum of 'bench to bedside'. Professor Poole-Wilson retired in 2008, but continued working as an Honorary Consultant at Imperial College London in the UK, where he had been the British Heart Foundation Simon Marks Professor of Cardiology for many years. As past president of the World Heart Federation and the European Society of Cardiology, we were honored when Professor Poole-Wilson accepted our invitation to join the journal's advisory board in 2006. His guidence during his 3 years on our advisory board was invaluable.

Helmut Drexler was a Professor of Medicine and Chief of Cardiology at the Hannover Medical School in Germany. Throughout his career, Professor Drexler's work centered on heart failure, and in later years he focused his attention on stem cell therapy. Professor Drexler joined our advisory board in 2004, when we launched the journal under the title Nature Clinical Practice Cardiovascular Medicine. Despite his commitments on various societies and associations, task forces for guidelines, and editorial boards for other cardiology journals, Professor Drexler always made time to provide expert advice to the editorial team.

For both, their work was also their hobby. They were valued members of our advisory board and of the cardiology community as a whole. Professor Philip Poole-Wilson and Professor Helmut Drexler will be sorely missed.

The Nature Reviews Cardiology editorial team