Manuscript files can be in the following formats: DOC, DOCX, or RTF. Microsoft Word documents should not be locked or protected.
Length
There are no restrictions on word count, number of figures, or amount of supporting information.
Font
Use a standard font size and any standard font,
Headings
Limit manuscript sections and sub-sections to 3 heading levels. Make sure heading levels are clearly indicated in the manuscript text.
Layout and spacing
Manuscript text should be double-spaced. Use single format.
Page and line numbers
Include page numbers and line numbers in the manuscript file. Use continuous line numbers.
Language
Manuscripts must be submitted in English.
Abbreviations
Define abbreviations upon first appearance in the text.
Do not use non-standard abbreviations unless they appear at least three times in the text.
Reference style
Modern Research uses “Vancouver” style.
Nomenclature
Use SI units. If you do not use these exclusively, provide the SI value in parentheses after each value.
Manuscript Organization
Manuscripts should be organized as follows. Instructions for each element appear below the list.
Beginning section
The following elements are required, in order:
Title page: List title, authors, and affiliations as first page of manuscript
Abstract
Introduction
Middle section
Materials and Methods
Results
Discussion
Conclusions
Ending section
Acknowledgments
References
Supporting information (if applicable)
Other elements
Figure captions are inserted immediately after the first paragraph in which the figure is cited. Figure files are uploaded separately.
Tables are inserted immediately after the first paragraph in which they are cited.
Supporting information files are uploaded separately.
Parts of a Submission
Title
Include a full title and a short title for the manuscript.
Title
Length
Guidelines
Full title
250 characters
Specific, descriptive, concise, and comprehensible to readers outside the field
Short title
100 characters
State the topic of the study
Titles should be written in sentence case (only the first word of the text, proper nouns, and genus names are capitalized).
Author list
Authorship requirements
Those who contributed to the work but do not meet the criteria for authorship can be mentioned in the Acknowledgments. The corresponding author must provide an ORCID iD at the time of submission by entering it in the user profile in the submission system.
Author names and affiliations
Enter author names on the title page of the manuscript and in the online submission system.
On the title page, write author names in the following order:
First name (or initials, if used)
Middle name (or initials, if used)
Last name (surname, family name)
Each author on the list must have an affiliation. The affiliation includes department, university, or organizational affiliation and its location, including city, state/province (if applicable), and country. Authors have the option to include a current address in addition to the address of their affiliation at the time of the study. The current address should be listed in the byline and clearly labeled “current address.” At a minimum, the address must include the author’s current institution, city, and country.
If an author has multiple affiliations, enter all affiliations on the title page only. In the submission system, enter only the preferred or primary affiliation. Author affiliations will be listed in the typeset PDF article in the same order that authors are listed in the submission.
Author names will be published exactly as they appear in the manuscript file. Please double-check the information carefully to make sure it is correct.
Corresponding author
The submitting author is automatically designated as the corresponding author in the submission system. The corresponding author is the primary contact for the journal office and the only author able to view or change the manuscript while it is under editorial consideration.
The corresponding author role may be transferred to another coauthor. However, note that transferring the corresponding author role also transfers access to the manuscript. (To designate a new corresponding author while the manuscript is still under consideration, watch the video tutorial below.)
Author contributions
Provide at minimum one contribution for each author in the submission system.
Contributions will be published with the final article, and they should accurately reflect contributions to the work. The submitting author is responsible for completing this information at submission, and we expect that all authors will have reviewed, discussed, and agreed to their individual contributions ahead of this time.
Cover letter
Upload a cover letter as a separate file in the online system. The length limit is 1 page.
The cover letter should include the following information:
Summarize the study’s contribution to the scientific literature
Relate the study to previously published work
Specify the type of article (for example, research article, systematic review, meta-analysis, clinical trial)
Title page
The title, authors, and affiliations should all be included on a title page as the first page of the manuscript file.
Abstract
The Abstract comes after the title page in the manuscript file. The abstract text is also entered in a separate field in the submission system.
The Abstract should:
Describe the main objective(s) of the study
Explain how the study was done, including any model organisms used, without methodological detail
Summarize the most important results and their significance
Not exceed 250 words
Abstracts should not include:
Citations
Abbreviations, if possible
Introduction
The introduction should:
Provide background that puts the manuscript into context and allows readers outside the field to understand the purpose and significance of the study
Define the problem addressed and why it is important
Include a brief review of the key literature
Note any relevant controversies or disagreements in the field
Conclude with a brief statement of the overall aim of the work and a comment about whether that aim was achieved
Materials and Methods
The Materials and Methods section should provide enough detail to allow suitably skilled investigators to fully replicate your study. Specific information and/or protocols for new methods should be included in detail. If materials, methods, and protocols are well established, authors may cite articles where those protocols are described in detail, but the submission should include sufficient information to be understood independent of these references.
Human or animal subjects and/or tissue or field sampling
Methods sections describing research using human or animal subjects and/or tissue or field sampling must include required ethics statements.
Data
Large data sets, including raw data, may be deposited in an appropriate public repository.
For smaller data sets and certain data types, authors may provide their data within supporting information files accompanying the manuscript. Authors should take care to maximize the accessibility and reusability of the data by selecting a file format from which data can be efficiently extracted (for example, spreadsheets or flat files should be provided rather than PDFs when providing tabulated data).
Cell lines
Methods sections describing research using cell lines must state the origin of the cell lines used.
Results, Discussion, Conclusions
These sections may all be separate, or may be combined to create a mixed Results/Discussion section (commonly labeled “Results and Discussion”) or a mixed Discussion/Conclusions section (commonly labeled “Discussion”). These sections may be further divided into subsections, each with a concise subheading, as appropriate. These sections have no word limit, but the language should be clear and concise. Together, these sections should describe the results of the experiments, the interpretation of these results, and the conclusions that can be drawn. Authors should explain how the results relate to the hypothesis presented as the basis of the study and provide a succinct explanation of the implications of the findings, particularly in relation to previous related studies and potential future directions for research.
Acknowledgments
Those who contributed to the work but do not meet our authorship criteria should be listed in the Acknowledgments with a description of the contribution. Authors are responsible for ensuring that anyone named in the Acknowledgments agrees to be named.
References
Any and all available works can be cited in the reference list. Acceptable sources include:
Published or accepted manuscripts
Manuscripts on preprint servers, providing the manuscript has a citable DOI or arXiv URL.
Do not cite the following sources in the reference list:
Unavailable and unpublished work, including manuscripts that have been submitted but not yet accepted (e.g., “unpublished work,” “data not shown”). Instead, include those data as supplementary material or deposit the data in a publicly available database.
Personal communications (these should be supported by a letter from the relevant authors but not included in the reference list)
References are listed at the end of the manuscript and numbered in the order that they appear in the text. In the text, cite the reference number in square brackets (e.g., “We used the techniques developed by our colleagues [19] to analyze the data”). Modern Research uses the numbered citation (citation-sequence) method and first six authors, et al.
Do not include citations in abstracts or author summaries.
Formatting references
Because all references will be linked electronically as much as possible to the papers they cite, proper formatting of the references is crucial.
Modern Research uses the “Vancouver” style. Example formats are listed below.
Hou WR, Hou YL, Wu GF, Song Y, Su XL, Sun B, et al. cDNA, genomic sequence cloning and overexpression of ribosomal protein gene L9 (rpL9) of the giant panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca). Genet Mol Res. 2011;10: 1576-1588.
Devaraju P, Gulati R, Antony PT, Mithun CB, Negi VS. Susceptibility to SLE in South Indian Tamils may be influenced by genetic selection pressure on TLR2 and TLR9 genes. Mol Immunol. 2014 Nov 22. pii: S0161-5890(14)00313-7. doi: 10.1016/j.molimm.2014.11.005.
Note: A DOI number for the full-text article is acceptable as an alternative to or in addition to traditional volume and page numbers. When providing a DOI, adhere to the format in the example above with both the label and full DOI included at the end of the reference (doi: 10.1016/j.molimm.2014.11.005). Do not provide a shortened DOI or the URL.
Accepted, unpublished articles
Same as published articles, but substitute “Forthcoming” for page numbers or DOI.
Online articles
Huynen MMTE, Martens P, Hilderlink HBM. The health impacts of globalisation: a conceptual framework. Global Health. 2005;1: 14. Available from: http://www.globalizationandhealth.com/content/1/1/14
Books
Bates B. Bargaining for life: A social history of tuberculosis. 1st ed. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press; 1992.
Book chapters
Hansen B. New York City epidemics and history for the public. In: Harden VA, Risse GB, editors. AIDS and the historian. Bethesda: National Institutes of Health; 1991. pp. 21-28.
Deposited articles(preprints, e-prints, or arXiv)
Krick T, Shub DA, Verstraete N, Ferreiro DU, Alonso LG, Shub M, et al. Amino acid metabolism conflicts with protein diversity; 1991. Preprint. Available from: arXiv:1403.3301v1. Cited 17 March 2014.
Published media (print or online newspapers and magazine articles)
Fountain H. For Already Vulnerable Penguins, Study Finds Climate Change Is Another Danger. The New York Times. 29 Jan 2014. Available from: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/30/science/earth/climate-change-taking-toll-on-penguins-study-finds.html Cited 17 March 2014.
New media (blogs, web sites, or other written works)
Allen L. Announcing PLOS Blogs. 2010 Sep 1 [cited 17 March 2014]. In: PLOS Blogs [Internet]. San Francisco: PLOS 2006 - . [about 2 screens]. Available from: http://blogs.plos.org/plos/2010/09/announcing-plos-blogs/.
Masters' theses or doctoral dissertations
Wells A. Exploring the development of the independent, electronic, scholarly journal. M.Sc. Thesis, The University of Sheffield. 1999. Available from: http://cumincad.scix.net/cgi-bin/works/Show?2e09
Databases and repositories (Figshare, arXiv)
Roberts SB. QPX Genome Browser Feature Tracks; 2013 [cited 2013 Oct 5]. Database: figshare [Internet]. Available from: http://figshare.com/articles/QPX_Genome_Browser_Feature_Tracks/701214
Multimedia (videos, movies, or TV shows)
Hitchcock A, producer and director. Rear Window [Film]; 1954. Los Angeles: MGM.
Supporting Information
Authors can submit essential supporting files and multimedia files along with their manuscripts. All supporting information will be subject to peer review. All file types can be submitted, but files must be smaller than 10 MB in size.
Authors may use almost any description as the item name for a supporting information file as long as it contains an “S” and number. For example, “S1 Appendix” and “S2 Appendix,” “S1 Table” and “S2 Table,” and so forth.
Supporting information files are published exactly as provided, and are not copyedited.
Supporting information captions
List supporting information captions at the end of the manuscript file. Do not submit captions in a separate file.
The file number and name are required in a caption, and we highly recommend including a one-line title as well. You may also include a legend in your caption, but it is not required.
Figures and Tables
Figures
Do not include figures in the main manuscript file. Each figure must be prepared and submitted as an individual file.
Cite figures in ascending numeric order at first appearance in the manuscript file.
Figure captions
Figure captions must be inserted in the text of the manuscript, immediately following the paragraph in which the figure is first cited (read order). Do not include captions as part of the figure files themselves or submit them in a separate document.
At a minimum, include the following in your figure captions:
A figure label with Arabic numerals, and “Figure” abbreviated to “Fig” (e.g. Fig 1, Fig 2, Fig 3, etc). Match the label of your figure with the name of the file uploaded at submission (e.g. a figure citation of “Fig 1” must refer to a figure file named “Fig1.tif”).
A concise, descriptive title
Tables
Cite tables in ascending numeric order upon first appearance in the manuscript file. Place each table in your manuscript file directly after the paragraph in which it is first cited (read order). Do not submit your tables in separate files. Tables require a label (e.g., “Table 1”) and brief descriptive title to be placed above the table. Place legends, footnotes, and other text below the table.
Additional Information Requested at Submission
Financial Disclosure Statement
This information should describe sources of funding that have supported the work. It is important to gather these details prior to submission because your financial disclosure statement cannot be changed after initial submission without journal approval. If your manuscript is published, your statement will appear in the Funding section of the article.
Enter this statement in the Financial Disclosure section of the submission form. Do not include it in your manuscript file.
The statement should include:
Specific grant numbers
Initials of authors who received each award
Full names of commercial companies that funded the study or authors
Initials of authors who received salary or other funding from commercial companies
URLs to sponsors’ websites
Also state whether any sponsors or funders (other than the named authors) played any role in:
Study design
Data collection and analysis
Decision to publish
Preparation of the manuscript
If they had no role in the research, include this sentence: “The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.”
If the study was unfunded, include this sentence as the Financial Disclosure statement: “The author(s) received no specific funding for this work."
Competing Interests
This information should not be in your manuscript file; you will provide it via our submission system. All potential competing interests must be declared in full. If the submission is related to any patents, patent applications, or products in development or for market, these details, including patent numbers and titles, must be disclosed in full.
Guidelines for Specific Study Types
Human subjects research
All research involving human participants must have been approved by the authors’ Institutional Review Board (IRB) or by equivalent ethics committee(s), and must have been conducted according to the principles expressed in the Declaration of Helsinki. Authors should be able to submit, upon request, a statement from the IRB or ethics committee indicating approval of the research. We reserve the right to reject work that we believe has not been conducted to a high ethical standard, even when formal approval has been obtained.
Subjects must have been properly instructed and have indicated that they consent to participate by signing the appropriate informed consent paperwork. Authors may be asked to submit a blank, sample copy of a subject consent form. If consent was verbal instead of written, or if consent could not be obtained, the authors must explain the reason in the manuscript, and the use of verbal consent or the lack of consent must have been approved by the IRB or ethics committee.
Methods sections of papers on research using human subjects or samples must include ethics statements that specify:
The name of the approving institutional review board or equivalent committee(s). If approval was not obtained, the authors must provide a detailed statement explaining why it was not needed
Whether informed consent was written or oral. If informed consent was oral, it must be stated in the manuscript:
Why written consent could not be obtained
That the Institutional Review Board (IRB) approved use of oral consent
How oral consent was documented
For studies involving humans categorized by race/ethnicity, age, disease/disabilities, religion, sex/gender, sexual orientation, or other socially constructed groupings, authors should:
Explicitly describe their methods of categorizing human populations
Define categories in as much detail as the study protocol allows
Justify their choices of definitions and categories, including for example whether any rules of human categorization were required by their funding agency
Explain whether (and if so, how) they controlled for confounding variables such as socioeconomic status, nutrition, environmental exposures, or similar factors in their analysis
In addition, outmoded terms and potentially stigmatizing labels should be changed to more current, acceptable terminology. Examples: “Caucasian” should be changed to “white” or “of [Western] European descent” (as appropriate); “cancer victims” should be changed to “patients with cancer.”
Animal research
All research involving vertebrates or cephalopods must have approval from the authors' Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) or equivalent ethics committee(s), and must have been conducted according to applicable national and international guidelines. Approval must be received prior to beginning research.
Manuscripts reporting animal research must state in the Methods section:
The full name of the relevant ethics committee that approved the work, and the associated permit number(s).
Where ethical approval is not required, the manuscript should include a clear statement of this and the reason why. Provide any relevant regulations under which the study is exempt from the requirement for approval.
Relevant details of steps taken to ameliorate animal suffering.
Example ethics statement
This study was carried out in strict accordance with the recommendations in the Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals of the National Institutes of Health. The protocol was approved by the Committee on the Ethics of Animal Experiments of the University of Minnesota (Protocol Number: 27-2956). All surgery was performed under sodium pentobarbital anesthesia, and all efforts were made to minimize suffering.
Authors should always state the organism(s) studied in the Abstract. Where the study may be confused as pertaining to clinical research, authors should also state the animal model in the title.
Cell lines
Authors reporting research using cell lines should state when and where they obtained the cells, giving the date and the name of the researcher, cell line repository, or commercial source (company) who provided the cells, as appropriate.
Authors must also include the following information for each cell line:
Details of institutional review board or ethics committee approval; AND
For human cells, confirmation of written informed consent from the donor, guardian, or next of kin
For established cell lines, the Methods section should include:
A reference to the published article that first described the cell line; AND/OR
The cell line repository or company the cell line was obtained from, the catalogue number, and whether the cell line was obtained directly from the repository/company or from another laboratory
Blots and gels
Manuscripts reporting results from blots (including Western blots) and electrophoretic gels should follow these guidelines:
All blots and gels that support results reported in the manuscript should be provided.
Original uncropped and unadjusted blots and gels, including molecular size markers, should be provided in either the figures or the supplementary files.
Lanes should not be overcropped around the bands; the image should show most or all of the blot or gel. Any non-specific bands should be shown and an explanation of their nature should be given.
The image should include all relevant controls, and controls should be run on the same blot or gel as the samples.
A figure panel should not include composite images of bands originating from different blots or gels. If the figure shows non-adjacent bands from the same blot or gel, this should be clearly denoted by vertical black lines and the figure legend should provide details of how the figure was made.
Antibodies
Manuscripts reporting experiments using antibodies should include the following information:
The name of each antibody, a description of whether it is monoclonal or polyclonal, and the host species.
The commercial supplier or source laboratory.
The catalogue or clone number and, if known, the batch number.
The antigen(s) used to raise the antibody.
The manuscript should also report the following experimental details:
The final antibody concentration or dilution.
A reference to the validation study if the antibody was previously validated. If not, provide details of how the authors validated the antibody for the applications and species used.
Small and macromolecule crystal data
Manuscripts reporting new and unpublished three-dimensional structures must include sufficient supporting data and detailed descriptions of the methodologies used to allow the reproduction and validation of the structures. All novel structures must have been deposited in a community endorsed database prior to submission.
Small molecule single crystal data
Authors reporting X-Ray crystallographic structures of small organic, metal-organic, and inorganic molecules must deposit their data with the Cambridge Crystallographic Data Centre (CCDC), the Inorganic Crystal Structure Database (ICSD), or similar community databases providing a recognized validation functionality. Authors are also required to include the relevant structure reference numbers within the main text (e.g. the CCDC ID number), as well as the crystallographic information files (.cif format) as Supplementary Information, along with the checkCIF validation reports that can be obtained via the International Union of Crystallography (IUCr).
Macromolecular structures
Authors reporting novel macromolecular structures must have deposited their data prior to submission with the Worldwide Protein Data Bank (wwPDB), the Biological Magnetic Resonance Data Bank (BMRB), the Electron Microscopy Data Bank (EMDB), or other community databases providing a recognized validation functionality. Authors must include the structure reference numbers within the main text and submit as Supplementary Information the official validation reports from these databases.
Methods, software, databases, and tools
Modern Research will consider submissions that present new methods, software, databases, or tools as the primary focus of the manuscript if they meet the following criteria:
Utility The tool must be of use to the community and must present a proven advantage over existing alternatives, where applicable. Recapitulation of existing methods, software, or databases is not useful and will not be considered for publication. Combining data and/or functionalities from other sources may be acceptable, but simpler instances (i.e. presenting a subset of an already existing database) may not be considered. For software, databases, and online tools, the long-term utility should also be discussed, as relevant. This discussion may include maintenance, the potential for future growth, and the stability of the hosting, as applicable.
Validation Submissions presenting methods, software, databases, or tools must demonstrate that the new tool achieves its intended purpose. If similar options already exist, the submitted manuscript must demonstrate that the new tool is an improvement over existing options in some way. This requirement may be met by including a proof-of-principle experiment or analysis; if this is not possible, a discussion of the possible applications and some preliminary analysis may be sufficient.
Software submissions
Manuscripts whose primary purpose is the description of new software must provide full details of the algorithms designed. Describe any dependencies on commercial products or operating system. Include details of the supplied test data and explain how to install and run the software. A brief description of enhancements made in the major releases of the software may also be given. Authors should provide a direct link to the deposited software from within the paper.
Database submissions
For descriptions of databases, provide details about how the data were curated, as well as plans for long-term database maintenance, growth, and stability. Authors should provide a direct link to the database hosting site from within the paper.
Botanical names
When publishing papers that describe a new botanical taxon, Modern Research aims to comply with the requirements of the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (ICN). The following guidelines for publication in an online-only journal have been agreed such that any scientific botanical name published by us is considered effectively published under the rules of the Code. Please note that these guidelines differ from those for zoological nomenclature, and apply only to seed plants, ferns, and lycophytes.
Effective January 2012, the description or diagnosis of a new taxon can be in either Latin or English. This does not affect the requirements for scientific names, which are still to be Latin.
Also effective January 2012, the electronic PDF represents a published work according to the ICN for algae, fungi, and plants. Therefore the new names contained in the electronic publication of Modern Research article are effectively published under that Code from the electronic edition alone, so there is no longer any need to provide printed copies.
For proper registration of the new taxon, we require two specific statements to be included in your manuscript.
Solanum aspersum S.Knapp, sp. nov. [urn:lsid:ipni.org:names:77103633-1] Type: Colombia. Putumayo: vertiente oriental de la Cordillera, entre Sachamates y San Francisco de Sibundoy, 1600-1750 m, 30 Dec 1940, J. Cuatrecasas 11471 (holotype, COL; isotypes, F [F-1335119], US [US-1799731]).
Journal staff will contact IPNI to obtain the GUID (LSID) after your manuscript is accepted for publication, and this information will then be added to the manuscript during the production phase
The electronic version of this article in Portable Document Format (PDF) in a work with an ISSN or ISBN will represent a published work according to the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants, and hence the new names contained in the electronic publication of a Modern Research article are effectively published under that Code from the electronic edition alone, so there is no longer any need to provide printed copies.
In addition, new names contained in this work have been submitted to IPNI, from where they will be made available to the Global Names Index. The IPNI LSIDs can be resolved and the associated information viewed through any standard web browser by appending the LSID contained in this publication to the prefix http://ipni.org/. The online version of this work is archived and available from the following digital repositories: [INSERT NAMES OF DIGITAL REPOSITORIES WHERE ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT WILL BE SUBMITTED (PubMed Central, LOCKSS etc)].
Fungal names
When publishing papers that describe a new botanical taxon, Modern Research aims to comply with the requirements of the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (ICN). The following guidelines for publication in an online-only journal have been agreed such that any scientific botanical name published by us is considered effectively published under the rules of the Code. Please note that these guidelines differ from those for zoological nomenclature.
Effective January 2012, the description or diagnosis of a new taxon can be in either Latin or English. This does not affect the requirements for scientific names, which are still to be Latin.
Also effective January 2012, the electronic PDF represents a published work according to the ICN for algae, fungi, and plants. Therefore the new names contained in the electronic publication of Modern Research article are effectively published under that Code from the electronic edition alone, so there is no longer any need to provide printed copies.
For proper registration of the new taxon, we require two specific statements to be included in your manuscript.
In the Results section, the globally unique identifier (GUID), currently in the form of a Life Science Identifier (LSID), should be listed under the new species name, for example:
Hymenogaster huthii. Stielow et al. 2010, sp. nov. [urn:lsid:indexfungorum.org:names:518624]
In the Methods section, include a sub-section called “Nomenclature” using the following wording (this example is for taxon names submitted to MycoBank; please substitute appropriately if you have submitted to Index Fungorum):
In addition, new names contained in this work have been submitted to MycoBank from where they will be made available to the Global Names Index. The unique MycoBank number can be resolved and the associated information viewed through any standard web browser by appending the MycoBank number contained in this publication to the prefix http://www.mycobank.org/MB/. The online version of this work is archived and available from the following digital repositories: [INSERT NAMES OF DIGITAL REPOSITORIES WHERE ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT WILL BE SUBMITTED (PubMed Central, LOCKSS etc)].