Guidelines for Authors

Manuscript will be carefully scrutinized for evidence of plagiarism, duplication and data manipulation; in particular, images will be carefully examined for any indication of intentional improper modification.

Any suspected misconduct ends up with a quick rejection and is then reported to the US Office of Research Integrity.

Ensure that your work is written in correct English before submission.
Professional copyediting can help authors improve the presentation of their work and increase its chances of being taken on by a publisher. In case you feel that your manuscript would benefit from a professional a professional English language copyediting checking language grammar and style, you can find a reliable revision service at:

The Corresponding Author must submit the manuscript online-only through our Manuscript Submission System.

Manuscript preparation

Manuscripts should be in either British or American English consistently throughout. Check for consistent spelling of names, terms, and abbreviations, including in tables and figure captions.

Each manuscript should be typewritten, double-spaced throughout; pages should be in A4 format and numbered, lines should be left numbered in continuum (10-digit numeric system). The manuscript can be submitted either as Word or PDF format.

The manuscript should be divided into: Title page; Abstract; Text; Acknowledgments; References; Tables; Figures; Tables/Figures legends.

The Title page must contain the following information: Title of the paper; full name and surname of author(s); full name, town and country of the institution(s) where the work was done; complete address (phone and fax numbers, E-mail address) of the corresponding author; key words (no more than seven); authors' contributions, i.e., information about the contributions of each person named as having participated in the study (http://www.icmje.org/#author); disclosures about potential conflict of interest.
The Abstract must be analytically informative.

Journal Sections

Research Articles: This is the most common type of journal manuscript used to publish full reports of data from research. It may be called an Original Article, Research Article, Research, or just Article. The Research Articles format is suitable for many different fields and different types of studies. It includes full Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion sections.
Requirements:  Abstract max. 400 words. Text must have a max. of 15000 words. Max. 15 tables/figures in total.

Short Reports or Letters: These papers communicate brief reports of data from original research that editors believe will be interesting to many researchers, and that will likely stimulate further research in the field. As they are relatively short the format is useful for scientists with results that are time sensitive (for example, those in highly competitive or quickly-changing disciplines). This format often has strict length limits, so some experimental details may not be published until the authors write a full Research Articles manuscript. These papers are also sometimes called Brief communications.
Requirements:  Abstract max. 400 words. Text must have a max. of 5000 words. Max. 5 tables/figures in total.

Hypothesis and Theories: The format is intended for papers that employ computational, theoretical, or analytical approaches to derive novel conceptual models with clearly experimentally testable predictions. Like Research and Resource articles, Theory papers must be of broad interest and written in a manner accessible to the general reader. They follow the same format and length guidelines as Research articles.
Requirements:  Abstract max. 400 words. Text must have a max. of 13000 words. Max. 15 tables/figures in total.

Review Articles: Review Articles provide a comprehensive summary of research on a certain topic, and a perspective on the state of the field and where it is heading. They are often written by leaders in a particular discipline after invitation from the editors of a journal. Reviews are often widely read (for example, by researchers looking for a full introduction to a field) and highly cited. Reviews commonly cite approximately 100 primary research articles.
Requirements:  Abstract max. 500 words. Text must have a max. of 20000 words. Max. 15 tables/figures in total.

Case Studies: These articles report specific instances of interesting phenomena. A goal of Case Studies is to make other researchers aware of the possibility that a specific phenomenon might occur. This type of study is often used in medicine to report the occurrence of previously unknown or emerging pathologies.
Requirements:  Abstract max. 400 words. Text must have a max. of 6000 words. Max. 55 tables/figures in total.

Clinical trials:  Once again, specific to the field of medicine, clinical trials describe the methodology, implementation, and results of controlled studies, usually undertaken with large patient groups. Clinical trial articles are also long, usually of about the same length as an original research article. Clinical trials also require practical work experience, as well as, high standards of ethics and reliability. So this format is more useful for experienced researchers.
Requirements:  Abstract max. 400 words. Text must have a max. of 13000 words. Max. 15 tables/figures in total.

Methodologies or Methods: These articles present a new experimental method, test or procedure. The method described may either be completely new, or may offer a better version of an existing method. The article should describe a demonstrable advance on what is currently available.
Requirements:  Abstract max. 350 words. Text must have a max. of 13000 words. Max. 15 tables/figures in total.

Perspectives, opinions, and commentaries: Perspective pieces are scholarly reviews of fundamental concepts or prevalent ideas in a field. These are usually essays that present a personal point of view critiquing widespread notions pertaining to a field. A perspective piece can be a review of a single concept or a few related concepts. These are considered as secondary literature and are usually short articles, around 2000 words.
Opinion articles present the author’s viewpoint on the interpretation, analysis, or methods used in a particular study. It allows the author to comment on the strength and weakness of a theory or hypothesis. Opinion articles are usually based on constructive criticism and should be backed by evidence. Such articles promote discussion on current issues concerning science. These are also relatively short articles.
Commentaries are short articles usually around 1000-1,500 words long that draw attention to or present a criticism of a previously published article, book, or report, explaining why it interested them and how it might be illuminating for readers.
Requirements:  Abstract max. 300 words. Text must have a max. of 4000 words. Max. 3 tables/figures in total.

Book reviews: The aim of a book review is to provide insight and opinion on recently published scholarly books. Book reviews are also relatively short articles and less time-consuming.
Requirements: Text must have a max. of 2000 words. Max. 3 tables/figures in total.

Tables and Figures

If tables are used, they should be double-spaced on separate pages. They should be numbered and cited in the text of the manuscript.
If figures are used, they must be submitted as .tiff or .jpg files, with the following digital resolution:

1. color (saved as CMYK): minimum 300 dpi;
2. black and white/grays: minimum 600 dpi;
3. one column width (8.5 cm) or 2 column widths (17.5 cm).

A different caption for each figure must be provided at the end of the manuscript, not included in the figure file.

Permissions
In case extracts (text/figures/tables) from other copyrighted works are included, the author(s) must obtain written permission from the copyright holder(s) and credit the source(s) in the article, for example: 'Adapted from Malatesta et al., Eur J Histochem 2009;53:e12; with permission.' The editorial office of European Journal of Histochemistry needs to receive a copy of the written permission before proceeding with publication. Please download here the 'License and Disclaimer'' agreement.

Other

If abbreviations are used in the text, authors are required to write full name+abbreviation in brackets [e.g. Multiple Myeloma (MM)] the first time they are used, then only abbreviations can be written (apart from titles; in this case authors have to write always the full name).
If names of equipment or substances are mentioned in the text, brand, company names and locations (city and state) for equipment and substances should be included in parentheses within the text.

References

References should be prepared strictly according to the Vancouver style. References must be numbered consecutively in the order in which they are first cited in the text (not alphabetical order), and they must be identified in the text by Arabic numerals in superscript. References in the main text must always be cited after dots and commas. References to personal communications and unpublished data should be incorporated in the text and not placed under the numbered references [Example: (Wright 2011, unpublished data) or (Wright 2011, personal communication)]. Where available, URLs for the references should be provided directly within the MS-Word document. References in the References section must be prepared as follows:

1. more than three authors, cite 3 authors, et al. If the paper has only 4 authors, cite all authors;
2. title style: sentence case; please use a capital letter only for the first word of the title;
3. journal titles mentioned in the References list should be abbreviated according to the following websites:
1. ISI Journal Abbreviations Index (http://library.caltech.edu/reference/abbreviations);
2. Biological Journals and Abbreviations (http://home.ncifcrf.gov/research/bja);
3. Medline List of Journal Titles (ftp://ftp.ncbi.nih.gov/pubmed/J_Medline.txt);
4. put year after the journal name;
5. never put month and day in the last part of the references;
6. cite only the volume (not the issue in brackets);
7. pages have to be abbreviated, e.g., 351-8.

To ensure the correct citation format, please check your references in the PubMed database (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed).

Examples:

Standard journal article
Halpern SD, Ubel PA, Caplan AL. Solid-organ transplantation in HIV-infected patients. N Engl J Med 2002;347:284-7.

Proceedings
Christensen S, Oppacher F. An analysis of Koza's computational effort statistic for genetic programming. In: Foster JA, Lutton E, Miller J, Ryan C, Tettamanzi AG, eds. Genetic programming. EuroGP 2002: Proceedings of the 5th European Conference on Genetic Programming, 2002 Apr 3-5, Kinsdale, Ireland. Berlin: Springer; 2002. pp 182-91.

Article with organization as author
Diabetes Prevention Program Research Group. Hypertension, insulin, and proinsulin in participants with impaired glucose tolerance. Hypertension 2002;40:679-86.

Books
- Murray PR, Rosenthal KS, Kobayashi GS, Pfaller MA. Medical microbiology. 4th ed. St. Louis, MO: Mosby; 2002.
- Bjørn Lomborg, ed. RethinkHIV - Smarter ways to invest in ending HIV in Sub-Saharan Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 2012.
- Meltzer PS, Kallioniemi A, Trent JM. Chromosome alterations in human solid tumors. In: Vogelstein B, Kinzler KW, eds. The genetic basis of human cancer. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill; 2002. pp 93-113.

Peer-review policy

All manuscripts submitted to our journal are critically assessed by external and/or in-house experts in accordance with the principles of peer review (http://www.icmje.org/#peer), which is fundamental to the scientific publication process and the dissemination of sound science. Each paper is first assigned by the Editors to an appropriate Associate Editor who has knowledge of the field discussed in the manuscript. The first step of manuscript selection takes place entirely in-house and has two major objectives: i) to establish the article appropriateness for our journals readership; ii) to define the manuscript priority ranking relative to other manuscripts under consideration, since the number of papers that the journal receives is much greater than it can publish. If a manuscript does not receive a sufficiently high priority score to warrant publication, the editors will proceed to a quick rejection. The remaining articles are reviewed by at least two different external referees (second step or classical peer review). Manuscripts should be prepared according to the Uniform Requirements established by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) (http://www.icmje.org/#prepare).

Authorship and Contributorship
All persons designated as authors should qualify for authorship according to the ICMJE criteria. Each author should have participated sufficiently in the work to take public responsibility for the content. Authorship credit should only be based on substantial contributions to: i) conception and design, or analysis and interpretation of data, and to ii) drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content; and on iii) final approval of the version to be published; and iv) agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work. Participation solely in the acquisition of funding or the collection of data does not justify authorship. General supervision of the research group is not sufficient for authorship. Authors should provide a brief description of their individual contributions. Those who do not meet all four criteria should not be listed as authors, but they should be acknowledged. Those whose contributions do not justify authorship may be acknowledged individually or together as a group under a single heading. Authors can find detailed information on the Publisher's web site.

Obligation to Register Clinical Trials 
The ICMJE believes that it is important to foster a comprehensive, publicly available database of clinical trials. The ICMJE defines a clinical trial as any research project that prospectively assigns human subjects to intervention or concurrent comparison or control groups to study the cause-and-effect relationship between a medical intervention and a health outcome. Medical interventions include drugs, surgical procedures, devices, behavioral treatments, process-of-care changes, etc. Our journals require, as a condition of consideration for publication, registration in a public trials registry. The journal considers a trial for publication only if it has been registered before the enrollment of the first patient. The journal does not advocate one particular registry, but requires authors to register their trial in a registry that meets several criteria. The registry must be accessible to the public at no charge. It must be open to all prospective registrants and managed by a non-profit organization. There must be a mechanism to ensure the validity of the registration data, and the registry should be electronically searchable. An acceptable registry must include a minimum of data elements (http://www.icmje.org/about-icmje/faqs/clinical-trials-registration/). For example, ClinicalTrials.gov (http://www.clinicaltrials.gov), sponsored by the United States National Library of Medicine, meets these requirements.

Protection of Human Subjects and Animals in Research
When reporting experiments on human subjects, authors should indicate whether the procedures followed were in accordance with the ethical standards of the responsible committee on human experimentation (institutional and national) and with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975, as revised in 2013. If doubt exists whether the research was conducted in accordance with the Helsinki Declaration, the authors must explain the rationale for their approach and demonstrate that the institutional review body explicitly approved the doubtful aspects of the study. An Informed Consent statement is always required from patients involved in any experiments. When reporting experiments on animals, authors should indicate whether the institutional and national guide for the care and use of laboratory animals was followed.  Further guidance on animal research ethics is available from the World Medical Association (2016 revision). When reporting experiments on ecosystems involving non-native species, Authors are bound to ensure compliance with the institutional and national guide for the preservation of native biodiversity.