Adopted as the official publication of The International Society for Autonomic Neuroscience - http://www.isanweb.org
Former title: Journal of the Autonomic Nervous System

Guide for Authors

Types of Article
Full-length articles of original research; Short Communications; Review articles; Clinical Reports and Book Reviews. For Full-length articles, please note you will be required to select a major and minor classification when submitting to the online system. The Editor-in-Chief should be consulted whenever a review article is under consideration. Rapid Communications will be accepted if extremely concise, fully documented and dealing with a novel and important observation in a research area in rapid expansion. These will receive priority handling both in the reviewing and publishing processes such that their publication will be advanced.

Ethics

Human Experiments
Papers describing experimental work on human subjects which carry a risk of harm must include a statement (a) that the experiments were conducted with the understanding and the consent of each subject, and (b) a statement that the responsible Ethical Committee has approved the experiments.

Animal Experiments
Papers describing experiments on living animals should provide (a) a full description of any anaesthetic and surgical procedure used, and (b) evidence that adequate steps were taken to ensure that animals did not suffer unnecessarily at any stage of the experiment, and comply with the existing national and international guidelines on the conduct of animal experiments.


Copyright Submission
Copyright submission of a paper to Autonomic Neuroscience: Basic & Clinical will imply that it represents original research not previously published (except in the form of an abstract or a preliminary report) and that it is not being considered for publication elsewhere. It also implies the transfer of the Copyright from the author to the publisher. Manuscripts submitted under multiple authorship are reviewed on the assumption that all listed authors concur with the submission and that a copy of the final manuscript has been approved by all authors and tacitly or explicitly by the responsible authorities in the laboratories where the work was carried out. If accepted, the manuscript shall not be published elsewhere in the same form, in either the same or another language, without the consent of the Editors and Publisher. If illustrations or other small parts of articles or books already published elsewhere are used in papers submitted to Autonomic Neuroscience: Basic & Clinical, the written permission of author and Publisher concerned must be included with the manuscript. In these cases, the original source must be indicated in the legend of the illustration.
Special regulations for readers and authors in the USA regarding copying and copyright are to be found in the preliminary pages of each issue.


Manuscript Preparation
All manuscripts must be submitted through the online system at http://ees.elsevier.com/autneu/. Manuscripts mailed to the editorial office will not be processed. Registration is required if using the system for the first time. After accessing the web site click on the "Register" link located towards the middle of the top of the screen. Detailed instructions are provided by clicking on the "Tutorial for Authors" link in the grey Author Information box in the upper right corner of the screen. The cover letter must contain a statement assuring that the material has not been published or is under active consideration by another journal. The authors must also indicate in the cover letter that the research was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki and/or with the Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals as adopted and promulgated by the United States National Institutes of Health.

The author should select a set of classifications from a list, and a category designation for their manuscript (original article, letter to the editor, short communication, etc.). Details of five reviewers that are required with a submission can be provided in the comments box or at a later stage when uploading the files for submission.

Authors may send queries concerning the submission process, manuscript status, or journal procedures to the Editorial Office (autneu@elsevier.com). Once the uploading is done, the system automatically generates an electronic (PDF) proof, which is then used for reviewing. All correspondence, including the Editor's decision and request for revisions, will be by e-mail.


The Title of the paper should be as concise, clear and as informative as possible, it should not contain abbreviations and should not exceed 120 letters and spaces; it should be free of unusual typographical characters so that it will not be too difficult for other authors to type it and retrieve it. The Abstract should summarize the results obtained and the major conclusions in such a way that a reader not familiar with the particular area of work can understand the implications of the work. The Abstract should not exceed one twentieth of the length of the manuscript. Full-length papers should normally be divided into the following headings: Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, Discussion (and Conclusions), (Acknowledgements) and References. Abbreviations should be used sparingly and should be avoided in the Abstract.


Rapid communications
Reports on exciting new results within the scope of the journal can be submitted for publication in the rapid communications section. A rapid communication should not exceed 700 words and should contain at most one simple table or figure. A maximum of 8 references may be used. The manuscript should be arranged in the following order: title (not exceeding 100 characters including spaces between words); surname(s) of author(s), preceded by one name spelled out in full; name and address of the establishment where the work was done (all on 1 page); abstract (max. 75 words) and keywords (indexing terms, max. 3 items); text without subheadings; acknowledgement(s); references; figure legend and figure or table. Name, full postal address, telephone, fax numbers and e-mail address of the author to whom correspondence is to be sent should be mentioned on the title page. Rapid communications have priority at the editorial office and publisher.

Short communications
Short communications should be prepared as rapid communications but should not exceed four pages in print (approx. 2000-3000 words including abstract, captions and references). A maximum of 2 illustrations (figures and tables) is allowed. An abstract of not more than 100 words should be provided and 3-6 keywords should be listed immediately below the abstract.

Clinical reports
Clinical reports should be prepared as Short communications.

Literature References
Citations in the text should be given in parentheses at the appropriate place by author(s) name(s) followed by the year in chronological order according to the Harvard system (Paintal, 1973; Birdsall et al., 1980). With more than two authors, name only the first followed by "et al." (Birdsall et al., 1980). When two or more papers by the same author(s) appear in one year, distinguish them by a, b, etc. after the date.

The Reference List
The reference list should be submitted in double spacing. It should be arranged in alphabetical order of the first author's name. If the first author's name appears more than once, the order is as follows: (1) single author: chronological sequence; (2) author and co-author: alphabetically according to co-author; (3) author and more than one co-author: chronological sequence (as in the text these will be referred to as "et al."). Reference must be complete including, in this order: author's name, initials, year of publication, title of article, title of the journal, volume, first and last page number of the article cited. Title abbreviations should conform to those adopted by List of Serial Title Word Abbreviations (available from International Serial data System, 20 Rue Bachaumont, 75002 Paris, France, ISBN 2-904938-02-8).

Examples: Paintal, A.S., 1973. Vagal sensory receptors and their reflex effects. Physiol. Rev. 53, 159-227. Birdsall, N.J.M., Hulme, B.C., Hamner, R., Stockton, J.R., 1980. Subclasses of muscarinic receptors. In: Yamamura, H.I., Olsen, R.W., Usdin, E. (Eds.), Psychopharmacology and Biochemistry of Transmitters and Receptors. Elsevier, Amsterdam, pp. 97-100. Leiblich, I., 1982. Genetics of the Brain. Elsevier, Amsterdam, 492 pp.

Unpublished experiments may be mentioned only in the text. They must not be included in the list of References. Papers which have been accepted for publication but which have not appeared may be quoted in the reference list as "in press". Personal communications may be used only when written authorization from the investigator is submitted with the manuscript. They must not be included in the list of references. All references listed should be referred to in the text and vice versa.

Figures
Figures of good quality should be submitted online as a separate file. The lettering should be large enough to permit photographic reduction. Legends should be typed together on a separate page in the electronic manuscript. If a figure cannot be submitted online, a hardcopy may be sent; please contact the Editorial Office (autneu@elsevier.com) for further instructions.

Colour illustrations must be approved by the editors and the extra costs of colour reproduction will be charged to the author(s).

If, together with your accepted article, you submit usable colour figures then Elsevier will ensure, at no additional charge, that these figures will appear in colour on the web (e.g. ScienceDirect and other sites) regardless of whether or not these illustrations are reproduced in colour in the printed version. For colour reproduction in print, a limited number of colour figures may be printed in the journal without cost, at the discretion of the Editor, who will make the judgement based on the academic necessity of the colour illustrations. For further information on the preparation of the electronic artwork, please see
http://www.elsevier.com/locate/authorartwork.

Each illustration should be numbered in Arabic numerals (Fig. 1, Fig. 2, etc.) An illustration, together with its legend, should be understandable with minimal reference to the text. a. All illustrations should be designed to fit either a single column (7 cm) or the full text width (16 cm).
b. Line drawings should normally be about twice the final size. Symbols should be used sparingly and direct labelling with an explicative term or abbreviation is preferred. All symbols and lettering should be large enough to permit reduction.
c. Micrographs. These should be submitted in a form suitable for direct reproduction without reduction. The maximum space available for micrographs is 16x19 cm. Micrographs should by carefully cropped, to leave out areas of low information content, and they should be grouped and arranged to optimize the available space. They should be separated by gutters of 2-3 mm and be directly labelled. Micrographs must have a calibration bar. Illustrations and legends should not be placed sideways.

Tables
Tables should be submitted online as a separate file and should bear a short descriptive title. Legends for each table should appear on the same page as the table. All tables must be numbered consecutively in Arabic numerals and cited in the text. Titles should be brief but descriptive. Tables should not have vertical lines, and horizontal lines must be kept to a minimum. Tables should be prepared for use in a single column (8.4 cm wide) or be of page width (17.6 cm).
(a) Each table should have a brief explanatory heading and sufficient experimental detail (following the table body as a footnote) so as to be intelligible without reference to the text.
(b) Tables should not duplicate material in text or illustrations
(c) Short or abbreviated column headings should be used and if necessary, explained in footnotes, and indicated as a,b,c, etc.
(d) Statistical measures of variation, S.D., S.E., M., etc. should be identified.

Funding body agreements and policies
Elsevier has established agreements and developed policies to allow authors whose articles appear in journals published by Elsevier, to comply with potential manuscript archiving requirements as specified as conditions of their grant awards. To learn more about existing agreements and policies please visit http://www.elsevier.com/fundingbodies

Preparation of Supplementary Material
Elsevier now accepts electronic supplementary material to support and enhance your scientific research. Supplementary files offer the author additional possibilities to publish supporting applications, movies, animation sequences, high-resolution images, background datasets, sound clips and more. Supplementary files supplied will be published online alongside the electronic version of your article in Elsevier web products, including ScienceDirect: http://www.sciencedirect.com. In order to ensure that your submitted material is directly usable, please ensure that data is provided in one of our recommended file formats. Authors should submit the material in electronic format together with the article and supply a concise and descriptive caption for each file. For more detailed instructions please visit http://www.elsevier.com/authors.

Proofs
One set of page proofs in PDF format will be sent by e-mail to the corresponding Author (if we do not have an e-mail address then paper proofs will be sent by post). Elsevier now sends PDF proofs which can be annotated; for this you will need to download Adobe Reader version 7 available free from http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html. Instructions on how to annotate PDF files will accompany the proofs.

If you do not wish to use the PDF annotations function, you may list the corrections (including replies to the Query Form) and return to Elsevier in an e-mail. Please list your corrections quoting line number. If, for any reason, this is not possible, then mark the corrections and any other comments (including replies to the Query Form) on a printout of your proof and return by fax, or scan the pages and e-mail, or by post. Please use this proof only for checking the typesetting, editing, completeness and correctness of the text, tables and figures. Significant changes to the article as accepted for publication will only be considered at this stage with permission from the Editor. We will do everything possible to get your article published quickly and accurately. Therefore, it is important to ensure that all of your corrections are sent back to us in one communication within 48 hours: please check carefully before replying, as inclusion of any subsequent corrections cannot be guaranteed. Proofreading is solely your responsibility. Note that Elsevier may proceed with the publication of your article if no response is received.


Offprints
The corresponding author, at no cost, will be provided with a PDF file of the article via e-mail. The PDF file is a watermarked version of the published article and includes a cover sheet with the journal cover image and a disclaimer outlining the terms and conditions of use.

Page charge
There will be no page charge.

For complete up-to-date addresses of Editors please check the link to Editorial Board at the beginning of these instructions."0") have been used properly, and format your article (tabs, indents, etc.) consistently. Characters not available on your word processor (Greek letters, mathematical symbols, etc.) should not be left open but indicated by a unique code (e.g., Gralpha, #, etc., for the Greek letter α). Such codes should be used consistently throughout the entire text. Please make a list of such codes and provide a key. Do not allow your word processor to introduce word splits and do not use a justified layout. Please adhere strictly to the general instructions on style/arrangement and, in particular, the reference style of the journal. Further information may be obtained from the Publisher.

Literature References
Citations in the text should be given in parentheses at the appropriate place by author(s) name(s) followed by the year in chronological order according to the Harvard system (Paintal, 1973; Birdsall et al., 1980). With more than two authors, name only the first followed by "et al." (Birdsall et al., 1980). When two or more papers by the same author(s) appear in one year, distinguish them by a, b, etc. after the date.

The Reference List should be typed in double spacing. It should be arranged in alphabetical order of the first author's name. If the first author's name appears more than once, the order is as follows: (1) single author: chronological sequence; (2) author and co-author: alphabetically according to co-author; (3) author and more than one co-author: chronological sequence (as in the text these will be referred to as "et al."). Reference must be complete including, in this order: author's name, initials, year of publication, title of article, title of the journal, volume, first and last page number of the article cited. Title abbreviations should conform to those adopted by List of Serial Title Word Abbreviations (available from International Serial data System, 20 Rue Bachaumont, 75002 Paris, France, ISBN 2-904938-02-8).

Examples:
Paintal, A.S., 1973. Vagal sensory receptors and their reflex effects. Physiol. Rev. 53, 159-227.
Birdsall, N.J.M., Hulme, B.C., Hamner, R., Stockton, J.R., 1980. Subclasses of muscarinic receptors. In: Yamamura, H.I., Olsen, R.W., Usdin, E. (Eds.), Psychopharmacology and Biochemistry of Transmitters and Receptors. Elsevier, Amsterdam, pp. 97-100.
Leiblich, I., 1982. Genetics of the Brain. Elsevier, Amsterdam, 492 pp.

Unpublished experiments may be mentioned only in the text. They must not be included in the list of References. Papers which have been accepted for publication but which have not appeared may be quoted in the reference list as "in press". Personal communications may be used only when written authorization from the investigator is submitted with the manuscript. They must not be included in the list of references. All references listed should be referred to in the text and vice versa.

Illustrations
Each illustration should bear the author's name and be numbered in Arabic numerals (Fig. 1, Fig. 2, etc.), must be referred to in the text and should be accompanied by a legend (typed with double spacing on separate pages). An illustration, together with its legend, should be understandable with minimal reference to the text.
a. All illustrations should be designed to fit either a single column (7 cm) or the full text width (16 cm).
b. Line drawings: these should be drawn in Indian ink on white card, drawing or tracing paper or be quality black and white prints. Line drawings should normally be about twice the final size. Symbols should be used sparingly and direct labelling with an explicative term or abbreviation is preferred. All symbols and lettering should be large enough to permit reduction.
c. Micrographs. These should be mounted on thin cardboard and submitted in a form suitable for direct reproduction without reduction. The maximum space available for micrographs is 16×19 cm. Micrographs should by carefully cropped, to leave out areas of low information content, and they should be grouped and arranged to optimize the available space. They should be separated by gutters of 2-3 mm and be directly labelled by the author with Letraset or similar lettering aids. Micrographs must have a calibration bar. Illustrations and legends should not be placed sideways. The original manuscript should be accompanied by a set of illustrations marked "For Printer". In the 4 copies of the paper, the illustrations should be original photographs or good quality photocopies. (Xerox copies are not acceptable.
d. Specific requests for reproduction of illustrations for a particular size (e.g. ×100%) should be mentioned on the reverse side of the figure.
e. Colour illustrations must be approved by the editors and the extra costs of colour reproduction will be charged to the author(s).

If, together with your accepted article, you submit usable colour figures then Elsevier will ensure, at no additional charge, that these figures will appear in colour on the web (e.g. ScienceDirect and other sites) regardless of whether or not these illustrations are reproduced in colour in the printed version. For colour reproduction in print, a limited number of colour figures may be printed in the journal without cost, at the discretion of the Editor, who will make the judgement based on the academic necessity of the colour illustrations. For further information on the preparation of the electronic artwork, please see http://www.elsevier.com/locate/authorartwork

Tables
Tables of numerical data should be typed/printed out (double spacing) on a separate page, numbered in sequence in Arabic numerals (Table 1, 2, etc.), provided with a heading and referred to in the text as Table 1, 2, etc.

Preparation of Supplementary Material

Elsevier now accepts electronic supplementary material to support and enhance your scientific research. Supplementary files offer the author additional possibilities to publish supporting applications, movies, animation sequences, high-resolution images, background datasets, sound clips and more. Supplementary files supplied will be published online alongside the electronic version of your article in Elsevier web products, including ScienceDirect: http://www.sciencedirect.com. In order to ensure that your submitted material is directly usable, please ensure that data is provided in one of our recommended file formats. Authors should submit the material in electronic format together with the article and supply a concise and descriptive caption for each file. For more detailed instructions please visit our Author Gateway at http://authors.elsevier.com

Supplementary files can be submitted on disk; these files can be stored on 3.5 inch diskette, ZIP-disk, or CD (either MS-Windows or Macintosh).

Proofs
Authors should keep a copy of their manuscript as proofs will be sent to them without the manuscript. Proofs will be drawn on lower-quality paper. Only printer's errors may be corrected (clearly marked in the text with red pen and clarified in the margin), no changes in, or additions to, the edited manuscript will be allowed at this stage. For Rapid Communications, in the interest of speed no proofs will be sent to the authors; proofreading will be undertaken by the Publisher.

E-Offprints Autonomic Neuroscience: Basic and Clinical offers e-offprints only. The author will receive an acknowledgement letter with an offprint Form highlighting this change. Free paper offprints are no longer sent to the author.

Page charge There will be no page charge.

For complete up-to-date addresses of Editors please check the link to Editorial Board at the beginning of these instructions.

http://authors.elsevier.com