International Journal for Research and Investigation on Atherosclerosis and Related Diseases
Official Journal of the European Atherosclerosis Society
Affiliated with the International Atherosclerosis Society and the Society of Atherosclerosis Imaging and Prevention

Atherosclerosis is a fully electronic journal, all manuscripts are to be submitted via the internet.
To submit your paper online, click on the link http://ees.elsevier.com/ath/. This will take you to the Atherosclerosis Editorial Manager home page. The Author Information box to the right of the page provides relevant information, including a tutorial on how to submit your manuscript.

Authors must select an appropriate Associate Editor from the list shown on the website, the expertise terms for each Editor are shown to assist with this choice. Authors must suggest four potential reviewers for their paper and to avoid delay in processing your submission please ensure that email addresses given for reviewers are correct. The Editorial Board reserves the right to decide whether or not the suggested reviewers are used. Please note the Associate Editors will not act as reviewers. Authors may also indicate if a particular reviewer should not be approached.

Types of papers that can be submitted for consideration by the Editorial Board include:

a) Basic Research Papers reporting results of original research or investigation using in vitro, cell culture, or animal models. Basic Research Papers should not exceed 4000 words (including tables and legends to figures) and no more than 30 references.

b) Clinical Research Papers reporting results of original clinical research or investigation in human subjects. Clinical Research Papers should not exceed 4000 words (including tables and legends to figures) and no more than 30 references.

Basic and Clinical Research papers must have no more than 5 figures and tables in total (e.g., 1 figure consisting of panels A and B, and 4 tables). Authors are encouraged to include additional figures and tables as supplementary appendixes, and these will be considered for Web-only publication.

c) Fast-track submission, for new findings of sufficient importance to justify accelerated review and publication, a fast-track submission process for original articles is available. In the submission letter, authors should explicitly request this option and provide credit card information (number, expiration date, name as it appears on the card, related invoice address and email address). If the editors agree that the manuscript is worthy of fast-track publication, the fee of 600 Euros will be automatically charged to the credit card. If accepted for fast-track submission, an article will be reviewed within 72 hours (otherwise, authors will be informed that the paper will be handled within the normal peer-review process). If accepted, a fast-track submission will appear in the first available issue of the journal.
PLEASE SELECT THE "FAST TRACK" OPTION FROM THE DROP DOWN MENU OF PAPER TYPES WHEN YOU SUBMIT YOUR MANUSCRIPT.

d) Rapid Communications. These papers should provide a brief but complete account of important new observations which merit urgent publication. The papers should be less than 5 printed pages (8-10 double-spaced typed pages) including figures and tables and should be concisely but adequately referenced. Authors should state in the comments section during the submission process why the paper merits urgent publication. Papers requiring revision will not be considered as Rapid Communications. The Editor-in-Chief will normally reach a decision on these papers within one month.

e) Short Communications. These papers should include original data of basic or clinical research. The following word limits apply: abstract 150 words, main text 1500 words, up to 2 figures and or tables and a maximum of 15 references. Authors maybe invited to submit a short communication by the editorial team.

f) Review Articles and Mini-Reviews, usually by invitation. Mini-Reviews should normally consist of current short reviews of topical information. Word limit: 3500, 25 references and up to 3 tables and or figures. Full reviews may contain up to 6 tables and or figures, authors are encouraged to include a "mechanism/overview" figure. Word limit 5000 and 60 references. Exceptions to these limits should be discussed with the Reviews Editor before submission.
All Reviews should be submitted for handling by the Reviews Editor, Arnold von Eckardstein.

g) Hypotheses and Viewpoints of up to 1500 words are published occasionally. These contributions are subject to the normal editorial procedure. These should be submitted to the Editor-in-Chief.

h) Commentary. If you wish to comment on work published in Atherosclerosis, please submit your opinions as a Commentary. The original Author(s) will have the opportunity to respond to your comments in the same issue of the journal.

i) Letters to the Editor are welcomed. Letters to the Editor reporting research findings that do not include novel data are unlikely to be published. Letters should not exceed 1200 words and should be submitted to the Editor-in-Chief.

j) Announcements of meetings, workshops, courses etc. are welcomed subject to available space.

Correspondence
Correspondence can be sent to the Editor-in-Chief:

Professor Steve Humphries
Cardiovascular Genetics
University College London
Medical School, Rayne Institute
5 University Street
London WC1 E6JJ
UK
Fax: +44 20 7679 6212
E-mail: rmhasle@ucl.ac.uk

Reviews Editor: Arnold von Eckardstein (arnold.voneckardstein@ikc.usz.ch) Supplements Editor: Steve Humphries (rmhasle@ucl.ac.uk) To ensure fast and efficient correspondence, all Authors must provide recent e-mail addresses. Authors must submit the names, addresses, email addresses and phone/fax numbers of four potential reviewers.

Manuscripts
Original articles should report original research not previously published or being considered for publication elsewhere. Please note, suspected cases of plagiarism or manipulation of data will be dealt with in consultation with the communicating author and the relevant authorities (please see below).
Manuscripts should be written in the English language (using either American or British spelling).
The number of words per manuscript should not exceed 4000 (including tables and legends to figures).
As a rule, research papers should be divided into sections, headed by a caption (e.g. Abstract, Introduction, Materials, Methods, Experimental Results, Discussion, etc.).
Please include a short paragraph of conclusions (at the end of the text), indicating the relevance of the study with regard to the basics and/or clinical aspect of atherosclerosis.
A statement concerning the source of funding, conflicts of interests and disclosures of financial support is highly recommended.

Abstracts
A structured abstract (objective, methods, results and conclusion) of 50-250 words must be included.

Keywords
A keyword summary must be provided; normally 3-7 items should be included. Authors are encouraged to choose their own keywords but, if in grave doubt which items to select, Medical Subject Headings (issued with the January Index Medicus, 1969) may be used as a guideline.

Illustrations
Figures should ideally be submitted in high-resolution TIF format, or alternatively in GIF, JPEG/JPG, or EPS format. The figures should be placed in separate files, named purely with the figure numbers (e.g. "Figure1.tif"). Legends for figures should be on separate pages within the main manuscript. The cost of colour figures will be paid by the Author.

Colour illustrations online
Please make sure that artwork files are in an acceptable format (TIFF, EPS or MS Office files) and with the correct resolution. Polaroid colour prints are not suitable.
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, you will receive information regarding the costs from Elsevier after receipt of your accepted article. Please indicate your preference for colour in print or on the Web only. For further information on the preparation of electronic artwork, please see http://authors.elsevier.com/artwork.
Please note: Because of technical complications which can arise by converting colour figures to "grey scale" (for the printed version should you not opt for colour in print) please submit in addition usable black and white versions of all the colour illustrations.

Tables
Tables with titles and legends must be on separate pages with double spacing. Authors must list on the title page or in the covering e-mail, the number of figures and/or tables to be found in the paper.

References
References must be given at the end of the paper, numbered in the order in which they appear in the text and quoted in the text at appropriate places. The number of references must not exceed 30 (except for Reviews).
They should be arranged as follows: Authors (second name and initial of first name(s), e.g. Mailhac A, Badimon JJ), title of article (upper case only on first word or proper nouns/names), title of journal (standard abbreviation if possible), year of publication, volume number of journal and page range (e.g. 1432-6).
References to books should include: Author's and/or Editor's name(s), title of book, place of publication, publisher, year, page numbers (if necessary). This journal should be cited as Atherosclerosis.

DNA sequences and GenBank accession numbers
For each and every gene accession number cited in an article, Authors must type the accession number in bold underlined text. Letters in the accession number must always be capitalised.

Example: (GenBank accession nos. AI631510 , AI631511 , AI632198 , and BF223228 ), a B-cell tumor from a chronic lymphatic leukemia (GenBank accession no. BE675048 ), and a T-cell lymphoma (GenBank accession no. AA361117 ).

For all gene variants the rs number must be provided. Current standard nomenclature for designation of DNA sequence variants must be adhered to: http://www.hgvs.org.
In order to allow for the work to be reproduced by others, where not previously published, authors are encouraged to provide as supplementary material for web-publication only, the primers and PCR conditions for all variants genotyped in the manuscript.

Preparation of supplementary data
Elsevier accepts electronic supplementary material (e-components) to support and enhance presentation of 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 artwork instruction pages at http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions.

Language Editing
International Science Editing and Asia Science Editing can provide English language and copyediting services to authors who want to publish in scientific, technical and medical journals and need assistance before they submit their article or, before it is accepted for publication. Authors can contact these services directly: International Science Editing ( http://www.internationalscienceediting.com) and Asia Science Editing ( http://www.asiascienceediting.com) or, for more information about language editing services, please contact authorsupport@elsevier.com who will be happy to deal with any questions.

Please note Elsevier neither endorses nor takes responsibility for any products, goods or services offered by outside vendors through our services or in any advertising. For more information please refer to our terms and conditions: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/languagepolishing.

Reprints
PDF offprints are provided free of charge. No reprints are provided free of charge. Reprints (50 copies minimum) can be ordered at quoted prices on order forms sent out together with the proofs.

General
Submission of an article implies that the work described has not been published previously (except in the form of an abstract or as part of a published lecture or academic thesis), that it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, that its publication is approved by all Authors and tacitly or explicitly by the responsible authorities where the work was carried out, and that, if accepted, it will not be published elsewhere in the same form, in English or in any other language, without the written consent of the Publisher. Parallel submissions will not be tolerated.

Atherosclerosis will not tolerate plagiarism in submitted manuscripts. Passages quoted or closely paraphrased from other authors (or from the submitting author's own published work) must be identified as quotations or paraphrases and sources quoted or paraphrased material must be acknowledged. Use of unacknowledged sources will be construed as plagiarism. If any manuscript is found to contain plagiarised material the review process will be halted immediately, and the University or Institute of the corresponding Author will be informed.
Atherosclerosis will not tolerate manipulation or enhancement of data. Authors will be asked to provide further evidence for the validity of data, and the University or Institute of the corresponding Author will be informed if such evidence is not forthcoming.

Upon acceptance of an article, Authors will be asked to transfer copyright (for more information on copyright see http://authors.elsevier.com). This transfer will ensure the widest possible dissemination of information.
If excerpts from other copyrighted works are included, the Author(s) must obtain written permission from the copyright owners and credit the source(s) in the article. Elsevier has preprinted forms for use by Authors in these cases: contact Elsevier's Rights Department, Philadelphia, PA, USA. Tel: (+1) 215 238 7869; fax: (+1) 215 238 2239; e-mail: healthpermissions@elsevier.com. Requests may also be completed online via the Elsevier homepage: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/permissions.

Elsevier will do everything possible to get your article corrected and published as quickly and accurately as possible. Therefore, it is important to ensure that all of your corrections are sent back to us in one communication. Subsequent corrections will not be possible, so please ensure your first sending is complete.

Patient consent
Studies on patients or volunteers require ethics committee approval and informed consent which should be documented in your paper.
Patients have a right to privacy. Therefore identifying information, including patients? images, names, initials, or hospital numbers, should not be included in videos, recordings, written descriptions, photographs, and pedigrees unless the information is essential for scientific purposes and you have obtained written informed consent for publication in print and electronic form from the patient (or parent, guardian or next of kin where applicable). If such consent is made subject to any conditions, Elsevier must be made aware of all such conditions. Written consents must be provided to Elsevier on request.
Even where consent has been given, identifying details should be omitted if they are not essential. If identifying characteristics are altered to protect anonymity, such as in genetic pedigrees, authors should provide assurance that alterations do not distort scientific meaning and editors should so note.
If such consent has not been obtained, personal details of patients included in any part of the paper and in any supplementary materials (including all illustrations and videos) must be removed before submission.

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