Steroids

Types of paper

Significant original research papers and pertinent reviews on all aspects of steroids will be considered for publication. Specifically, both experimental and theoretical studies dealing with the following areas of investigation are welcome: chemistry and physiochemistry; biosynthesis; metabolism; molecular biology; physiology; pharmacology; analytical techniques; comparative endocrinology; clinical research; mode of action (including that of related peptides); and the role of steroids on growth and differentiation. Relevant compounds also include non-steroidal analogs that are inhibitors or activators of steroid biosynthetic enzymes or ligands for steroid hormone receptors

Letters to the editor are welcome, for editing and publication at the discretion of the editor. Rapid Communications will be considered if material is of unusual interest and particularly timely.



Ethics in Publishing

For information on Ethics in Publishing and Ethical guidelines for journal publication see http://www.elsevier.com/publishingethics and http://www.elsevier.com/ethicalguidelines.

When experimental animals are used, the materials and methods section must clearly indicate that adequate measures were taken to minimize pain or discomfort, and that the experiments were conducted in accordance with international standards on animal welfare as well as being compliant with local and national regulations. Studies are expected to be compliant with minimal standards as defined by the European Communities Council Directive of 24 November 1986 (86/609/EEC) http://europa.eu.int/comm/food/fs/aw/aw_legislation/scientific/86-609-eec_en.PDF and the National Institutes of Health Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals http://www.nap.edu/readingroom/books/labrats/ Full details of any anesthetic or analgesic dose and treatment must be given.

Conflict of interest

All authors are requested to disclose any actual or potential conflict of interest including any financial, personal or other relationships with other people or organizations within three years of beginning the submitted work that could inappropriately influence, or be perceived to influence, their work. See also http://www.elsevier.com/conflictsofinterest.

Submission declaration

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 including electronically in the same form, in English or in any other language, without the written consent of the copyright-holder.

Authorship

All authors should have made substantial contributions to all of the following: (1) the conception and design of the study, or acquisition of data, or analysis and interpretation of data, (2) drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content, (3) final approval of the version to be submitted.

Changes to authorship

This policy concerns the addition, deletion, or rearrangement of author names in the authorship of accepted manuscripts:
Before the accepted manuscript is published in an online issue: Requests to add or remove an author, or to rearrange the author names, must be sent to the Journal Manager from the corresponding author of the accepted manuscript and must include: (a) the reason the name should be added or removed, or the author names rearranged and (b) written confirmation (e-mail, fax, letter) from all authors that they agree with the addition, removal or rearrangement. In the case of addition or removal of authors, this includes confirmation from the author being added or removed. Requests that are not sent by the corresponding author will be forwarded by the Journal Manager to the corresponding author, who must follow the procedure as described above. Note that: (1) Journal Managers will inform the Journal Editors of any such requests and (2) publication of the accepted manuscript in an online issue is suspended until authorship has been agreed.
After the accepted manuscript is published in an online issue: Any requests to add, delete, or rearrange author names in an article published in an online issue will follow the same policies as noted above and result in a corrigendum.

Copyright

Upon acceptance of an article, authors will be asked to complete a 'Journal Publishing Agreement' (for more information on this and copyright see http://www.elsevier.com/copyright). An e-mail will be sent to the corresponding author confirming receipt of the manuscript together with a 'Journal Publishing Agreement' form or a link to the online version of this agreement.
Subscribers may reproduce tables of contents or prepare lists of articles including abstracts for internal circulation within their institutions. Permission of the Publisher is required for resale or distribution outside the institution and for all other derivative works, including compilations and translations (please consult http://www.elsevier.com/permissions). 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: please consult http://www.elsevier.com/permissions.

Retained author rights

As an author you (or your employer or institution) retain certain rights; for details you are referred to: http://www.elsevier.com/authorsrights.

Role of the funding source

You are requested to identify who provided financial support for the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the article and to briefly describe the role of the sponsor(s), if any, in study design; in the collection, analysis and interpretation of data; in the writing of the report; and in the decision to submit the article for publication. If the funding source(s) had no such involvement then this should be stated. Please see http://www.elsevier.com/funding.

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.

US National Institutes of Health (NIH) voluntary posting (" Public Access") policy.

As a service to our authors, Elsevier will deposit to PubMed Central (PMC) author manuscripts on behalf of Elsevier authors reporting NIH funded research. This service is a continuation of Elsevier's 2005 agreement with the NIH when the NIH introduced their voluntary 'Public Access Policy.'

The service will help authors comply with the National Institutes of Health (NIH) revised ''Public Access Policy,'' effective April 7, 2008. The NIH's revised policy requires that NIH-funded authors submit to PubMed Central (PMC), or have submitted on their behalf, their peer-reviewed author manuscripts, to appear on PMC no later than 12 months after final publication.

Elsevier will send to PMC the final peer-reviewed manuscript, which was accepted for publication and sent to Elsevier's production department, and that reflects any author-agreed changes made in response to peer-review comments. Elsevier will authorize the author manuscript's public access posting 12 months after final publication. Following the deposit by Elsevier, authors will receive further communications from Elsevier and NIH with respect to the submission.

Authors are also welcome to post their accepted author manuscript on their personal or institutional web site. Please note that consistent with Elsevier's author agreement, authors should not post manuscripts directly to PMC or other third party sites. Individual modifications to this general policy may apply to some Elsevier journals and society publishing partners.

As a leading publisher of scientific, technical and medical (STM) journals, Elsevier has led the industry in developing tools, programs and partnerships that provide greater access to, and understanding of, the vast global body of STM information. This service is an example of Elsevier willingness to work cooperatively to meet the needs of all participants in the STM publishing community.



Open access

This journal offers you the option of making your article freely available to all via the ScienceDirect platform. To prevent any conflict of interest, you can only make this choice after receiving notification that your article has been accepted for publication. The fee of $3,000 excludes taxes and other potential author fees such as color charges. In some cases, institutions and funding bodies have entered into agreement with Elsevier to meet these fees on behalf of their authors. Details of these agreements are available at http://www.elsevier.com/fundingbodies. Authors of accepted articles, who wish to take advantage of this option, should complete and submit the order form (available at http://www.elsevier.com/locate/openaccessform.pdf). Whatever access option you choose, you retain many rights as an author, including the right to post a revised personal version of your article on your own website. More information can be found here: http://www.elsevier.com/authorsrights.

Language and language services

Please write your text in good English (American or British usage is accepted, but not a mixture of these). Authors who require information about language editing and copyediting services pre- and post-submission please visit http://webshop.elsevier.com/languageservices or our customer support site at http://support.elsevier.com for more information.

Submission

Submission to this journal proceeds totally online. Visit the submission site of the journal at http://ees.elsevier.com/steroids You will be guided through the creation and uploading of your files. The system automatically converts source files to a single PDF file of the article, which is used in the peer-review process. Please note that even though manuscript source files are converted to PDF files at submission for the review process, these source files are needed for further processing after acceptance. All correspondence, including notification of the Editor's decision and requests for revision, takes place by e-mail.

Referees

Please submit, with the manuscript, the names, addresses and e-mail addresses of 4 potential referees. Note that the editor retains the sole right to decide whether or not the suggested reviewers are used.



Use of wordprocessing software

It is important that the file be saved in the native format of the wordprocessor used. The text should be in single-column format. Keep the layout of the text as simple as possible. Most formatting codes will be removed and replaced on processing the article. In particular, do not use the wordprocessor's options to justify text or to hyphenate words. However, do use bold face, italics, subscripts, superscripts etc. When preparing tables, if you are using a table grid, use only one grid for each individual table and not a grid for each row. If no grid is used, use tabs, not spaces, to align columns. The electronic text should be prepared in a way very similar to that of conventional manuscripts (see also the Guide to Publishing with Elsevier: http://www.elsevier.com/guidepublication). Note that source files of figures, tables and text graphics will be required whether or not you embed your figures in the text. See also the section on Electronic artwork.
To avoid unnecessary errors you are strongly advised to use the 'spell-check' and 'grammar-check' functions of your wordprocessor.

Article structure

Manuscripts Arrange the manuscript in the following order: title page, abstract, keywords, text, acknowledgments, references, footnotes, tables, figure legends, and figures. Number the pages in sequence, with the title page as page 1, the abstract as page 2, etc. Text: Arrange the body of the manuscript in the following order:
Introduction, Experimental, Results, Discussion.
Title page


Give the full title of paper. Do not use asterisks or other extraneous symbols in the title. Give the first name, middle initial, and last name of all authors. List each author's institutional affiliation(s). Show the address of each author at the time of the study as well as the present address if it differs.


Provide the name and address of the corresponding author to whom questions and reprint requests should be sent. Give the name and address of the institution from which the work originated.


Text
Arrange the text in the following order:

• Introduction: The rationale for the study. Provide a brief account of the nature, approach and importance of the study to be presented.
• Experimental: A clear and precise description of the experimental procedures. Identify all drugs and chemicals used, dosages, and routes of administration. All methods must be referenced and/or described in sufficient detail to enable a reader to repeat the experiment. For animal and human studies, the experimental protocol must be humane and ethical. In all manuscripts reporting the results of human studies, a statement must appear in the Experimental section indicating that approval was obtained from the institutional review board and that all human subjects signed written informed consent.
• Results: A factual account of the study's findings. Present these as logically appropriate in text, tables, or figures; do not repeat in the text what is demonstrated in a table or figure.
• Discussion: Place the results of the study in present and historical context and denote its importance to the field. Ensure that all conclusions are justified by the results of the study.

Appendices
If there is more than one appendix, they should be identified as A, B, etc. Formulae and equations in appendices should be given separate numbering: Eq. (A.1), Eq. (A.2), etc.; in a subsequent appendix, Eq. (B.1) and so on. Similarly for tables and figures: Table A.1; Fig. A.1, etc.

Essential title page information

• Title. Concise and informative. Titles are often used in information-retrieval systems. Avoid abbreviations and formulae where possible.
• Author names and affiliations. Where the family name may be ambiguous (e.g., a double name), please indicate this clearly. Present the authors' affiliation addresses (where the actual work was done) below the names. Indicate all affiliations with a lower-case superscript letter immediately after the author's name and in front of the appropriate address. Provide the full postal address of each affiliation, including the country name and, if available, the e-mail address of each author.
• Corresponding author. Clearly indicate who will handle correspondence at all stages of refereeing and publication, also post-publication. Ensure that telephone and fax numbers (with country and area code) are provided in addition to the e-mail address and the complete postal address. Contact details must be kept up to date by the corresponding author.
• Present/permanent address. If an author has moved since the work described in the article was done, or was visiting at the time, a 'Present address' (or 'Permanent address') may be indicated as a footnote to that author's name. The address at which the author actually did the work must be retained as the main, affiliation address. Superscript Arabic numerals are used for such footnotes.

Abstract

A concise and factual abstract is required (maximum length 250 words). The abstract should state briefly the purpose of the research, the principal results, and major conclusions. An abstract is often presented separately from the article, so it must be able to stand alone. References should be avoided but, if essential, they must be cited in full. Avoid non-standard or uncommon abbreviations; if they must be used, define them at their first mention in the abstract itself.

Graphical abstract

A Graphical abstract is optional and should summarize the contents of the article in a concise, pictorial form designed to capture the attention of a wide readership online. Authors must provide images that clearly represent the work described in the article. Graphical abstracts should be submitted as a separate file in the online submission system. Image size: Please provide an image with a minimum of 531 × 1328 pixels (h × w) or proportionally more. The image should be readable at a size of 5 × 13 cm using a regular screen resolution of 96 dpi. Preferred file types: TIFF, EPS, PDF or MS Office files. See http://www.elsevier.com/graphicalabstracts for examples.
Authors can make use of Elsevier's Illustration and Enhancement service to ensure the best presentation of their images also in accordance with all technical requirements: Illustration Service.

Highlights

Highlights are mandatory for this journal. They consist of a short collection of bullet points that convey the core findings of the article and should be submitted in a separate file in the online submission system. Please use 'Highlights' in the file name and include 3 to 5 bullet points (maximum 85 characters, including spaces, per bullet point). See http://www.elsevier.com/highlights for examples.

Keywords
Immediately after the abstract, provide a maximum of six keywords, avoiding general and plural terms and multiple concepts (avoid, for example, "and", "of"). Be sparing with abbreviations; only firmly established ones should be used.

Abbreviations

Define abbreviations that are not standard in this field in a footnote to be placed on the first page of the article. Such abbreviations that are unavoidable in the abstract must be defined at their first mention there, as well as in the footnote. Ensure consistency of abbreviations throughout the article.

Acknowledgements
Acknowledge grants, sponsors, funding sources, and individuals who provided significant assistance. Include the affiliations of individuals being thanked. It is the author's responsibility to obtain permission from all those mentioned by name, because readers may infer their endorsement.

Units of measure
Standard metric units are preferred. SI units are optional, except that the use of Bq (becquerel) is not acceptable; use Ci (curie) or dpm (disintegrations per minute). Centrifugation should be described in terms of force (_g), not as rpm.

Nomenclature and units
Refer to drugs by their approved generic names. If trade names are used, the generic equivalent should be given parenthetically at the first use. Identify compounds by their formal chemical name at first use; thereafter the trivial name may be used. All names should be in accordance with the most recent IUPAC-IUB rules on the nomenclature of steroids published in Pure and Applied Chemistry 61, 1783-1822, 1989. Substituted steroids should be named so that only one functional group is designated as a suffix and all other substituents are listed as X steroids 71 (2006) IX-XI prefixes. If the first letter of the suffix is a vowel, the terminal 'e' of the name of the hydrocarbon should be dropped (e.g., etiocholan-17-one). Unsaturation should be indicated by writing the locant number for the double bond(s) before the suffix (e.g., 3-hydroxyandrost-5-en-17-one). Trivial names may be modified by prefixes indicating substituents (e.g., 17-hydroxyprogesterone) but must not be more cumbersome than the systematic names they replace. Chemically impossible trivial names (e.g., 20-hydroxyprogesterone) are not acceptable. Alcohols are named as ols or hydroxy derivatives, not as dihydroketones. Isotope location should be designated by a prefix bracket placed directly before the part of the name to which it applies (i.e., without a space or hyphen): e.g., 3,20-dihydroxy-[4-14C]pregnan-7-one; [3-3H]methoxyandrostan-17-one, 11?,21-dihydroxy-[1,2-3H; 4-14C]pregnane-3,20-dione. Iodinated compounds, in which iodine is part of the structure, are to be labeled in the same manner; e.g., [16?-125I]iodoestradiol; 3-hydroxy-[21-125I]iodopregn-5-en-20-one.

Follow internationally accepted rules and conventions: use the international system of units (SI). If other quantities are mentioned, give their equivalent in SI. You are urged to consult IUPAC: Nomenclature of Organic Chemistry: http://www.iupac.org/publications/pac/1989/pdf/6110x1783.pdf for further information.

Compound identity and purity
Naturally occurring compounds
Authors must include copies of key spectra for the characterization of new compounds. This material should be submitted separately as "Supporting Information" which will not appear in the journal, but will used by reviewers and be available on the web (see below).

Synthetic compounds
Identification of structure: Sufficient spectroscopic information must be presented to establish the structural identity of all new compounds. These data should appear in the Experimental Section and be adequate for unambiguous comparisons to be made between the reported compound and the same compound prepared independently. A list of proton or carbon-13 NMR peaks is generally sufficient, but if structural identification was based on NMR data, peaks assignments should also be given. Chemical shift data should be given only to two decimal places. Infrared absorptions diagnostic for key functional groups are also helpful, and high resolution mass spectroscopic data can provide an additional criterion of compound identity. When a series of closely related compounds is reported, spectroscopic data can be presented in a table, or full spectroscopic data for a representative member can be presented, with comments made on the spectral features unique to other members of the series. For known compounds, the source or literature reference to the method of preparation and characterization must be provided. Graphic images of spectra and additional information related to structure identification may be presented as Supporting Information, which will not appear in the journal but will be available on the web.
Criteria for the purity of all compounds and of compounds with biological data: All new compounds reported need to be pure. Evidence of high purity is essential where biochemical or biological assay data are presented and related to compound structures; these compounds are termed "SAR compounds". The purity of SAR compounds should be more than 98 percent; the purity of other compounds should be more than 95 percent. Any questions related to the purity of SAR compounds should be presented in the Results section of the manuscript.
Evidence for purity can take many forms: Combustion analyses for carbon, hydrogen and nitrogen is adequate. These data should appear in the Experimental Section and should agree with the calculated data within 0.4 percent, a recommended form for presentation is: C18H23NO4: calcd. C, 68.12; H, 7.30; N, 4.41. Found. C, 68.50; H, 7.18; N, 4.26.
When satisfactory combustion analyses are not available, evidence of purity should be provided by HPLC chromatograms run in two divergent solvent systems (typically normal and reversed phase solvent systems) or by high quality proton NMR spectra obtained at high signal-to-noise. These chromatograms or spectra should be included as supplementary data.

Database linking

Elsevier aims at connecting online articles with external databases which are useful in their respective research communities. If your article contains relevant unique identifiers or accession numbers (bioinformatics) linking to information on entities (genes, proteins, diseases, etc.) or structures deposited in public databases, then please indicate those entities according to the standard explained below.
Authors should explicitly mention the database abbreviation (as mentioned below) together with the actual database number, bearing in mind that an error in a letter or number can result in a dead link in the online version of the article.
Please use the following format: Database ID: xxxx
Links can be provided in your online article to the following databases (examples of citations are given in parentheses):
• ASTM: ASTM Standards Database (ASTM ID: G63)
• CCDC: Cambridge Crystallographic Data Centre (CCDC ID: AI631510)
• GenBank: Genetic sequence database at the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) (GenBank ID: BA123456)
• GEO: Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO ID: GSE27196; GEO ID: GPL5366; GEO ID: GSM9853)
• MI: EMBL-EBI OLS Molecular Interaction Ontology (MI ID: 0218)
• MINT: Molecular INTeractions database (MINT ID: 6166710)
• NCBI Taxonomy: NCBI Taxonomy Browser (NCBI Taxonomy ID: 48184)
• NCT: ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT ID: NCT00222573)
• OMIM: Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM ID: 601240)
• PDB: Worldwide Protein Data Bank (PDB ID: 1TUP)
• TAIR: The Arabidopsis Information Resource database (TAIR ID: AT1G01020)
• UniProt: Universal Protein Resource Knowledgebase (UniProt ID: Q9H0H5)

Footnotes

Footnotes should be used sparingly. Number them consecutively throughout the article, using superscript Arabic numbers. Many wordprocessors build footnotes into the text, and this feature may be used. Should this not be the case, indicate the position of footnotes in the text and present the footnotes themselves separately at the end of the article. Do not include footnotes in the Reference list.
Table footnotes
Indicate each footnote in a table with a superscript lowercase letter.

Artwork

Electronic artwork
General points
• Make sure you use uniform lettering and sizing of your original artwork.
• Save text in illustrations as 'graphics' or enclose the font.
• Only use the following fonts in your illustrations: Arial, Courier, Times, Symbol.
• Number the illustrations according to their sequence in the text.
• Use a logical naming convention for your artwork files.
• Provide captions to illustrations separately.
• Produce images near to the desired size of the printed version.
• Submit each figure as a separate file.

A detailed guide on electronic artwork is available on our website:
http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions
You are urged to visit this site; some excerpts from the detailed information are given here.
Formats
Regardless of the application used, when your electronic artwork is finalised, please 'save as' or convert the images to one of the following formats (note the resolution requirements for line drawings, halftones, and line/halftone combinations given below):
EPS: Vector drawings. Embed the font or save the text as 'graphics'.
TIFF: Color or grayscale photographs (halftones): always use a minimum of 300 dpi.
TIFF: Bitmapped line drawings: use a minimum of 1000 dpi.
TIFF: Combinations bitmapped line/half-tone (color or grayscale): a minimum of 500 dpi is required.
If your electronic artwork is created in a Microsoft Office application (Word, PowerPoint, Excel) then please supply 'as is'.
Please do not:
• Supply files that are optimised for screen use (e.g., GIF, BMP, PICT, WPG); the resolution is too low;
• Supply files that are too low in resolution;
• Submit graphics that are disproportionately large for the content.

Color artwork

Figures
Please make sure that artwork files are in an acceptable format (TIFF, EPS, or MS Office files) and with good resolution, please see http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions.


Colour figures
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 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. For further information on the preparation of electronic artwork, please see http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions [Please note: Because of technical complications that can arise in 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 files corresponding to all the colour illustrations].

Figure captions

Figure legends
Provide a concise legend for each figure that is sufficiently clear so that the figure can be understood without reference to the text. Legends to figures should be presented on a separate page. Identify and explain all abbreviations, symbols, and figure parts. The use of symbols in legends is restricted to standard ones that can be typeset; it is usually preferable to place the key symbols directly on the art.

Tables
Provide a title for each table. If a table must be continued to a second page, repeat all headings.

References

Citation in text

Please ensure that every reference cited in the text is also present in the reference list (and vice versa). Any references cited in the abstract must be given in full in the abstract itself. Unpublished results and personal communications are not recommended in the reference list, but may be mentioned in the text. If these references are included in the reference list they should follow the standard reference style of the journal and should include a substitution of the publication date with either "Unpublished results" or "Personal communication" Citation of a reference as "in press" implies that the item has been accepted for publication.

Web references
As a minimum, the full URL should be given and the date when the reference was last accessed. Any further information, if known (DOI, author names, dates, reference to a source publication, etc.), should also be given. Web references can be listed separately (e.g., after the reference list) under a different heading if desired, or can be included in the reference list.

References in a special issue
Please ensure that the words 'this issue' are added to any references in the list (and any citations in the text) to other articles in the same Special Issue.

Reference style
Text: Indicate references by number(s) in square brackets in line with the text. The actual authors can be referred to, but the reference number(s) must always be given.
List: Number the references (numbers in square brackets) in the list in the order in which they appear in the text.
Examples:
Reference to a journal publication:
[1] Van der Geer J, Hanraads JAJ, Lupton RA. The art of writing a scientific article. J Sci Commun 2010;163:51–9.
Reference to a book:
[2] Strunk Jr W, White EB. The elements of style. 4th ed. New York: Longman; 2000.
Reference to a chapter in an edited book:
[3] Mettam GR, Adams LB. How to prepare an electronic version of your article. In: Jones BS, Smith RZ, editors. Introduction to the electronic age, New York: E-Publishing Inc; 2009, p. 281–304.
Note shortened form for last page number. e.g., 51–9, and that for more than 6 authors the first 6 should be listed followed by 'et al.' For further details you are referred to 'Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts submitted to Biomedical Journals' (J Am Med Assoc 1997;277:927–34) (see also http://www.nlm.nih.gov/bsd/uniform_requirements.html).

Journal abbreviations source
Journal names should be abbreviated according to
Index Medicus journal abbreviations: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/tsd/serials/lji.html;
List of title word abbreviations: http://www.issn.org/2-22661-LTWA-online.php;
CAS (Chemical Abstracts Service): http://www.cas.org/sent.html.

Video data
Elsevier accepts video material and animation sequences to support and enhance your scientific research. Authors who have video or animation files that they wish to submit with their article are strongly encouraged to include these within the body of the article. This can be done in the same way as a figure or table by referring to the video or animation content and noting in the body text where it should be placed. All submitted files should be properly labeled so that they directly relate to the video file's content. To ensure that your video or animation material is directly usable, please provide the files in one of our recommended file formats with a maximum size of 30 MB and running time of 5 minutes. Video and animation files will be published online in the electronic version of your article in Elsevier Web products, including ScienceDirect: http://www.sciencedirect.com. Please supply 'stills' with your files: you can choose any frame from the video or animation or make a separate image. These will be used instead of standard icons and will personalize the link to your video data. For more detailed instructions please visit our video instruction pages at http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions. Note: since video and animation cannot be embedded in the print version of the journal, please provide text for both the electronic and the print version for the portions of the article that refer to this content.

Supplementary data
Preparation of supplementary data
Elsevier accepts 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. To ensure that your submitted material is directly usable, please ensure that data is provided in one of our recommended file formats: TIFF, EPS or PDF. MS Office files (Word, Powerpoint, Excel). 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."

Submission checklist

The following list will be useful during the final checking of an article prior to sending it to the journal for review. Please consult this Guide for Authors for further details of any item.
Ensure that the following items are present:
One author has been designated as the corresponding author with contact details:
• E-mail address
• Full postal address
• Telephone and fax numbers
All necessary files have been uploaded, and contain:
• Keywords
• All figure captions
• All tables (including title, description, footnotes)
Further considerations
• Manuscript has been 'spell-checked' and 'grammar-checked'
• References are in the correct format for this journal
• All references mentioned in the Reference list are cited in the text, and vice versa
• Permission has been obtained for use of copyrighted material from other sources (including the Web)
• Color figures are clearly marked as being intended for color reproduction on the Web (free of charge) and in print, or to be reproduced in color on the Web (free of charge) and in black-and-white in print
• If only color on the Web is required, black-and-white versions of the figures are also supplied for printing purposes
For any further information please visit our customer support site at http://support.elsevier.com.

DNA sequences and GenBank Accession numbers

Many journals cite ''gene accession numbers'' in their running text and footnotes. Gene accession numbers refer to genes or DNA sequences about which further information can be found in the databases at the National Center for Biotechnical Information (NCBI) at the National Library of Medicine. Authors wishing to enable other scientists to use the accession numbers cited in their papers via links to these sources should type this information in the following manner: For each and every accession number cited in an article, authors should type the accession number in bold, underlined text. Letters in the accession number should always be capitalized. (See Example 1 below). This combination of letters and format will enable Elsevier's typesetters to recognize the relevant texts as accession numbers and add the required link to GenBank's sequences.


Example 1: ''(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)''. Authors are encouraged to check accession numbers used very carefully. An error in a letter or number can result in a dead link. In the final version of the printed article, the accession number text will not appear bold or underlined (see Example 2 below).


Example 2: ''(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)''. In the final version of the electronic copy, the accession number text will be linked to the appropriate source in the NCBI databases, enabling readers to go directly to that source from the article (see Example 3 below).


Example 3: ''(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)''.


Style
Note that Steroids uses the serial comma, e.g., Jones, Smith, and Brown (comma before 'and' in a series of three or more items). American-style spelling is required. For example: color, not colour; hydrolyze, not hydrolyse; estrogen, not oestrogen; labeled, not labelled. End-of-line hyphenation should be according to American-style word division (based on pronunciation, not word derivation). Leave a space between number and unit (50 mg, 3.5 M). For solvent proportions use the following style: ethanol/methanol (70:30 v/v) or ethyl acetate/isooctane (1:1).

Letters to the Editor
There is no specific format but there should be a short abstract of no more than 2 sentences; and no more than 5 references. There is word limit of 2, 500 words, not to exceed 2 -3 published pages including figures , tables, abstract and references. A maximum of any combination of 2 tables or figures is allowed.



Use of the Digital Object Identifier

The Digital Object Identifier (DOI) may be used to cite and link to electronic documents. The DOI consists of a unique alpha-numeric character string which is assigned to a document by the publisher upon the initial electronic publication. The assigned DOI never changes. Therefore, it is an ideal medium for citing a document, particularly 'Articles in press' because they have not yet received their full bibliographic information. The correct format for citing a DOI is shown as follows (example taken from a document in the journal Physics Letters B):
doi:10.1016/j.physletb.2010.09.059
When you use the DOI to create URL hyperlinks to documents on the web, the DOIs are guaranteed never to change.

Proofs

One set of page proofs (as PDF files) 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) or, a link will be provided in the e-mail so that authors can download the files themselves. Elsevier now provides authors with PDF proofs which can be annotated; for this you will need to download Adobe Reader version 7 (or higher) available free from http://get.adobe.com/reader. Instructions on how to annotate PDF files will accompany the proofs (also given online). The exact system requirements are given at the Adobe site: http://www.adobe.com/products/reader/tech-specs.html.
If you do not wish to use the PDF annotations function, you may list the corrections (including replies to the Query Form) and return them 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 – please let us have all your corrections within 48 hours. It is important to ensure that all corrections are sent back to us in one communication: 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. For an extra charge, paper offprints can be ordered via the offprint order form which is sent once the article is accepted for publication. 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.



For inquiries relating to the submission of articles (including electronic submission) please visit this journal's homepage. Contact details for questions arising after acceptance of an article, especially those relating to proofs, will be provided by the publisher. You can track accepted articles at http://www.elsevier.com/trackarticle. You can also check our Author FAQs (http://www.elsevier.com/authorFAQ) and/or contact Customer Support via http://support.elsevier.com.

Author Information Pack