The International Journal of Radiation Oncology * Biology * Physics
(IJROBP), known in the field as the Red Journal, publishes
original laboratory
and clinical investigations related to radiation oncology, radiation
biology, and medical physics. Original contributions
by leading
scientists and researchers include experimental studies of combined modality
treatment and relevant innovations in tumor sensitization,
especially
at the molecular level, normal tissue protection, including both
precision avoidance and biochemical means, brachytherapy,
particle irradiation,
and tumor imaging. Technical advances related to dosimetry
and conformal radiation treatment planning are also
included.
The IJROBP is published 15 times annually by Elsevier Inc.,
New York. In 2006, the journal was ranked 7th out of
85 journals in
the Radiology, Nuclear Medicine & Medical Imaging category in theISI Journal Citation Reports and had an
impact factor of 4.463.
James D. Cox, M.D., serves as the journal's Editor-in-Chief. He can
be contacted at International Journal
of Radiation Oncology * Biology * Physics, Department of Scientific Publications, Unit 227, 1515 Holcombe
Blvd., Houston, TX 77030;
phone: (713) 792-6014; fax: (713)
794-1120; e-mail: ijrobp@mdanderson.org.
The IJROBP accepts submissions and correspondence electronically,
and
the Web-based system enables authors to track their submissions
online. The entire review process and all written correspondence are
also handled through this system. Author and reviewer tutorials are provided
online, and 24-hour phone and e-mail help is available.
Authors must register on the Website with their e-mail address and
other information to receive a password. Those who have previously
reviewed
a manuscript for the IJROBP may already be registered. Specific
instructions for accessing and using the system can
be found at www.redjournal.org. (Select the Submissions & Reviews button).
Once the
submission files are uploaded, the system automatically generates an
electronic (PDF) proof, which is then used for reviewing.
All correspondence,
including editor decisions and requests for revisions, are by
e-mail.
Journal Policies
Human and
Animal Experimentation. When reporting on human subjects,
please indicate in the text whether the procedures followed were in
accordance
with the ethical standards of the responsible committee on
human experimentation (institutional or regional) and with the Helsinki
Declaration
of 1975, as revised in 2000. Patient anonymity must be ensured
at all times; do not use patient names, initials, hospital numbers, or
other identification in the manuscript, tables, or figures. In clinical photographs,
identities of patients should be masked or otherwise
cropped.
Written consent forms from patients must accompany all photographs
in which there is any possibility of identification of the
patient. When reporting
experiments on animals, please also indicate in the text that you
followed the institution's or a national research
council's guide for, or
a national law on, the care and use of laboratory animals.
Conditions of Publication. It is a condition
of publication that manuscripts
submitted to the IJROBP have not already been published and
will not be submitted simultaneously
or published elsewhere. All manuscripts
submitted to the IJROBP are subject to peer review, and only
those that are of the
highest scientific quality are accepted for publication.
Copyright Transfer. Authors are required to sign a copyright transfer
form,
which will accompany page proofs of the article. For details on
copyright policy, please refer to Copyright Information at http://www.elsevier.com/authors.
Conflict of Interest Policy. The IJROBP adheres to the policy on conflict
of interest promulgated by the International
Committee of Medical
Journal Editors, which states, in part, that "to prevent ambiguity, authors
must state explicitly whether potential
conflicts do or do not exist." (See
Conflict of Interest Notification.) The complete policy can be accessed at
the following Web site:
www.icmje.org.
Authorship. According to the "Uniform Requirements"
(see Journal
Style and Guidelines), all persons designated as authors should qualify
for authorship. Each author should have participated
sufficiently in the
work to take public responsibility for its content. Authorship credit
should be based only on substantial contributions
to (1) conception
and design, or analysis and interpretation of data, and to (2) drafting
the article or revising
it critically for important intellectual content, and
to (3) final approval of the version to be published. Conditions
1- must
all be met. Participation solely in the acquisition of funding or the collection
of data does not justify authorship. General
supervision of the research
group does not justify authorship. Any part of an article critical
to its main conclusions must be the responsibility
of at least one author.
In the case of corporate authorship, all members of the group must
meet all criteria to justify authorship
and inclusion in the byline. Those
who do not meet these criteria should be listed (with their permission) in
an Acknowledgments section.
The order of authorship must be agreed to by all co-authors before the
manuscript is submitted for consideration. Any changes in authorship
after submission of a manuscript must be explained in a letter to the
Editor-in-Chief that is signed by all co-authors to indicate
their consent
to the change. These changes include the deletion and addition of
authors as well as any change in the order of authors. Changes can be
expected to delay publication.
Permissions. Written permission must be obtained by authors and submitted
with the manuscript for the following:
permission of the publisher and/or copyright holder to reprint in theIJROBP
any material that has been previously published, including
figures, tables, and quotations; quotations must be accurate and
fully credited.
permission for the use of personal communication and/or unpublished
data; such communication must include the name, degrees
of the person(s) with whom the author has communicated or obtained
the data, and the month and year in which the information
was obtained.
written consent forms from patients for all photographs in which
there is any possibility of identifying the patient.
Permissions letters and forms must be uploaded separately from the
manuscript and mentioned in the cover letter.
Online Publication.
Articles that have been accepted for publication,
set into page proof, and corrected by authors and editors are posted online
before
print publication under the "Articles in Press" section of theIJROBP's Web site, www.redjournal.org.
Journal Style and Guidelines
In addition to this Instructions to Authors, the IJROBP relies on the
"Uniform Requirements
for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical
Journals," (http://www.icmje.org/) and the American Medical Association
Manual
of Style, 9th ed.
Types of Manuscripts
Rapid Communication. Rapid communication manuscripts must be
extremely
timely and of utmost importance and must be deemed appropriate
for rapid publication by the Editor-in-Chief. They cannot exceed
1,500
words, any combination of four figures and/or tables, and 15 references.
Manuscripts submitted for rapid review must be submitted electronically
using the online system. Manuscripts will be reviewed by two
expert reviewers within 48 hours of receipt of the required fee, and the
authors will be notified of their status within 72 hours. The submission/
processing fee for a Rapid Communication article is $500
(to be used as
honoraria for rapid reviewers). Please send a check payable to Elsevier
Inc., or send a credit card account number and
expiration date. Accepted
manuscripts will be published in the next available issue of the IJROBP.
In the event that
the Editor-in-Chief believes an article submitted as
a Rapid Communication does not warrant rapid review and publication,
the submission
fee will be returned to the authors, who may then choose
whether to have the manuscript continue through the standard IJROBP
review process. Please note that the rapid review process pertains to
Rapid Communication articles only.
Editorials. Editorials
are brief commentary, analysis, or opinion pieces
about a published article or other topic of special interest. Both solicited
and unsolicited
editorials undergo review and should not exceed 1,500
words and 10 references.
Critical Reviews. Critical reviews are contributions
from experts in the
field and are solicited by or on behalf of the journal s Editor-in-Chief or
Senior Editor for Critical Reviews. Before
a critical review article is initiated,
potential authors will be expected to complete and submit a financial
disclosure. Authors with
interest or questions regarding critical
reviews should write to Lynn D. Wilson, M.D., M.P.H. (Senior Editor,
Critical Reviews): Lynn.Wilson@yale.edu.
Critical Review articles are limited to 6,500 words including references.
Correspondence. Letters to the editor must be brief
and concise. Those
with comments on a particular article should be submitted within 2
months of publication of the article; authors whose
articles are being
commented on are given the opportunity to reply and should do so
within 2 months of the request. Letters must be limited
to no more
than 400 words and 10 references. Correspondence is reviewed by the
Editor-in-Chief for possible inclusion in the journal.
Letters and replies
must be submitted electronically using the online system.
Book Reviews. Reviews of recently released books
of interest to the
journal s readers are published on a limited basis and must not exceed
700 words. Submissions should be made electronically
using the online
system under the category "Book Review." Queries and review copies
of books should be sent directly to the book review
editor, David S.
Shimm, M.D., who will consider them for publication: dshimm@aol.com. or Raleigh Regional Cancer Center,
275 Dry Hill Road, Beckley,
WV 25801.
Scientific Articles. The journal publishes scientific articles describing
original laboratory
and clinical investigations related to radiation oncology,
radiation biology, and medical physics. Submissions are thoroughly
reviewed
for scientific originality, significance, relevance, and
priority, and the topics must be of broad interest to the journal s readers.
Only high-priority manuscripts that report cutting-edge science and that
promise to have a strong impact on clinical practice are accepted.
Articles must not exceed 5,000 words including text, abstract, title page, references, figure legends, and tables.
Style for
Scientific Articles
All material submitted to the journal must be typed double-spaced. Each
page of a manuscript (except the title
page, which is page 1) should be
identified with the first author s last name and the page number in the top
right-hand corner. This
format should be used throughout the text, references,
figure legends, and tables.
The text should have clearly marked levels of headers
and follow the
standard format of Abstract, Introduction, Methods and Materials, Results,
and Discussion. The manuscript should be organized
in the following
sequence: title page, abstract, key words, text, references, and
legends. Figures and tables must be in separate files.
(See Figures and
Tables sections.) Only standard abbreviations and acronyms should be
used, and each one should be defined at its first
use in the text. Manuscripts must be thoroughly edited by an English language medical
editor to be acceptable for publication.
Parts of a Scientific Article
Title Page. The title page should include a concise but informative title;
a complete
byline (see Authorship), including each author's full name
and highest earned academic degree(s); each author's complete affiliation(
s), including department(s), institution(s), city, state, and country;
the name and complete mailing address, phone number, fax number,
and e-mail address of the corresponding author (to whom all correspondence
and reprint requests will be directed); and a shortened running
title.
Acknowledgment of grant or other financial support, meeting
presentation, conflict of interest, or assistance with manuscript
preparation
or data collection can be included here or in an Acknowledgments
section.
Conflict of Interest Notification. On
the page that follows the title page
under the heading "Conflicts of Interest Notification," please state explicitly
whether any actual
or potential conflicts of interest do or do
not exist. Provide additional detail, as necessary, in the accompanying
cover letter.
Abstract. The Abstract should have no more than 250 words and should
be structured using the following subheadings:
Purpose, Methods and
Materials, Results, and Conclusions. Review articles may not require
all subheadings. The Abstract should reflect
the content of the article
and include the purpose of the study, the experimental design, the
most important results, and an interpretation
of the data, including the
conclusion and any implications derived from the results.
Key Words. After the Abstract, provide
five specific key words for
indexing.
Introduction. The Introduction section should include the background
and rationale for
the study, a clear purpose or hypothesis statement, and
a brief description of the experimental design.
Methods and Materials.
The Methods and Materials section should describe
the materials used and the experimental and statistical methods.
Previously described
methods should not be included, only cited, with
significant modifications stated. Clinical studies should be identified
as retrospective
or prospective. Methods should not be included in the
Results section or figure legends.
Results. The Results section should
describe only the most important
results of the study and include as little discussion as possible. Measures
of statistical significance
must be clearly indicated, and tables and figures
should be cited in numerical order.
Discussion. The Discussion section should
begin with a statement of the
conclusions based on the study's findings and include an interpretation
of the results in the context of
other published studies. The study's limitations
and implications should also be stated. The conclusions can be
included in this section
or presented separately under the heading "Conclusions."
They should be clearly tied to the purpose of the study. Background
information,
methods, and results should not be repeated in
detail in the Discussion.
References. The reference list must be typed double-spaced.
References
must be cited and numbered in consecutive numerical order as they first
appear in the text and should be listed in consecutive
numerical (not alphabetical)
order in the References section. All bibliographic information
must be complete and accurate. The
author is responsible for the
accuracy of all references. The following reference style must be
used, and the author should also refer
to the "Uniform Requirements"
and the American Medical Association Manual of Style for other examples
and conventions.
Journal
references should be given in the following order: author(s)
surnames and initials, that is, the names of the first three authors followed
by et al. (for references with six or more authors; provide all authors'
names for references with up to five authors).; article
title (with
subtitle if any), journal abbreviation in italics, year, volume number, part
or supplement number, and inclusive page numbers.
If the paper has
been seen only in abstract form, this should be indicated at the end of
the original reference by the addition of the
word [Abstract]. Likewise,
if the reference is to a volume with a supplement, the supplement number
with the abbreviation [Suppl.] should
be included. References to
books must include the names of the authors, title, edition number,
city of publication, publisher, and year.
References to chapters in books
must include the names of the editors and the chapter title after the
name(s) of the author(s) and the
book title. Examples of references using
the AMA numbered style follow:
Davis JT, Allen HD, Powers JD, et al. Population
requirements
for capitation planning in pediatric cardiac surgery. Arch Pediatr
Adolesc Med 1996;150:257 259.
Champlin
RER, Feig SA, Ho WG, et al. Bone marrow transplantation
for acute lymphoblastic leukemia in remission: Importance
of extramedullary
involvement [Abstract]. Blood 1982;60 (Suppl.
1):165a.
Ringsven MK, Bond D. Gerontology and leadership skills
for
nurses. 2nd ed. Albany (NY): Delmar Publishers; 1996.
Figures. Figures should be consecutively numbered (1, 2, 3, etc.) as they
appear in the text and must be accompanied by legends
(See Figure Legends.).
Each figure should be placed in a separate file and uploaded individually
at submission. The author should include
figures that enhance,
not duplicate, textual information. Four-color figures may be submitted,
but the author must assume all costs for
separation and printing. The
charge is $650 for the first color figure, then $100 for each additional
color figure in the
print issue. Color figures are printed free of charge
in the online version of articles. Lettering should be uniform and large
enough
to be easily read when reduced for publication. Patient anonymity
must be ensured at all times; do not use patient names, initials, hospital
numbers, or other identification in the figures or legends. In clinical photographs,
identities of patients should be masked or otherwise
cropped.
Written consent forms from patients must accompany all photographs
in which there is any possibility of identifying the patient.
Unsuitable figures
will be returned to the author for correction or substitution.
For further details in the preparation of artwork and
the types of files
that are acceptable for publication, please go to www.elsevier.com/artwork.
Figure Legends. Complete, explanatory, and descriptive legends must
be provided for all figures. The legends must correspond
to the consecutively
numbered figures and be typed double-spaced after the References
section. All abbreviations or other letter designations
used in
a figure must be defined in the legend for that figure. Magnification
and staining materials should be indicated. Acknowledgment
of previously
published material should be given in the legend, and the source
should be included in the References section. (See Permissions.)
Tables. Tables should be typed double-spaced on separate pages and
numbered consecutively. Tables should be placed in one separate
file
for uploading at submission. Each table number (1, 2, 3, etc.) should
be followed by a brief, specific title. The data should be
self-explanatory
and should supplement, not duplicate, the text. Acknowledgments to
previously published material should be given in
a footnote to the table,
and the source should be included in the References section. (See Permissions.)
All abbreviations used in the
table must be defined in the footnotes.
Footnotes should be ordered as they first appear in the table with
the following standard symbols:
) *(asterisk), † (dagger), †† (double dagger),§ (section mark), || (parallel mark), ¶ (paragraph symbol),
and #
(number sign).
