Guide for Authors
Developmental Biology publishes original research on mechanisms of development, differentiation,
and growth in animals and plants at the molecular, cellular, and genetic levels. Areas of particular emphasis include transcriptional
control mechanisms, embryonic patterning, cell-cell interactions, growth factors and signal transduction, and regulatory hierarchies.
Scientific Guidelines for Authors submitting to Developmental Biology
Developmental Biology's
goal is to publish high quality papers providing causal insight into the cellular and molecular mechanisms that govern developmental
processes.
Studies which simply confirm an established functional role for a developmental component by presenting analysis in a
new species lack sufficient novelty for consideration.
Similarly, purely descriptive spatial gene expression or gene phylogeny articles
are not considered for publication unless they are notably of consequence and are of particular value to the field.
Types of paper
Developmental Biology publishes Original Research Papers, Review Articles, Essays,
Perspectives, and articles for the Genomes and Developmental Control and Evolution of Developmental Control Mechanisms sections.
Original Research Papers
Developmental Biology seeks to publish only the very best papers that contribute new information
to our understanding of developmental mechanisms. Questions are frequently raised about "descriptive" papers. Such papers are
appropriate for DB if they provide important new insights. This would not include, for example, a description of the expression pattern
of a gene in one species that has already been described in another species, or an expression pattern with no obvious link to a developmental
process.
We require that manuscripts specifically address biological relevance. While morpholino, microarray and RNAi studies may
be acceptable, they must contain adequate controls to be considered for publication.
The following types of Original Research
papers have specific guidelines:
Expression profiling and gene expression studies must contain supporting functional
data. Studies solely based on analysis of expression by microarray, northern blots, PCR or
in situ hybridization are too descriptive
or preliminary to justify full review.
Gene knock-down experiments:
Experiments using interfering DNA or proteins to address
gene function are expected to be highly controlled. In particular, experiments with
Morpholino,
RNAi, siRNA or dominant negative constructs are expected to contain very precise controls to address the specificity of the effects observed.
Studies in which the expression, structure or function of a gene/protein is altered but lead to no
phenotypic consequences
are not appropriate. Furthermore, studies of mutants which simply show that a gene/protein is required for development will be discouraged
unless attempts are made to address the mechanistic basis, causal roles or tissues and processes affected.
Experiments using
stem
cells must advance our understanding of biological functioning. Studies that simply grow/isolate stem cells from a tissue and show
what markers they express are not appropriate.
Studies using
cell culture must show direct (in vivo) relevance in a developmental
context.
Papers usually do not exceed 15,000 words.
Review Articles
Review articles are intended to reach a broad audience of readers from investigators in the field to new graduate students learning
the material for the first time. Review articles are subject to the same review process as original papers, but may receive expedited
consideration. Manuscripts should be prepared according to the general guidelines given below. The Materials and Methods, Results, and
Discussion sections may be replaced with appropriate alternatives; an abstract is still required. The editor-in-chief and the reviews
editor invite inquiries and suggestions for timely and provocative review articles.
Perspectives
Perspectives are short
scholarly articles that express an opinion on a body of work, an idea or concept. They may relate to historical material or may honor
a specific scientist or technique. They are not, however, letters to the editor or a forum for discussing a specific article or author
published in the journal. Word limit: 2,000
Essays
Essays are longer scholarly articles that express an opinion on
a body of work, an idea or concept. They may in part review articles covering a narrow topic or controversial field and put forward a
hypothesis. Unlike reviews they do not necessarily have to address a topic in its entirety but may concentrate on one specific aspect
of research. The work should contain references and figures and generally not contain more than 8,000 words.
Resource Papers
Resource papers provide information which will have an impact on the work of developmental
biologists, and are therefore considered important and timely. They will often be considered "descriptive" but as with other descriptive
papers, such papers are appropriate for DB if they provide important new insights, or contain a valuable and usable collection of data.
Genomes and Developmental Control
The Genomes and Developmental Control section is dedicated to papers that address analysis
of developmental cis-regulatory systems; developmental genomics; transcriptional mechanisms in development, analysis of specific developmental
processes, and system-level approaches to such networks; comparative analysis and evolution of regulatory systems; and computational
advances that illuminate the identification and the structure/function relationships of developmental control systems. Papers selected
for this section will appear together on a monthly basis. As always, we are dedicated to rapidly reviewing papers.
Evolution of
Developmental Control Mechanisms
The goal of the Evolution of Developmental Control Mechanisms section is to provide a focus
on research that examines evolutionary questions from a developmental perspective. The section is not intended for accounts of descriptive
observations or for reports of gene expression, but rather for research that illuminates mechanistic differences in processes and causes
of evolutionary change in developmental programs. The intersection of embryology and evolution has formed a framework for understanding
evolutionary processes since the time of Darwin. The recent availability of genomic sequence information has greatly facilitated identification
of homologous genes and their regulatory regions across diverse species, from unicellular organisms to plants, vertebrates, and invertebrates.
The advent of powerful tools for performing experimental analyses (RNAi, antisense morpholino oligonucleotides, transgenesis, pharmacological
intervention, etc.) now allows testing and comparison of gene deployment and function across diverse species. This section aims to provide
a venue of choice for such in-depth comparative functional analyses.
Contact details
for submission
Articles for Developmental Biology should be submitted via the journal's online submission system,
http://ees.elsevier.com/developmentalbiology.
Customer support is available 24/7:
Please use our help site at:
http://epsupport.elsevier.com/. Here you will be
able to learn more about the online submission system via interactive tutorials, explore a range of problem solutions via our knowledgebase,
and find answers to frequently asked questions. You will also find our 24/7 support contact details should you need any assistance from
one of our customer service representatives.
For questions on the reviewing and submission process, please contact:
Developmental
Biology Editorial Office
525 B Street, Suite 1800
San Diego, CA 92101-4495, USA
Tel: (619) 699-6351
Fax: (619)
699-6211
E-mail:
db@elsevier.com
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.
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.
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). Acceptance of the agreement will ensure the widest
possible dissemination of information. 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.
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 and you will be guided stepwise 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 removing the need for
a paper trail.
Referees
Please submit, with the manuscript, the names,
addresses and e-mail addresses of three potential referees. Note that the editor retains the sole right to decide whether or not the
suggested reviewers are used.
Additional information
Cover Submissions
Color figures for exclusive use as cover illustrations may be submitted by authors who are also submitting a manuscript for
consideration. Such illustrations do not need to relate to the manuscript being submitted but should relate to the larger scope and focus
of
Developmental Biology. A legend of 100 or fewer words should accompany each image.
Materials
Publication
of a research article in
Developmental Biology is taken to imply that the authors are prepared to distribute all non-commercially
obtained materials used in the experiments (e.g. cells, DNA, antibodies, primary data), to other academic researchers for their own use
or for verification. All nucleic acid and protein sequences must have been deposited in the appropriate databases and the Accession Numbers
cited in the paper.
Data from microarray and other similar screens:
Please see the MGED open letter specifying microarray
standards at
http://www.mged.org/Workgroups/MIAME/miame_checklist.html. Authors submitting manuscripts relying on microarray
or similar screens must supply the data as Supplementary data (see below) at the time of submission, along with the completed MIAME checklist.
The data must be MIAME-compliant and supplied in a form that is widely accessible. The microarray data must also be submitted to either
the GEO (
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/geo/) or ArrayExpress (
http://www.ebi.ac.uk/arrayexpress/) databases,
with accession numbers at or before acceptance of the paper for publication. The editors understand that on occasion authors may not
feel it appropriate to deposit the entire data set at the time of publication of this paper. We are therefore willing to consider exceptions
to this requirement in response to a request from the authors, which must be made at the time of initial submission or as part of an
informal pre-submission enquiry.
Mouse Gene Expression Data
Upon acceptance of the manuscript for publication in DB,
authors reporting mouse gene expression data from RNA in situ hybridization, immunohistochemistry, Northern blot, Western blot and RT-PCR
experiments are requested to submit pertinent data to the Mouse Gene Expression Database (GXD). These data submissions will receive accession
numbers that may then be inserted into the manuscript. Please see GXD's guidelines for electronic data submission at
http://www.informatics.jax.org/mgihome//GXD/GEN/gxd_submission_guidelines.shtml.
US National Institutes of Health (NIH) 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'. See
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/authors.authors/nihauthorrequest.
Access to non-subscribers 12 months after publication
Elsevier is pleased to announce that all articles published in
Developmental
Biology are accessible to non-subscribers 12 months after publication via ScienceDirect (
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/00121606).
Policy for Wellcome Trust funded authors
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/authorshome.authors/wellcometrustauthors.
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
Introduction
State the objectives of the work and provide an adequate background, avoiding a detailed literature
survey or a summary of the results.
Material and methods
Provide
sufficient detail to allow the work to be reproduced. Methods already published should be indicated by a reference: only relevant modifications
should be described.
Results
Results should be clear and concise.
Discussion
This should explore the significance of the results of the work, not repeat them. A combined
Results and Discussion section is often appropriate. Avoid extensive citations and discussion of published literature.
Conclusions
The main conclusions of the study may be presented in a short Conclusions section, which
may stand alone or form a subsection of a Discussion or Results and Discussion section.
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. 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. For this reason, References should be avoided, but if essential, then
cite the author(s) and year(s). Also, non-standard or uncommon abbreviations should be avoided, but if essential they must be defined
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 6 keywords, using American spelling and avoiding
general and plural terms and multiple concepts (avoid, for example, 'and', 'of'). Be sparing with abbreviations: only abbreviations firmly
established in the field may be eligible. These keywords will be used for indexing purposes.
Acknowledgements
Collate acknowledgements in a separate section at the end of the article before the references and do
not, therefore, include them on the title page, as a footnote to the title or otherwise. List here those individuals who provided help
during the research (e.g., providing language help, writing assistance or proof reading the article, etc.).
Database linking and Accession numbers
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):
•
GenBank:
Genetic sequence database at the National Center for Biotechnical Information (NCBI) (GenBank ID: BA123456)
•
PDB:
Worldwide Protein Data Bank (PDB ID: 1TUP)
•
CCDC: Cambridge Crystallographic
Data Centre (CCDC ID: AI631510)
•
TAIR: The Arabidopsis Information
Resource database (TAIR ID: AT1G01020)
•
NCT: ClinicalTrials.gov
(NCT ID: NCT00222573)
•
OMIM: Online Mendelian Inheritance
in Man (OMIM ID: 601240)
•
MINT: Molecular INTeractions
database (MINT ID: 6166710)
•
MI: EMBL-EBI OLS Molecular
Interaction Ontology (MI ID: 0218)
•
UniProt: Universal Protein Resource
Knowledgebase (UniProt ID: Q9H0H5)
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
Please make sure that artwork files are in an acceptable format (TIFF, EPS or MS Office
files) and with the correct resolution. If, together with your accepted article, you submit usable color figures then Elsevier will ensure,
at no additional charge, that these figures will appear in color on the Web (e.g., ScienceDirect and other sites) in addition to color
reproduction in print. For further information on the preparation of electronic artwork, please see
http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions.
Figure captions
Ensure that each illustration has a caption. Supply captions separately, not attached
to the figure. A caption should comprise a brief title (
not on the figure itself) and a description of the illustration. Keep
text in the illustrations themselves to a minimum but explain all symbols and abbreviations used.
Tables
Number tables consecutively in accordance with their appearance in the text. Place footnotes to tables below the
table body and indicate them with superscript lowercase letters. Avoid vertical rules. Be sparing in the use of tables and ensure that
the data presented in tables do not duplicate results described elsewhere in the article.
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.
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: All citations in the text should refer to:
1.
Single author: the author's name (without
initials, unless there is ambiguity) and the year of publication;
2.
Two authors: both authors' names and the year of publication;
3.
Three or more authors: first author's name followed by 'et al.' and the year of publication.
Citations may be made
directly (or parenthetically). Groups of references should be listed first alphabetically, then chronologically.
Examples: 'as demonstrated
(Allan, 2000a, 2000b, 1999; Allan and Jones, 1999). Kramer et al. (2010) have recently shown ....'
List: References should
be arranged first alphabetically and then further sorted chronologically if necessary. More than one reference from the same author(s)
in the same year must be identified by the letters 'a', 'b', 'c', etc., placed after the year of publication.
Examples:
Reference to a journal publication:
Van der Geer, J., Hanraads, J.A.J., Lupton, R.A., 2010. The art of writing a scientific article.
J. Sci. Commun. 163, 51–59.
Reference to a book:
Strunk Jr., W., White, E.B., 2000. The Elements of Style, fourth ed. Longman,
New York.
Reference to a chapter in an edited book:
Mettam, G.R., Adams, L.B., 2009. How to prepare an electronic version of
your article, in: Jones, B.S., Smith , R.Z. (Eds.), Introduction to the Electronic Age. E-Publishing Inc., New York, pp. 281–304.
Developmental Biology's reference style is also available from EndNote.
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.
In order to ensure that your video or animation material is directly usable, please provide the files in one of our recommended file
formats with a preferred maximum size of 50 MB. Video and animation files supplied 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
Elsevier accepts electronic supplementary material to support and enhance your scientific research. Supplementary files
offer the author additional possibilities to publish supporting applications, 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 provide the data 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.
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.
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.
Distribution of Material
Authors who
publish a research article in
Developmental Biology must be prepared to freely distribute to academic researchers for their
own use any cell lines, DNA clones, monoclonal antibodies, or genetically engineered mice described in the article. All genetic-sequence
information published in
Developmental Biology must also be deposited with GenBank or the EMBL Database Library.
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.
