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JOURNAL OF THEORETICAL BIOLOGY

Guide for Authors

Guide for Authors

The aim of the Journal of Theoretical Biology is to publish theoretical papers that clearly give insight into biological processes. The biological significance should be clearly stated. Highly speculative papers not based on current biological knowledge will not be acceptable. Papers may include new experimental results that bear on the theory being presented. Papers may include a lot of mathematics; however, the contribution will be measured in terms of biological insight and biological implications.

It is essential that papers be accessible to as wide a readership as possible. Every effort should be made to make the main points of the paper intelligible to biologists as a whole. Authors should thus make it clear how any mathematical models relate to the biological problems they address; detailed mathematical technicalities and experimental procedures may usually be best presented in appendices so as not to impede the exposition of the central ideas.

Brief notes may be submitted in the form of Letters to the Editor. Comment on current theoretical issues or papers published in the journal is also welcome.

Submission of Manuscripts

Authors are required to submit their papers electronically by using online manuscript submission available at External link http://ees.elsevier.com/jtb. This site will guide authors step-by-step through the submission process. Authors can upload their articles as LaTeX, Microsoft (MS) Word, or WordPerfect files. It is also possible to submit an article in PostScript or Adobe Acrobat PDF format, but if the article is accepted, the original source files will be needed. If you submit a word processing file, the system generates an Adobe Acrobat PDF version of the article, which is used for the reviewing process. Authors, reviewers, and editors send and receive all correspondence by e-mail and no paper correspondence is necessary.

Authors are requested to suggest one suitable member of the Editorial Board as handling editor for their article. In addition, they are asked to submit the names and current e-mail addresses of at least five scientists who may, if necessary, be used as referees for their paper.

Each manuscript should be accompanied by an electronic cover letter outlining the basic findings of the paper and their significance.

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

Papers will be published in English. The American or the British forms of spelling may be used, but this usage must be consistent throughout the manuscript.

Great importance is attached to conciseness of presentation, so far as is consistent with clarity.

Language Services: Authors who require information about language editing and copyediting services pre- and post-submission should visit External link http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/authorshome.authors/languagepolishing or contact authorsupport@elsevier.com for more information. Please note Elsevier neither endorses nor takes responsibility for any products, goods or services offered by outside vendors through our services or in any advertising. For more information please refer to our Terms and Conditions at External link http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/termsconditions.cws_home/termsconditions

Revisions: Should authors be requested by the editor to revise the text on a manuscript, the revised version should be submitted within 3 months. After this period, the manuscript will be regarded as a new submission.

Copyright:Upon acceptance of an article, authors will be asked to sign a 'Journal Publishing Agreement' (for more information on this and copyright see External link http://www.elsevier.com/copyright). Acceptance of the agreement will ensure the widest possible dissemination of information. An e-mail (or letter) 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 External link 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 External link http://www.elsevier.com/permissions.

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

Funding body agreements and policies:
Elsevier has established agreements and developed policies to allow authors who publish in Elsevier journals 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 External link http://www.elsevier.com/fundingbodies

Ethical approval
For information on Ethics in Publishing and Ethical guidelines for journal publication see External link http://www.elsevier.com/authorethics and http://www.elsevier.com/ethicalguidelines.
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 paper for publication. If the funding source(s) had no such involvement then this should be stated. Please see External link http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/authorshome.authors/funding
Contributors
Each author is required to declare his or her individual contribution to the article: all authors must have materially participated in the research and/or article preparation, so roles for all authors should be described. The statement that all authors have approved the final article should be true and included in the disclosure.
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 External link http://www.elsevier.com/conflictsofinterest
Acknowledgements
List here those individuals who provided help during the research (e.g., providing language help, writing assistance or proofreading the article, etc.).

Presentation of Manuscript

General Presentation: Double-space the entire manuscript and use wide (3 cm) margins. (Avoid full justification; i.e., do not use a constant right-hand margin.) Ensure that each new paragraph is clearly indicated. Present tables and figure legends on separate pages at the end of the manuscript. If possible, consult a recent issue of the journal to become familiar with layout and conventions. Number all pages consecutively.

Title Page: provide the following data:
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 is willing to 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.
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 (not exceeding 300 words) is required for all manuscripts except letters. The abstract should state briefly the purpose of the research, the principal results and major conclusions. An abstract is often presented separate from the article, so it must be able to stand alone. References should therefore be avoided, but if essential, they must be cited in full, without reference to the reference list. Non-standard or uncommon abbreviations should be avoided, but if essential they must be defined at their first mention in the abstract itself.
Keywords. Immediately after the abstract, provide a maximum of 5 keywords, 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. Please note that Keywords should NOT include words that already appear in the title of the manuscript. These keywords will be used for indexing purposes.

Acknowledgments: Collate Acknowledgments, including information on grants received, in a separate section at the end of the article before the references. Do not include them on the title page at all.

References: 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. Citations may be made directly (or parenthetically). Groups of references should be listed first alphabetically, then chronologically. Examples: "as demonstrated (Allan, 1996a, 1996b, 1999; Allan and Jones, 1995). Kramer et al. (2000) have recently shown.

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 should not be in the reference list, but may be mentioned in the text. Citation of a reference as 'in press' implies that the item has been accepted for publication.

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.

References should be listed as follows:

Cabanc, M., LeBlanc, J., 1983. Physiological conflict in humans: fatigue vs. cold discomfort. Am. J. Physiol. 224, R621-R628.

Collier, G. H., Rovee-Collier, C. K., 1981. A comparative analysis of optimal foraging behavior: laboratory stimulations. In: Kamil, A. C., Sargent, T. D. (Eds.), Foraging Behavior. Gerland, New York, pp. 39-76.

When citing an Elsevier journal, include the digital object identifier (DOI - see following paragraph for further information), if noted, from the article's title page. Please note the following examples:

Asquith, B., Bangham, C.R.M., 2003. The dynamics of T-cell fratricide: application of a robust approach to mathematical modelling in immunology. J. Theor. Biol. 222 (1), 53-69., doi:10.1016/S0022-5193(03)00013-4.

Kesmir, C., De Boer, R., 2003. A spatial model of germinal center reactions: cellular adhesion based sorting of B cells results in efficient affinity maturation. J. Theor. Biol., doi:10.1016/S0022-5193(03)00010-9.

Responsibility for the accuracy of bibliographic citations lies entirely with the authors.

Digital Object Identifier (DOI): This is a persistent identifier which may be used to cite and link to electronic documents. The DOI consists of a unique alphanumeric character string, which is assigned to a document by the publisher upon the initial electronic publication. The DOI will never change, and therefore it is an ideal medium for citing Articles in Press which have not yet received their full bibliographic information. The References section, above, shows samples of DOIs included in references.

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.

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 forth.

Footnotes: Footnotes should be used sparingly. Number them consecutively throughout the article, using superscript Arabic numbers. Many word processors 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 on a separate sheet at the end of the article. Do not include footnotes in the Reference list.

Units, Symbols and Abbreviations: All measurements should be expressed in accordance with the Systeme International d'Unites (S.I. units, International Metric System) With the exception of those used for units of measurement no abbreviation should be used without being spelled out when first introduced. Abbreviations consisting of groups of initials (such as CNS, IVP) should be written in capitals without full stops. Define abbreviations that are not standard in this field at their first occurrence in the article: in the abstract but also in the main text after it. Ensure consistency of abbreviations throughout the article.

Mathematical formulae: Present simple formulae in the line of normal text where possible. In principle, variables are to be presented in italics. Use the solidus (/) instead of a horizontal line,

e.g., Xp/Ym

Powers of e are often more conveniently denoted by exp. Number consecutively any equations that have to be displayed separate from the text (if referred to explicitly in the text).

Preparation of Illustrations

  • Make sure you use uniform lettering and sizing of your original artwork.
  • Only use the following fonts in your illustrations: Arial, Courier, Helvetica, Times, Symbol.
  • Number the illustrations according to their sequence in the text.
  • Provide all illustrations as separate files.


A detailed guide on electronic artwork is available on our Web site: External link http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions.

Captions : Ensure that each illustration has a caption. Supply captions on a separate sheet, 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.

Color figures will be published free of charge, where their use is necessary to a good understanding of the article; this will be determined by the Editor(s).
However, 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) regardless of whether these illustrations are reproduced in color in the printed version. For further information on the preparation of electronic artwork, please see External link http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions. Please note: Because of technical complications that can arise in converting color figures to "gray scale" (for the printed version should you not opt for color in print), please submit in addition usable black-and-white files corresponding to all the color illustrations.

Preparation of Supplementary Material

Elsevier accepts electronic supplementary material to support and enhance your scientific research. Supplementary files offer additional possibilities for publishing 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 (External link http://www.sciencedirect.com). 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. Please note, however, that supplementary material will not appear in the printed journal. For more detailed instructions, please visit, External link http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions, then click on Multimedia files".

Proofs

One set of page proofs in PDF format will be sent by e-mail to the corresponding author (if we do not have an e-mail address then paper proofs will be sent by post). Elsevier now sends PDF proofs which can be annotated; for this you will need to download Adobe Reader© version 7 (or higher) available free from External link http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html. Instructions on how to annotate PDF files will accompany the proofs. The exact system requirements are given at the Adobe site: External link http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/acrrsystemreqs.html#70win.
If you do not wish to use the PDF annotations function, you may list the corrections (including replies to the Query Form) and return to Elsevier in an e-mail. Please list your corrections quoting line number. If, for any reason, this is not possible, then mark the corrections and any other comments (including replies to the Query Form) on a printout of your proof and return by fax, or scan the pages and e-mail, or by post. Please use this proof only for checking the typesetting, editing, completeness and correctness of the text, tables and figures. Significant changes to the article as accepted for publication will only be considered at this stage with permission from the Editor. We will do everything possible to get your article published quickly and accurately. Therefore, it is important to ensure that all of your corrections are sent back to us in one communication: 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.

Electronic Offprints (e-offprints):

The corresponding author, at no cost, will be provided with a PDF file of the article via e-mail or, alternatively, option list 6.1 free paper offprints. 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. Additional paper offprints can be ordered by the authors. An order form with prices will be sent to the corresponding author.

Journal title is covered in Current Contents, ASCA, Index Medicus, EMBASE/Excerpta Medica and the Science Citation Index.
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