Basic, Translational, and Clinical Research in Neuromodulation



BRAIN STIMULATION aims to be the premiere journal for publication of original research in the field of neuromodulation. The purview extends across the entire field of brain stimulation, including noninvasive and invasive techniques, and technologies that alter brain function through the use of electrical, magnetic, radiowave, or focally targeted pharmacological stimulation. BRAIN STIMULATION encourages manuscripts describing the effects of brain stimulation on basic processes, such as gene expression and other aspects of molecular biology, neurochemical regulation, functional brain activity, sensorimotor function, or cognitive and affective processes at the systems level. Likewise, BRAIN STIMULATION seeks the highest level of research on the biophysics and biopsychophysics of stimulation paradigms, as well as the use of these techniques as a probe to outline patterns of neural connectivity. As an equal partner with this basic emphasis, the journal encourages a strong representation of research on the therapeutic potential and adverse effects of the stimulation technologies. The Editors encourage clinical manuscripts not only describing clinical trials, but also conceptual pieces, discussions of ethics as they pertain to this field, or services research.

All manuscripts must be submitted to BRAIN STIMULATION: Basic, Translational and Clinical Research in Neuromodulation via our online manuscript submission and peer review system at http://ees.elsevier.com/brs . We regret we cannot consider manuscripts submitted outside of this system.

Except where explicitly stated otherwise, BRAIN STIMULATION conforms to the guidelines set forth by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) (see Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals: Writing and Editing for Biomedical Publication (February 2006): available at http://www.ICMJE.org .

All manuscripts considered suitable for the Journal are strictly refereed. Articles are accepted with the understanding that they are original contributions submitted solely to BRAIN STIMULATION and are not under consideration for publication elsewhere. Prior presentation of abstracts at meetings regarding the research is acceptable, but the abstract should be noted on the title page. Original research (including clinical reports and review articles), techniques and methods, brief communications (including relevant preliminary research reports) and letters to the editor may be submitted. Please conform to the following guidelines for each article type (word limits include the abstract and body text and do not include the references):

Original Research (includes clinical reports, review articles)	• 4,000 word limit • Abstract of up to 250 words (see formatting requirement for abstracts below)
Techniques and Methods (feature new, improved, or noteworthy comments about brain stimulation techniques or methods)	• 1,500 word limit • 150 word abstract • maximum 2 figures
Short Communication	• 1,000 word limit • no abstract • 1 figure or table
Letter to the editor	•1,000 word limit • maximum of 10 references • maximum 1 table • Subject to editing according to space limitations

Editorials are written by invitation only. Please contact the Editorial Office directly if you want to write an editorial.

Editorial changes necessary to improve clarity and conformity to journal style may be made without prior consultation with authors. Any editorial changes, however, will be subject to author's review prior to publication.

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES:

All new manuscripts must be submitted through the BRAIN STIMULATION online manuscript submission and peer review system ( http://ees.elsevier.com/brs ). Complete instructions about the electronic submission process are available at the website. If authors experience any difficulty during the submission process or require any assistance, please contact support@elsevier.com.

Manuscripts must be double-spaced with wide margins. Pages should be numbered consecutively with an abbreviated title in the upper right-hand corner of each page.

Please include a title page with the full names of authors, academic or professional affiliations, and complete address, phone number, and e-mail address of the corresponding author. Up to five key words and a running title of no more than 45 characters should be indicated on the title page.

A Word About Authorship. All persons designated as authors should qualify for authorship. Each author should have participated sufficiently in the work to take public responsibility for the content. The corresponding author affirms that he or she had access to all data from the study, both what is reported and what is unreported, and also that he or she had complete freedom to direct its analysis and its reporting, without influence from the sponsors. The corresponding author also affirms that there was no editorial direction or censorship from the sponsors. Preparation of drafts of manuscripts by employees of the sponsor who are not listed as authors is expressly prohibited.

Authorship credit should be based on substantial contributions to: 1) conception and design or analysis and interpretation of data; 2) drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content; and 3) final approval of the version to be published. Conditions 1, 2, and 3 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 is also not sufficient. Any part of an article critical to its main conclusions must be the responsibility of at least one author.

Only those with key responsibility for the material in the article should be listed as authors; others contributing to the work should be recognized in the acknowledgment section. (Because readers may infer endorsement of the data and conclusions, all persons acknowledged must give written permission for their contribution to be noted in print. It is the corresponding author's responsibility to obtain written permission.) Editors may require authors to justify the assignment of authorship.

The order of the documents submitted should be as follows:

1. Cover letter (a separate file; include a conflict-of-interest/financial disclosure statement regarding all authors (see below)).
2. Manuscript (including title page, abstract, main text, acknowledgements, conflicts of interest, table and figure legends and references all as one document)
3. Tables and/or figures
4. Ancillary information not intended for full publication, but available for reviewers and highly interested readers. This information may be posted on the BRAIN STIMULATION website. Examples include additional lengthy tables, in-depth photographs of scientific methods, or short videos of scientific techniques or behavioral effects of stimulation.

Authors are required to submit the cover letter, manuscript, and any tables and artwork in electronic form. Files should be labeled with logically descriptive file names (e.g., "Manuscript.doc," "Fig1.doc"). Tables and graphics should be uploaded as separate files. Please note that original source files, not PDF files, are required. Complete instructions for electronic artwork submission can be found on the journal's welcome page on http://ees.elsevier.com/brs . Authors with multiple figure files should consider compressing them in a single .zip file for uploading.

Authors may send queries concerning the submission process, manuscript status, or journal procedures to the Editorial Office via an e-mail link on the author's main page in the submission system or by e-mailing the Editorial Office via regular e-mail (georgem@musc.edu). All correspondence, including the Editor's decision and request for revisions, will be made via e-mail.

Manuscripts for original articles and brief reports should be structured with sections entitled and ordered as follows: Title Page, Abstract, Introduction, Methods and Materials, Results, Discussion, Acknowledgments, Financial Disclosures, References, Footnotes, Table/Figure Legends, and Appendices. Begin sections for reference lists, footnotes, and legends on separate pages. Acronyms must be spelled out on first use in text, and where used in tables or figures, in each of their legends.

FORMAT FOR ABSTRACTS: Abstracts should be written in the form of:

Background: This is a concise statement of why this research was done, placing it in the context of current knowledge or controversies.

Objective/Hypothesis: This is a clear statement of the precise objective or question addressed in the paper. If a hypothesis was tested, it should be stated.

Methods: The basic design of the study and its duration should be described. The methods used should be stated and the statistical data/methods provided.

Results: The main results of the study should be given in narrative form. Any measurements or other information that may require explanation should be defined. Any important information not included in the presentation of results should be declared. Levels of statistical significance should be indicated, as well as any other factors crucial to the outcome of the study.

Conclusion(s): of the study that are directly supported by the evidence reported should be given along with the clinical application, and speculation about the potential impact on current thinking.

The main body of the manuscript is next in the document, generally following the format of Introduction/background, Hypothesis, Methods, Results, and Discussion.

Acknowledgments: All acknowledgments should follow the Discussion section and precede the Reference section. This section should include acknowledgments for personal and technical assistance, in addition to detailed information regarding all sources of grant and other material or financial support. If a research group is listed as an author, then the individual members of the research team should also be named here.

Financial Disclosures This section must include the required conflict of interest statements for each author (see Conflicts of Interest section, below).

References should be listed numerically, corresponding to their order of appearance in the text. BRAIN STIMULATION uses the Vancouver reference style. Citation in the text is by Arabic numeral in parentheses, (1). Use et al. only for six or more authors: et al. follows the names of the first three authors. References should be styled as follows:

Reference Samples:

Journal:

1. Nahas Z, Teneback C, Chae JH, et al. Serial Vagus Nerve Stimulation Functional MRI (VNS/fMRI) in Treatment Resistant Depression. Neuropsychopharmacology 2007;32:1-12. Periodical abbreviations should follow those used in Index Medicus.

Book:

2. George MS, Belmaker RH. TMS in Clinical Psychiatry. Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Press, 2006.

Edited book:

George MS, Nahas Z, Bohning DE, Kozel FA, Anderson B, Mu C, et al. Vagus Nerve Stimulation and Deep BRAIN STIMULATION. In: Stein DJ, Kupfer DJ, Schatzberg AF, editors. Textbook of Mood Disorders. Washington, DC: APPI; 2005. p. 337-349.

Footnotes. Footnotes to text should be numbered consecutively with superior Arabic numerals. Footnotes to tables should be indicated by superior lowercase letters.

Figures and Tables. Figures and Tables should be numbered in the order of their mention with Arabic numerals (i.e., 1, 2, 3) and should have brief descriptions. Avoid 1a, 1b, 1c numbering; numerical sequence and separate captions are preferred. Figures and/or Tables that are to appear together should be cited together in the manuscript text.

Supplementary Material. Supplementary material, relevant to the work but not critical to support the findings, is made available via links in the online article but not published in print. Examples include additional lengthy tables, in-depth photographs of scientific methods, or short videos of scientific techniques or behavioral effects of stimulation. All such material will be posted exactly as received, and should be submitted as intended for viewing. See http://ees.elsevier.com/brs for submission details.

PDF Proofing. The corresponding author will receive proofs via e-mail link in PDF format, which should be corrected and returned within 48 hours of receipt. Authors should carefully check all proofs, as it is their responsibility to see that all errors are corrected and queries from editors answered. Any paid color art will be included in the PDF proof.

Reprints. Reprints may be ordered prior to publication. A reprint order form is mailed separately to the corresponding author.

Copyright. Upon acceptance of an article by the Journal, the author will be sent a copyright transferal form along with acknowledgment of acceptance of manuscript. The author is asked to transfer copyright of the article to the publisher. This transfer will ensure the widest possible dissemination of information under U.S. Copyright Law.

Review Process. The Editors select the reviewers, although suggestions of potential reviewers is encouraged and in fact required. As a general rule, three independent reviewers evaluate each manuscript. On occasion, the editor will request an additional review for statistical adequacy. The comments of the reviewers are generally communicated to the authors within 1-2 months of submission. Authors should contact the Editorial Office if the delay has been longer.

BRAIN STIMULATION excludes reviewers who work at the same institution as any author, or those who have any other obvious conflict of interest. The identity of individual reviewers remains confidential to all parties except the Editorial Office.

Authors should be aware that manuscripts might be returned without outside review when the Editors deem that the paper is of insufficient general interest for the readership of BRAIN STIMULATION, or that the scientific priority is such that it is unlikely to receive favorable reviews. Editorial rejection is done to speed up the editorial process and to allow the authors more time to promptly submit manuscripts elsewhere. All other submissions (with the general exception of Editorials and Correspondence) will be subject to peer review.

If revisions are a condition of publication, only two revised versions of the paper will be considered.

Disclosure of Financial Interests and Potential Conflicts Of Interest. BRAIN STIMULATION requires all authors to provide full disclosure of any and all relevant financial interests. Further, we require all authors of all types of articles (including letters) to specify the nature of potential conflicts of interest, financial or otherwise. This disclosure includes direct or indirect financial or personal relationships, interests, and affiliations relevant to the subject matter of the manuscript that have occurred over the last two years, or that are expected in the foreseeable future. This disclosure includes, but is not limited to, grants or funding, employment, affiliations, patents (in preparation, filed, or granted), inventions, honoraria, consultancies, royalties, stock options/ownership, or expert testimony. This policy of full disclosure is similar to the policies of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors, the Journal of the American Medical Association, and other such organizations. The conflict of interest statements should be included in the Financial Disclosures section of the manuscript at the time of submission for all article types. If an author has no conflicts of interest to declare, this must be explicitly stated. Authors should contact the Editorial Office with questions or concerns, but should err on the side of inclusion when in doubt. The following is a sample text:

'Dr. Einstein reports having received lecture fees from EMC Laboratories, and research funding from Quantum Enterprises. Dr. Curie disclosed consulting fees from RA Inc. Dr. Newton reported his patent on "Newtonian physics". Dr. Archimedes reported no biomedical financial interests or potential conflicts of interest.'

The submitting author will be required to indicate that this information has been fully included in the manuscript at the time of submission. In addition, all authors are required to acknowledge that the conflict of interest disclosures are complete for both themselves and their co-authors, to the best of their knowledge. Manuscripts that fail to include the complete statements of all authors upon submission will be returned to the corresponding author and will delay the processing and evaluation of the manuscript.

Conflict-of-Interest Policies Specific for BRAIN STIMULATION. This is a field where collaboration with industry is often part-and-parcel of research. Research in device-based technologies often cannot proceed without the involvement of device manufacturers, or the individuals responsible for device invention, design, fabrication, etc. The journal is thus developing a set of written conflict-of-interest policies for primary or senior authors (first and last positions), co-authors, reviewers, and editors. The general rules follow the principles that: 1) all financial involvements pertaining to the research should be disclosed by authors (see above); 2) reviewers should also disclose any financial or other conflict-of-interest, and recuse themselves when such conflicts are of sufficient magnitude as to lend the appearance of potential bias in review; and 3) a similar policy applies to editors.

Ethical Considerations. Authors of reports on human studies, especially those involving placebo, symptom provocation, drug discontinuation, or patients with disorders that may impair decision-making capability, should consider the ethical issues related to the work presented and include (in the Methods and Materials section of their manuscript) detailed information on the informed consent process, including the method or methods used to assess the subject's capacity to give informed consent, and safeguards included in the study design for protection of human subjects. Specifically, authors should consider all ethical issues relevant to their research, and briefly address each of these in their reports. When relevant patient follow-up data are available, this should also be reported. Specifically, investigators reporting on research involving human subjects or animals must have prior approval from an institutional review board. This approval should be mentioned in the methods section of the manuscript. In countries were institutional review boards are not available, the authors must include a statement that research was conducted in accordance with the Helsinki Declaration as revised 1989. All studies involving animals must state that the authors followed the guidelines for the use and care of laboratory animals of the author's institution or the National Research Council or any national law pertaining to animal research care.

Template and Format for Letters to the Editor Regarding TMS-related spells (seizures, syncopal episodes). In an effort to encourage full and efficient reporting of all TMS-related seizure events or spells, Brain Stimulation has set up a simple method for publishing these events. Authors should follow the following format, adding in the pertinent information if available. Following publication of the letter, we will then also place this information in a constantly updated spreadsheet of TMS seizures, accessible from the Brain Stimulation webpage. Before preparing the letter to the editor regarding the seizure, we encourage authors to download and view the web-video distinguishing syncope from seizures, available at www.brainstimjrnl.com/content/mmc_library.

Dear Editor:

We report the following TMS-related seizure or spell. The subject was a xx year old man/woman with the following diagnoses (healthy control, xx disease). The patient had the following risk factors (prior closed head injury, loss of consciousness, history of seizures or febrile seizures, family history of epilepsy). He/she was taking the following medications (list generic drugs and doses). On the day of the event, the subject had the following additional risk factors (change in sleep pattern, sleep deprivation, change in medication, occult drug use, high doses of caffeine, etc.).

We were delivering the TMS in the following manner - coil type (round, figure eight), coil location, TMS machine manufacturer, orientation of coil, biphasic or uniphasic pulse, intensity related to motor threshold, method of motor threshold determination (active, resting, EMG, visual), frequency, length of train, intertrain interval, total number of pulses in a session, number of sessions.

The event occurred x minutes into the YY train for this patient on the ZZ day of stimulation. The subject was sitting, standing, seated, upright, supine, etc. The setting was a research lab, clinical delivery suite, other. The TMS operator first noted (describe any movements, where, type, vocalizations, head turning, eye turning). The TMS operator had the following training regarding seizures. The movements lasted for XX minutes. We did the following (passive support, starting IV, administering medications). The subject had urinary, fecal incontinence, post-ictal confusion lasting xx minutes or hours, tongue biting, other physical trauma. The seizure self-terminated or stopped after xx intervention. During the event it was possible/not possible to check pulse and blood pressure, which were XX.

A general neurologic exam and mental status exam was performed by XX, with what type of training, xx minutes after the event and the following was noted. These labs were drawn and were normal/abnormal (electrolytes, calcium, prolactin) or whatever. An EEG was done/not done and revealed the following (...). A brain CT/MRI revealed the following (...). There were/were not sequela. The patient was retreated with TMS (or not).

The clinical diagnosis of this event was TMS-related seizure, TMS-related syncope, other. The specific reasons for favoring this choice among the possible differential diagnoses were XX. This event is also listed in the following publication. This event was also reported to the FDA or other safety body.

Name of investigator and location of where the seizure occurred.