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Online submission

FEBS Journal requires authors to use online submission of manuscripts at http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/febsj/

Step-by-step instructions on how to submit your manuscript online are available during the submission process. Queries can be sent to the Editorial Office (febsj@camfebs.co.uk) and further information can be obtained online from the submission site via the Get Help Now button.

  • Main text can be uploaded as a PDF, DOC or RTF file.
  • Upload the figures separately as PDF, GIF, JPG, EPS, TIFF, PPT or XLS files. Each figure must be labelled with a figure number.
  • File sizes should be no larger than 2MB.
  • Main text, figure, scheme and table files will be combined into a single PDF document for the peer review process.
  • Supplementary files, e.g. unpublished papers, will not be included in the PDF but will be available to referees, unless uploaded as a Supplementary file NOT for Review.
  • To ensure accurate conversion of characters, standard fonts such as Times, Times New Roman, Arial or Helvetica should be used for preparing the text and figures. Courier or Courier New should be used for sequence alignments.
  • Symbol font should be used to convert Greek characters and other non-standard characters such as the degree symbol.

During the submission process the following should be provided:

  • The names of four suggested referees, together with their institutions, telephone numbers and email addresses. Please add in brackets after the names the relevant areas of expertise and indicate their suitability as referees. Please do not suggest scientists based in your own institution or close collaborators elsewhere, as they will not be approached. The editors will check the standing of the referees in their stated fields by reference to PubMed and other public databases.
  • A covering letter of submission (giving the postal, fax and email addresses of the corresponding author). We require a statement that the manuscript is not under consideration for publication elsewhere and that its publication in the present form has been approved by all authors (see Editorial policy).
  • Evidence of submission of sequences to a databank.
  • Approval of citation of any personal communications.
  • Any unpublished papers that are cited must be uploaded for referees to access. An electronic copy of any related paper under consideration or in press elsewhere must also be submitted to facilitate evaluation by the referees. Failure to do this may delay the review process.
  • Any Supplementary material.
  • If the manuscript is a resubmission, please upload a letter giving point-by-point responses to the referees of the previous version.

NB Once you have viewed your pdf proof, you will receive an onscreen acknowledgement of submission with a reference number.

Submission of a revised manuscript
Submit the revised manuscript online to http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/febsj/ following the instructions provided in the editorial decision letter. You will need to:

  • Respond to the referees' comments online.
  • Upload a revised version of the text of the manuscript in Word format and any Tables in Word format. Alterations to the text should by highlighted by using track changes in Word. Authors are asked to ensure that only ONE set of changes is visible. Alternatively, changes can be highlighted in BOLD TYPE.
  • Upload separate print quality figures files in PDF, TIFF or EPS format.
  • It is essential to follow instructions described below in Preparation of electronic artwork for publication.
  • Provide a completed Exclusive Licence Form to the FEBS Journal Editorial Office:

    - by email to bruyns@camfebs.co.uk as [manuscript number]_ELF.pdf
    - by fax to +44 1223 369090
    - by mail to FEBS Journal Editorial Office, 98 Regent Street, Cambridge, CB2 1DP, UK

NB An acceptance date will not be allocated until the Editorial Office has received a completed Exclusive Licence Form.

Editorial policy

Submission of a manuscript implies that the work described has not been published before (except in the form of an abstract or as part of a lecture, review or thesis), that it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, that its publication in the present form has been approved by all authors and by the responsible authorities in the institutions where the work was carried out, and that, if accepted, it will not be published elsewhere in the same form, in any language, without the consent of FEBS, the licence holder. Previously published abstracts, etc should be referred to in the Introduction.

An electronic copy of any related paper under consideration or in press elsewhere should also be submitted to facilitate evaluation by the referees.

Submission of a research article is taken to imply that the authors are willing to make available to academic researchers cell lines, DNA clones, antibodies or similar materials, that have been used in the experiments reported.

Evaluation of manuscripts
Submitted manuscripts are assigned to an Editor of the Journal who is responsible for its evaluation. The Editor's decision regarding publication is based on the reports of referees, which will, at the Editor's discretion, be transmitted to the authors. Authors will be informed of the Editorial decision, on average, within 4-5 weeks of submission of a Regular Paper. The status of each manuscript within the editorial process can be followed online at http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/febsj/. Enquiries should be addressed to the Editorial Office, email: febsj@camfebs.co.uk.

Authorship
Papers should conform to recommendations for authorship provided by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (the Vancouver Group). For further details see the ICMJE website http://www.icmje.org/.

Regular papers
Regular papers are the main form of publication of new research results in FEBS Journal. There is no formal limitation on length but a regular paper rarely exceeds about 7500 words (39 000 characters, without spaces). Shorter papers are of course welcome and the Editors will make recommendations for shortening any paper if that appears appropriate without loss of essential content. A concise well-written paper is easier for the Editor and referees to evaluate and this can help to speed up publication.

Reviews and minireviews
Authors wishing to submit a Review article or Minireview Series should contact the Reviews Editor, Prof. Ferdinand Hucho, email: hucho@chemie.fu-berlin.de.
A Minireview Series normally comprises three to five short review articles on related topics, each contributed by a different research group in the field. Each minireview should be submitted as a separate manuscript by the corresponding author or coordinator of the series.

The coordinator is expected to provide a short overview of the series, which should be a maximum of 600 words and contain no references, figures or tables. In addition, we request a short biography (maximum 100 words) and also a photograph as a separate TIFF file (with a resolution of 300 dpi). The overview and biography should be uploaded together as a separate manuscript.

The coordinator should arrange for a general title for the Minireview Series and ensure that this recurs in the separate title of each of the individual constituent papers. This is to emphasize their connectedness and to ensure they are picked up together in literature searches.

An Exclusive Licence Form is needed for the overview and for each minireview.

Meeting Reports
A Meeting Report should begin with a proper introduction to the field, explain what the hot topics are, what the major advances appeared to be, and include some critical summing up of the field on the part of the author of the report. Thus it should resemble a review article, but be centred on a meeting. All topics in the general area of the molecular life sciences are welcome. Prospective authors should consult the Reviews Editor (Ferdinand Hucho: hucho@chemie.fu-berlin.de) or the Editor-in-Chief (Richard Perham: perham@camfebs.co.uk)

Papers with mathematical models
For papers that contain a mathematical model, FEBS Journal offers the opportunity for specialist refereeing of such articles plus online publication of live versions of the models for accepted manuscripts.

Authors are requested to submit an ASCII text file containing the model description (reaction stoichiometries, rate equations, parameter values and initial conditions, i.e. everything that is needed to program the model) in parallel to their manuscript file, following the instructions given at http://jjj.biochem.sun.ac.za/journals/febsj/submit.html.  Models can also be submitted in SBML format. The files should be sent as an email attachment to Prof. Jacky Snoep (email: jls@sun.ac.za) after online submission of the manuscript at http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/febsj. The manuscript number allocated to the manuscript should be quoted in the email containing the file of the associated model. The email containing the model should be copied to the Editorial Office (email: febsj@camfebs.co.uk) for information. At this stage the model will be converted to a replica that can be run over the Internet only by the reviewers of the paper. If the paper is accepted for publication in FEBS Journal, the model will subsequently be made freely accessible online.

The submission letter should clearly indicate that it is requested that the paper be treated technically as a modelling paper. When it is published in the Journal, the paper will not be distinguishable from its normal counterparts, except for a reference to the website that contains the model.

Accepted manuscripts can be provided as LaTex files but, as our production editing procedures use a Word-based system, the use of LaTeX files may result in slight delays at proof stage. Manuscripts supplied in LaTex format should be accompanied by a pdf version, for reference.

Papers with three-dimensional models of proteins

If your manuscript describes a three-dimensional model of a protein that has been manually built, you should consider depositing it in the PMDB database (http://www.caspur.it/PMDB see also NAR 34, 306-309). The database will return a unique identifier which you can include in your manuscript, thereby allowing readers to have access to your model without the need to contact you directly. The accession number should be included in the manuscript e.g. as a footnote on the first page: 'Database: model data are available in the PMDB database under the accession number XXXX'. The model can be stored in the database as either a full model with 3D coordinates in PDB format, or as an alignment to a known structure in the CASP format. You may keep your model on hold (i.e. not public) for up to three months after deposition.

Sequence data
Sequences should be treated as follows:

  • Protein sequences, which have been determined by direct sequencing of the protein, must be submitted to UniProt at the website http://www.uniprot.org/help/submissions. Please note that accession numbers are not provided in advance for protein sequences that are the result of translation of nucleic acid sequences. These translations will automatically be forwarded from the EMBL nucleotide database and are assigned UniProt accession numbers.
  • Results from characterization experiments should also be submitted to UniProt. This can include such information as function, subcellular location, subunit composition etc. Contact website http://www.uniprot.org/update.
  • Sequence alignments should be submitted as supplementary material, preferably as a PDF.
  • Proteomics data with protein identifications by Mass Spectrometry should be submitted to the PRIDE database at the EMBL Outstation The European Bioinformatics Institute website (see http://www.ebi.ac.uk/pride/#submission).
  • Nucleotide sequences of DNA should be determined from both strands. Authors must describe the sequencing strategy employed and must justify in their paper why any regions of the sequence have been determined from only one strand.
  • New nucleotide data must be submitted and deposited in the DDBJ/EMBL/GenBank databases and an accession number obtained. Submission to any one of the three collaborating databanks is sufficient to ensure data entry in all. The accession number should be included in the manuscript e.g. as a footnote on the first page: 'Note: nucleotide sequence data are available in the DDBJ/EMBL/GenBank databases under the accession number(s) XXXX'. If requested the database will withhold release of data until publication.
  • The most convenient method for submitting sequence data is by World Wide Web:
    EMBL via Webin: http://www.ebi.ac.uk/embl/Submission/webin.html
    GenBank via Bankit: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/BankIt/
    DDBJ via Sakura: http://sakura.ddbj.nig.ac.jp/
  • Alternatively, the stand-alone submission tool 'Sequin' is available from the EBI at: http://www.ebi.ac.uk/Sequin and from NCBI at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/projects/Sequin/.
  • For special styles of submission (e.g. genomes, bulk submissions etc.), additional submission systems are available from the above sites.

NB All accession numbers must be obtained before the paper can be accepted for publication

Results for proteins and nucleic acids from X-ray diffraction and NMR spectroscopy

Results from X-ray-diffraction and NMR studies should be treated as follows:

  • X-ray crystallographic results (atomic coordinates and structure factors) and NMR solution structure results (atomic coordinates and restraint files) should be deposited at one of the appropriate entry points for the Protein Data Bank: Research Collaboratory for Structural Bioinformatics (www.rcsb.org/pdb/) for proteins and nucleic acids; European Bioinformatics Institute (http://www.ebi.ac.uk/) for proteins.
  • Other types of data from NMR spectroscopy of proteins and nucleic acids (chemical shift assignments, couplings, relaxation parameters, hydrogen exchange) should be deposited at BioMagResBank (www.bmrb.wisc.edu/).
  • No paper will be sent out for review without a written statement from the submitting author that the coordinates will be deposited. An accession number must be clearly cited in the paper or added at the proof stage. The accession number should be included in the manuscript e.g. as a footnote on the first page: 'Database: structural data are available in the Protein Data Bank/BioMagResBank databases under the accession number(s) XXXX'. The maximum delay before release of data is specified by the data banks and is currently 1 year for coordinates. If a delay is imposed, the specified release date should be cited in the paper.
  • Results from preliminary X-ray investigations will not be accepted for publication unless they contain features of special interest. Similarly, papers reporting NMR signal assignments and secondary structure will not be accepted unless they provide important new information about biological structure or function.

Structured Digital Abstracts

A Structured Digital Abstract (SDA) will be added to research articles accepted for publication in FEBS Journal that describe protein–protein interactions. An SDA is an informative extension of the regular journal article abstract and consists of one or more sentences that show helpful links to database entries in the MINT (Molecular INTeraction) database http://mint.bio.uniroma2.it/mint/Welcome.do. Authors will be contacted by MINT to confirm that the SDA content is accurate and the SDA will be added to the manuscript at proof stage. For more information, please see http://www.febsjournal.org/structured_digital_abstracts.asp

Ethical standards
Authors should consider and follow the ethical standards described below. The processing of papers may be delayed if there is any doubt about their conformity with these ethical standards.

1. Research Misconduct
Any breach of research or publication ethics including plagiarism, submission of fraudulent results/data including doctored figures, dual publication and false or incomplete attribution of authorship will not be tolerated. It will also be considered malpractice for an author to make inappropriate contact with a reviewer/editor during the review process with the aim of influencing the outcome. FEBS Journal will take action where misconduct is suspected, along the lines of the general principles outlined in Guidelines on Good Publication Practice produced by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). The Guidelines are available from the web on: www.publicationethics.org.uk.

2. Animal Experiments
Where appropriate, authors should include in the Materials and methods  (Experimental procedures) section :

  • A statement indicating that the experiments were performed in accordance with named national legislation where it exists, or in its absence, with the named institutional/local body concerned with the ethics of experimentation (e.g. the National Research Council or NIH in the USA). Experiments should be carried out in accordance with the European Communities Council Directive of 24 November 1986 (86/609/EEC) or with the Guidelines laid down by the NIH in the USA regarding the care and use of animals for experimental procedures.
  • A full description of the anaesthetic and surgical procedures used, and of peri-operative care.
  • Authors must provide evidence that they took adequate steps to ensure that animals did not suffer unnecessarily at any stage of an experiment, whether acute or chronic.

3. Human Experiments
Research involving human subjects should comply with the Code of Ethics of the World Medical Association (Declaration of Helsinki), see http://www.cirp.org/library/ethics/helsinki/.
If human subjects are used,

  • Manuscripts must be accompanied by a statement in the Materials and methods  (Experimental procedures) section, indicating that:
    1/ the experiments were undertaken with the understanding and written consent of each subject,
    2/ the study methodologies conformed to the standards set by the Declaration of Helsinki and
    3/ were approved by the local ethics committee.
  • Authors should ensure that all risks are minimized and the subjects are not injured and do not feel they have been abused as a result of participating in the study. Fully informed consent should always be sought.
  • In cases of experiments involving minors, in addition to meeting above mentioned precautions, evidence must be presented that the experiments were performed with the understanding and consent of the legal guardian.

The Editor reserves the right to reject a paper if there is doubt as to whether appropriate procedures have been used.

Preparation of the manuscript

Please use standard fonts (Times, Times New Roman, Arial or Helvetica for general text; Courier or Courier New should be used for sequence alignments; Symbol font should be used to convert Greek characters and other non-standard characters such as the degree symbol) in your document. NB Asian-based font sets may produce uncertain results.

Please note that Materials and methods or Experimental procedures should be located after the Discussion (not after Introduction).

Authors must ensure that they include all funding, with grant numbers, in the Acknowledgments section of the manuscript.

Manuscripts must contain the following:

Title page
Title. This should be concise but informative. Subtitles, if necessary, should not follow a colon. Avoid abbreviations.
Authors' names. These should appear below the title, with the first or middle name of each author given in full. Given names should appear first.
Addresses. The laboratories where the work was carried out should be given below the authors' names. If the work was carried out at more than one laboratory, the names of the authors should be followed by superscript numbers, which should also precede the names of the appropriate laboratories.
Corresponding author(s). The full name and address of the author for correspondence, including fax and telephone numbers and email address should be given. The author should indicate if any of these should not be published. Authors are encouraged to provide the URL of their departmental Website for publication.
Running title. This should contain not more than 50 characters (including spaces).
Abbreviations. These should be defined unless included in the table of accepted abbreviations. They should be introduced only if essential because of frequent repetition or excessive length of the full name. For further details, see Nomenclature, symbols, units and abbreviations section below.
Enzymes. For enzymes it is recommended that Enzyme Commission (EC) numbers be supplied; these are provided in the NC-IUBMB list (www.chem.qmw.ac.uk/iubmb/enzyme/), which has a search facility and explains how to submit suggestions for new listings and for updating older entries.
Keywords. Up to five keywords for Regular papers and up to 10 for Reviews should be provided. These keywords will be printed alongside the summary.
Subdivision. For statistical purposes only, authors should assign their manuscript to one of the 16 fields given in Aims and Scope.


Summary

  • The summary should give a concise statement of the problem, the experimental approach, and the major findings and conclusions.
  • It should contain not more than 250 words.
  • It should be intelligible without reference to other parts of the paper.
  • References, if cited, should be given in full (without the title of the paper).
  • Abbreviations should be avoided. If used, they should be defined in the summary.

Manuscript
The manuscript should then contain the following sections in this order:

Introduction
Results
Discussion (It is permissible to combine Results and Discussion if a clearer, shorter paper is produced)
Materials and methods or Experimental procedures
Acknowledgements
References
Titles of Supplementary material
Tables
Schema
Figure legends

  • FEBS Journal uses a numbered system for references.
  • References must be cited in the text, starting in the Introduction, by numbers in square brackets, e.g. [1], in numerical order of their citation in the text.
  • Titles must be provided for all serial publications.
  • Reference to articles cited as 'in press' should include the title, and the name of the journal.
  • Reference to unpublished work, including papers in preparation, should be kept to a minimum and should be mentioned in parentheses in the text as unpublished work, not in the reference list. The names of all contributors to the work should be given.
  • Personal communications should be mentioned only in the text.
  • Web pages should not be included in the reference list.
  • Avoid footnotes.

The reference list should appear in numerical order. Examples of the correct styles are shown below:

1. Tsubokawa M, Tohyama Y, Tohyama K, Asahi M, Inazu T, Nakamura H, Saito H & Yamamura H (1997) Interleukin-3 activates Syk in a human myeloblastic leukemia cell line, AML193.Eur J Biochem249, 792-796.
2. Sambrook J, Fritsch EF & Maniatis T (1989) Molecular Cloning: A Laboratory Manual, 2nd edn. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, Cold Spring Harbor, NY.
3. Langer T & Neupert W (1994) Chaperoning mitochondrial biogenesis. InThe Biology of Heat Shock Proteins and Molecular Chaperones (Morimoto RI, Tissičres A & Georgopoulos C, eds), pp. 53-83. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, Plainview, NY.

The use of a tool such as EndNote or Reference Manager is recommended for reference management and formatting. EndNote reference styles can be searched for at http://www.endnote.com/support/enstyles.asp, and Reference Manager reference styles can be searched for at http://www.refman.com/support/rmstyles.asp.

Acknowledgements

Authors must ensure that they include all funding, with grant numbers, in the Acknowledgments section of the manuscript.

Tables

  • These must be supplied as editable text and not as embedded figures/objects.
  • They should have a bold title and appear in the text following the references.
  • Experimental conditions and general remarks should appear in a legend between the title and the table. They should not reproduce the detail given in Materials and methods.
  • Footnotes should be used only if information cannot be included in the legend; they should be indicated by superscript lower-case letters.
  • All columns should have a heading; units should appear under the column heading(s).

Schema

  • These should appear in the text following the references
  • Authors should not use Microsoft Word 2007 equation tool to supply equations/schema. Instead, authors should use Mathtype plug-in, an equation editor for Word which is freely available to download.

Figure legends

  • Figure legends should appear in the text document following the references, each with a title, and be comprehensible without reference to the text.
  • The figure title must be relevant to the entire figure.
  • Supplementary figure legends should be included in the actual supplementary figure files (see Supplementary material).

Figures

  • Supply figures at final size widths: 80 mm (single column); 165 mm (double column) or 105 mm (intermediate). Max. depth is 230 mm.
  • Use sans serif, true-type fonts for labels if possible (preferably Arial or Helvetica) and Times (New) Roman if serif fonts required. Use Courier or Courier New for sequence data.
  • Line drawing lettering/lines must be clear. The axes of each graph should be lettered with the numerical scale and the measured quantity with units according to the style of the Journal.
  • Halftones (photographs) must have scale bars where applicable.

Images should not be modified to change their appearance or enhance any specific feature. Any adjustments of brightness and contrast or colour balance must be applied to the entire image and should not result in loss or gain of information. Unacceptable modifications include the addition, alteration or removal of a particular feature of an image. All figures in manuscripts will be examined for any indication of improper modifications. The final acceptance of all manuscripts is contingent on any concerns raised by referees being resolved.

Colour figures. The Journal encourages the publication of colour figures. Colour is free to authors where the Editors are of the view that it is essential. In all other instances, authors will be asked to return a signed copy of the completed Colourwork Agreement Form to the Editorial Office before their manuscript is passed to the Publisher. The Journal is pleased to allow authors to publish figures in colour free of charge in the online edition.

Reproduced figures

  • Reproduction of a previously published figure should be acknowledged at the end of the figure legend as follows: Figure reproduced from [ref number].
  • For each reproduced figure, the author should check with the relevant publisher whether permission for reproduction is required. Authors should inform the Editorial Office (febsj@camfebs.co.uk) when permission is required for a figure. Permission must be obtained before publication and sent to the Editorial Office by email or fax.

Cover illustrations
Authors with a colour figure appearing in an accepted paper that they believe would make a good image for the journal cover are invited to submit a copy of the figure 12 cm (width) by 14 cm (height), in colour, without any labels or scale bars. Please supply an electronic copy of the figure, with a short legend (max 15 words), following instructions in Preparation of electronic artwork for publication.

Preparation of electronic artwork for publication
Although low quality images are adequate for review purposes, print publication requires high quality images to prevent the final product being blurred or fuzzy. Information on the appropriate file formats for electronic graphics is available at http://authorservices.wiley.com/bauthor/illustration.asp.

  • Submit .eps, pdf, or .tiff files only.
  • For best quality reproduction, use .eps or pdf for line art, graphs, annotated photographs, e.g. gels, and .tiff for photographic images.
  • When creating pdf files, it is essential that Press Quality settings (with a resolution of >600 d.p.i.) are used in your pdf-generating software.
  • For scanned images, the scanning resolution (at final image size, see above for a guide to sizes) should be >600 d.p.i. to ensure adequate reproduction.
  • EPS files should be saved with fonts embedded (and with a TIFF preview if possible).
  • Black and white images should be supplied as 'grayscale'.
  • Colour images should be supplied as CMYK.
  • Multipart figures should be supplied in the final layout in one file, with each part labelled.

To facilitate production of publication quality artwork, we recommend that authors generate their artwork in software packages incorporating a SAVE AS or EXPORT TIFF/EPS function, e.g.: Adobe Illustrator 7.0 and above (EPS), Adobe Illustrator 9.0 (EPS but can also export files as TIFF), Deneba Canvas 6.0 and above (EPS), CorelDRAW 7.0 and above (EPS), Adobe Photoshop 4.0 and above (TIFF). You can EXPORT low resolution figs (GIF/JPG) from these packages for review purposes. EPS files can be produced from other applications [e.g. PowerPoint (see Electronic Artwork Guidelines)]BUT results can be unpredictable (e.g. fonts and shading not converted correctly, lines missing, dotted lines becoming solid). All scanned images embedded into other applications should be scanned at the recommended resolutions (see above).

Supplementary material
 This is additional, peer-reviewed material that appears online but is not printed in the Journal. It must be submitted with the initial submission, preferably as a single file.

  • Supplementary material must be cited at appropriate points in the main text of the manuscript.
  • Supplementary Figures, tables and text must be numbered Fig. S1, Fig. S2, etc., Table S1, Table S2, etc. and Doc. S1, Doc. S2, etc., respectively.
  • Titles and legends of supplementary figures and tables need to be included in the respective figure and table file(s).
  • The availability of supplementary material needs to be indicated in the main manuscript by a paragraph, to appear after the References, headed 'Supporting information' and providing titles of figures, tables and text.
  • Most common formats (e.g. DOC, XLS, PDF, MOV, AVI, MPEG, WRL) and data sets for protein structures can be used.
  • FEBS Journal requests that all ‘Materials and methods’ and ‘Results’ are properly described in the main manuscript, but that detail unnecessary to the main argument is placed in supplementary material.
  • An author's website can not be used as supplementary material. Text, figures and tables should be provided when the article is accepted.
  • Supplementary material will appear as supplied by the author.

Nomenclature, abbreviations, units and symbols

FEBS Journal prefers abbreviations and nomenclature to follow internationally agreed recommendations, e.g. those of the Nomenclature Committee of the International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (see www.chem.qmw.ac.uk/iubmb/nomenclature), however:

  • Authors may use commonly used abbreviations/acronyms but these must be defined in the text at first citation and included in the Abbreviations list. For standard abbreviations for semi-systematic or trivial names, please see this table.
  • SI units and quantities should be used (see http://www.bipm.fr/enus/3_SI/si.html) but Ĺ, cal, p.p.m. can be used where appropriate.
  • It is often convenient, especially in figures and table headings, to give a multiple of the quantity set or measured by multiplying it by a stated factor. The units in which it is expressed should not be multiplied by a number but may be indicated by prefixes such as: M, k, m, µ, n or p.
  • A negative index style is used for units.
  • Square brackets are commonly used to indicate concentrations.

English language editing before submission

Authors for whom English is a second language may choose to have their manuscript professionally edited before submission to improve the English. A list of independent suppliers of editing services can be found at www.blackwellpublishing.com/bauthor/english_language.asp. All services are to be arranged and paid for by the author, and use of one of these services does not guarantee acceptance or preference for publication.

Publication

Exclusive licence form
Authors will be required to sign an Exclusive Licence Form (ELF) for all papers accepted for publication. Signature of the ELF is a condition of publication and papers will not be passed to the publisher for production unless a signed form has been received. Only one signature is required; any author can sign, after agreement with the co-authors that he is signing on their behalf. Please note that signature of the ELF does not affect ownership of copyright in the material. (Government employees need to complete the Author Warranty sections, although copyright in such cases does not need to be assigned.) The ELF can be downloaded here or from Instructions and Forms at http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/febsj/.

OnlineOpen
OnlineOpen is a pay-to-publish service from Wiley-Blackwell that offers authors whose papers are accepted for publication the opportunity to pay up-front for their manuscript to become open access (i.e. free for all to view and download) via the Online Journal website. Each OnlineOpen article will be subject to a one-off fee to be met by or on behalf of the Author in advance of publication.

OnlineOpen is available to authors who wish to make their paper available to non-subscribers on publication, or whose funding agency requires grantees to archive the final version of their article. With OnlineOpen, the author, the author's funding agency, or the author's institution pays a fee to ensure that the paper is made available to non-subscribers upon publication via Wiley InterScience, as well as being deposited in the funding agency's preferred archive. For the full list of terms and conditions, see http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/
authorresources/onlineopen.html#OnlineOpen_Terms

The OnlineOpen fee is charged at a per-page rate of $500 with a minimum charge of $3000 (for papers with 6 pages or less) and a maximum charge of $10,000 (for papers with 20 pages or more).
Any authors wishing to publish their paper as OnlineOpen, in addition to providing a signed and completed Exclusive Licence Form, will be required to complete the payment form available from our website at: www.blackwellpublishing.com/pdf/FEBS_OOF.pdf (Please note this form is for use with OnlineOpen material ONLY.) The payment form should be completed at proof stage, and should be sent to the Production Editor at febsjournal@wiley.com along with the corrected proof.

Prior to acceptance there is no requirement to inform the Editorial Office that you intend to publish your paper OnlineOpen. All OnlineOpen articles are treated in the same way as any other paper; they go through the journal's standard peer-review process and will be accepted or rejected based on their own merit. On acceptance of the paper you should inform the Editorial Office if the paper is intended for OnlineOpen publication, and should return an Exclusive Licence Form as usual.

Embargo Period
After submission authors will retain the right to publish their paper in various media/circumstances: in particular authors are entitled at any time to post an electronic version of their submitted article online. Authors may post their accepted version (i.e as originally submitted for publication in FEBS Journal, and revised to take account of peer review comments) 12 months after the date of publication. Articles may be posted on personal websites, employer's website/repository and on free public servers in the subject area. Electronic versions of the accepted article must include a link to the published version online. Please note that authors are not permitted to post the Blackwell Publishing PDF version of the article online. Please see Exclusive Licence Form for further details.

NIH funded authors and FEBS Journal

From April 2008, the NIH is mandating grantees to deposit their peer-reviewed author manuscripts in PubMed Central, to be made publicly available within 12 months of publication. The NIH mandate applies to all articles based on research that has been wholly or partially funded by the NIH and that are accepted for publication on or after April 7, 2008. In order to help authors comply with the NIH mandate, Wiley-Blackwell will post accepted manuscripts of NIH grant-holders (incorporating all amendments made during peer review, but prior to the publisher’s copy-editing and typesetting) to PubMed Central at the point of acceptance by the journal. This version will then be made publicly available in PubMed Central 12 months after publication. Following the deposit Wiley-Blackwell authors will receive further communications from the NIH with respect to the submission. For further information, see here.

If authors wish to make their final published article openly accessible and without a 12 month embargo, they can choose to publish via the OnlineOpen service.

If the authors acknowledge NIH funding in the manuscript and give the grant number, then the paper will be automatically handled by Wiley-Blackwell to meet the terms of the NIH mandate.

Wellcome and HHMI grantees can find out further information here.

Permissions
Authors or a third party wishing to reproduce figures, tables or brief quotations from the text of articles published in FEBS Journal for non-commercial purposes may do so, providing the original publication is acknowledged accordingly and the approval of all the authors is obtained. No special permission is needed from either FEBS or the Publisher for this. If authors or a third party wish to use a major part of an article or an entire article elsewhere, whether in English or in any translation, permission must be asked from the Publisher, who will if necessary contact FEBS, the licence holder.

Publication date
Papers accepted for publication in FEBS Journal will be placed on the online version of the journal, as soon as they are ready for publication. This can occur at any time up to 3 weeks in advance of the cover date of the printed issue. Authors should take this into account when planning their intellectual and patent activities related to a document.

Online production tracking

NEW: Online production tracking is now available for your article through Wiley-Blackwell Author Services.

Author Services enables authors to track their article - once it has been accepted - through the production process to publication online and in print. Authors can check the status of their articles online and choose to receive automated e-mails at key stages of production so they don't need to contact the Production Editor to check on progress. Visit http://authorservices.wiley.com/bauthor/ for more details on online production tracking and for a wealth of resources including FAQs and tips on article preparation, submission and more.

Author material archive policy
Please note that unless specifically requested, Blackwell Publishing will dispose of all submitted hardcopy or electronic material two issues after publication. If you require the return of any material submitted, please inform the Editorial Office or Production Editor as soon as possible if you have not yet done so.

 

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35th FEBS Congress