Nutrition provides an international forum for professionals interested in the applied and basic biomedical nutritional sciences, and publishes papers both of clinical interest and of scientific import. Investigators are encouraged to submit papers in the disciplines of nutritionally related biochemistry, genetics, immunology, metabolism, molecular and cell biology, neurobiology, physiology, and pharmacology. Papers on nutrition-related plant or animal sciences which are not of direct relevance to man, whereas occasionally of interest are not the main focus of the Journal.

CONDITIONS OF PUBLICATION — ETHICAL AND LEGAL CONSIDERATIONS

All material submitted to Nutrition, for any section of the journal, is considered for publication on the understanding that authors (including all coauthors) agree to Nutrition's publication policies as stated in this section of the Guidelines to Authors.

In the event of non-compliance with these conditions of publication, including issues that surface after a contribution is published, Nutrition's rights include: sending a notice of failure to comply to authors' employers and funding agencies; and/or informing readers via a published correction/retraction; the latter is linked to the original contribution via electronic indexing and becomes part of the formal published record.

Research/publication misconduct is a serious breach of ethics. Such misconduct includes:

i) Redundant or duplicate publication by same author(s),
ii) Publication in another source by the same author(s) without acknowledgement or permission from the publisher, or
iii) Plagerism or self-plagiarism (publication of material without acknowledging original author source).
iv) Fabrication of data, not substantiable via review of research records.

Should such publications occur, editorial action would be taken. In certain cases, secondary publication is justifiable and even beneficial; however, such circumstances should be prospectively discussed with and agreed upon by the Editor-In-Chief.

Nutrition will not accept a submission of work previously reported in large part in a published article (duplicate) or that is contained in another paper submitted or accepted for publication in Nutrition or elsewhere.

Authorship

Corresponding Author: One author is designated the corresponding author (not necessarily the senior author) who will be approached to clarify any issues, such as those pertaining to materials and methods, or technical comments. If Nutrition receives feedback from its readers concerning the published paper, the corresponding author will be contacted. It is this author's responsibility to inform all coauthors of such matters to ensure they are dealt with promptly.

The corresponding author must affirm in the cover letter at the time of submission that:

1. None of the material in the manuscript is included in another manuscript, has been published previously, or is currently under consideration for publication elsewhere. This includes symposia proceedings, transactions, books, articles published by invitation, and preliminary publications of any kind except an abstract of less than 250 words. If there is any question concerning potential overlap, the related material must be included for evaluation.

2. Ethical guidelines were followed by the investigator in performing studies on humans or animals and should be described in the paper. The approval of the institutional review board of either animal or human ethics committee must be cited in the Methods.

3. Each author must have participated sufficiently in the work to take public responsibility for the content of the paper and must approve of the final version of the manuscript. Authorship should be based on substantive contributions to each of the following: conception and design of the study; generation, collection, assembly, analysis and/or interpretation of data; and drafting or revision of the manuscript; approval of the final version of the manuscript. Authors are required to include a statement in the Acknowledgements to specify the actual contribution of each coauthor under the above headings.

4. If requested, the authors will provide the data or will cooperate fully in obtaining and providing the data on which the manuscript is based for examination by the editors or their assignees

Conflict of Interest

Conflict of interest regarding a manuscript exists when a participant in the peer review and publication process—author, reviewer, or editor—has ties to activities that could inappropriately influence his or her impartial judgment, whether or not judgment is in fact affected. Financial relationships with industry are usually considered to be the most important conflicts of interest. However, conflicts can occur for other reasons, such as personal relationships or academic competition. See Competing Interest Form for instructions about the competing interests statement.

CATEGORIES OF MANUSCRIPTS

Nutrition publishes a wide range of articles, which includes original investigations, review articles, rapid communications, research letters, case reports and special category manuscripts. Manuscripts must be prepared in accordance with the "Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals" developed by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (N Engl J Med 1991;324:424-428). All submissions are peer reviewed.

Original Investigation (3000-5000 words including tables, figures and references)
Original investigations are considered full-length applied (human) or basic (bench work) research reports. They cover topics relevant to clinical and basic studies relevant to man in the following areas nutritionally related biochemistry, genetics, immunology, metabolism, molecular and cell biology, neurobiology, physiology, and pharmacology. Studies in adult and pediatric populations are welcome. The work presented in the manuscript must be original; studies confirming previous observations will be considered. Other considerations of a paper's publishability are its importance to the science, the soundness of the experimental design, the validity of methods, the appropriateness of the conclusions and the quality of presentation.

Rapid Communication (1000-3000 words including tables, figures and references)
Papers representing concise and original studies of scientific importance are considered. In the cover letter the author should justify the request for Rapid Communication. The review process is 10 days, authors are allowed one revision if accepted, and the final version of the paper appears in the next available issue of the journal.

Research Letter (up to 1000 words, including up to 10 references and 1 figure or table)
A Research Letter contains new data or a clinical observation, in a format that allows for rapid publication.

Review Article (up to 5000 words including tables, figures and references)
In-depth, comprehensive state of the art reviews on a nutritional topic are welcomed. Reviews may be invited by the Editor or may be unsolicited viewpoints.

Case Report (up to 2500 words including tables figures, and references)
Case Reports include case studies of 4 or fewer patients that describe a novel situation or add important insights into mechanisms, diagnosis or treatment of a disease.

Editorial (up to 1000 words including tables, figures and references)
Editorials express opinions on current topics of interest, or provide comments on papers published in Nutrition or other journals. Editorials are generally solicited by one of the Editors.

Correspondence (Letter to the Editor) (1000 words including tables, figures and references)
Opinion pieces concerning papers published in Nutrition are particularly welcomed and all submissions are subject to editing. Letters commenting on past-published papers are sent to the corresponding author for a response. Letters are selected for their relevance and originality; not all letters submitted can be published.

Meeting Proceedings (up to 2500 words including tables, figures and references)
Reports of meeting proceedings are synopses of scientific meetings of interest to Nutrition's audience. Authors should e-mail the Editor to solicit potential interest 8 weeks prior to conference.

Collections of abstracts representing the proceedings of organizational meetings are not subjected to customary peer review. It is the view of the Editorial Board that it is of service to the nutrition community to present such material as promptly as possible.

Hypothesis (up to 3000 words including tables, figures and references)
Novel insights into a significant questions or clinical issues are welcome, and will be peer reviewed. As the definition of “hypothesis” suggests, articles of this type should be, although they lack direct experimental evidence, closely tied to empirical data and lead to testable predictions.

Special Article (up to 5000 words including tables, figures and references)
Associated with a particular special event, invitation or announcement; for example, the annual John M. Kinney Awards papers.

PREPARATION OF MANUSCRIPT
Manuscripts must be written in English. Prior to submission, it is mandatory that authors have the manuscript evaluated and edited by a native English speaker. The layout and style should adhere strictly to the instructions given under PREPARATION OF MANUSCRIPT.

Cover Letter (see AUTHORSHIP)
The cover letter should make it clear that the final manuscript has been seen and approved by all authors and that they have taken due care to ensure the integrity of their work and their personal scientific reputation. Any potential conflicts of interest should be declared, in addition to any information on prior or duplicate publication (see Ethical and Legal Considerations).

Authors must recommend five potential referees, at least three of whom should be from outside the country of the principal author, together with their e-mail addresses. While Nutrition does not guarantee these reviewers will be called upon, these suggestions may facilitate the editorial decision. It is Nutrition's experience that friends are the harshest critics while investigators in the same field are the most objective. Also include any person(s) who should not be considered a potential reviewer.

SUBMISSION PROCEDURE - PREPARING ELECTRONIC MANUSCRIPTS

As of 15 March 2005 all new manuscripts must be submitted through Nutrition's online submission and review Web site ( http://ees.elsevier.com/nut/ ). Use the following guidelines to prepare your submission. Via the "Author Gateway" page of this journal you will be guided stepwise through the creation and uploading of various files. Once the uploading is done, the system automatically generates an electronic (PDF) proof (which is then used for reviewing). The corresponding author will be informed via e-mail that a PDF of the submission has been created and that approval is required from the corresponding author to begin the review process. Be sure to keep a backup copy of your paper for reference and safety. All correspondence should be with the Regional Editorial Offices. If a paper is accepted, the Production Office will correspond with the author via e-mail.

For online submission authors are requested to submit the text, tables and artwork in separate documents in electronic form to http://ees.elsevier.com/nut/ . In an accompanying cover letter, authors should state that the manuscript, or parts of it, have not been and will not be submitted elsewhere for publication.

Text files should be supplied in one of the following formats: Microsoft Word Windows or Macintosh formatted. Format your paper (tabs, indents, etc.) consistently. Once a manuscript has been accepted, most formatting codes will be removed or replaced so there is no need to use excessive layout styling. Do not use options such as automatic word breaking, justified layout, double columns or automatic paragraph numbering. However, do use bold face, italic, subscripts, and superscripts for scientific nomenclature.

When preparing tables, if you are using a table grid, please use only one grid for each separate table and not a grid for each row. If no grid is being used, use tabs to align columns, not spaces.

Graphic files: see Artwork Instructions under Instructions for Authors on Nutrition's website within Science Direct for guidelines for preparing electronic artwork: (Note: Only TIFF, EPS, or PDF formats are acceptable formats). Each figure should be a separate file and not be embedded in the text. All graphic files must be submitted in sufficiently high resolution (300dip for grayscale or color images and 600-1000 dpi for line art) to allow for printing.

PREPARATION OF MANUSCRIPT

Manuscripts should be typewritten, using DOUBLE SPACING and 1-inch margins. Pages should be numbered consecutively starting with the title page.

Title Page
This should include 1) title of paper (use no abbreviations, limit: 120 characters with spaces), 2) running head of fewer than 55 characters with spaces, 3) full names of all authors with highest academic degree(s); 4) affiliations of all authors; 4) role of each author in the work (see Authorship); 5) a word count for the entire manuscript (including figures and tables), and the number of figures and tables, 4) the complete mailing address (including telephone, fax, and e-mail address of the corresponding author for e-mailing of proofs and reprint requests).

Acknowledgments
Acknowledge only persons who have made substantive contributions to the study. Authors are responsible for obtaining permission of everyone acknowledged by name. If the name of the individual performing statistical consultation is not included with authors, acknowledgment must include name and degree of statistician. Acknowledge all funding and material support, both direct and indirect for the work represented by the manuscript; include commercial, institutional, and other forms of support.

Abstract

Abstracts should be no more than 250 words, in accordance with Medline limitations. The structured abstract for an original investigation should be organized as follows:

Objective. The abstract should begin with a clear statement of the precise objective or question addressed in the paper. If a hypothesis was tested, it should be stated.

Research Methods & Procedures. The basic design of the study and its duration should be described. The methods used should be stated, the statistical data/methods provided and referenced.

Results: The main results of the study should be given in narrative form. Measurements or other information that may require explanation should be defined. Levels of statistical significance should be indicated, including other factors crucial to the outcome of the study.

Conclusion(s) State only conclusions that are directly supported by the evidence and the implications of the findings.

Key Words: 5—7 key words or phases should be provided which should be selected from the body of the text and not duplicate title words.

Structure of Text

Introduction: Context of study.

Materials and Methods: Provide sufficient detail to allow the work to be reproduced. Methods already published should be indicated by a reference; only relevant modification should be described.

Results: These should be clear and concise and not duplicate data in Tables.

Discussion: This should be relevant to the results and placed in context of the current literature.

Conclusion: (no longer than 50 words) Summarize your findings.

References
References are numbered sequentially in the order in which they first appear in the text in square brackets. All references cited in the text should be listed at the end of the manuscript on a separate page. All items in the reference list should be cited in the text and conversely, all references cited in the text must be presented in the list. The Journal has adopted the Vancouver style, citing the first six authors and then adding et al. and uses page ranges.

References to periodicals should be as follows: name and initials of authors, title of paper, abbreviated journal title (conforming to those used in Index Medicus), year, and first and last pages of the article.

Book references should be as follows: author, initials, title of book, title of series and volume number (if applicable), publisher and city, and year.

Multi-author books or to proceedings printed in book form should be similar to those for monograph books.

Article
Folch J, Lees M, Sloane-Stanley GH. A simple method for the isolation and purification of total lipids from animal tissues. J Biol Chem 1957;266:497-509.

Article in Book
Johnson RK. Energy. In: Mahan LK, Escott-Stump S, editors. Krause's food, nutrition & diet therapy. 10^th ed. Philadelphia: W.B. Saunders; 2000, p. 19-30.

Book
Kline P. The handbook of psychological testing. London: Routeledge; 1993.

The authors are responsible for the accuracy, relevance, and completeness of each reference.

For references to articles in press, supply the name of the journal. References to unpublished material, including written (not verbal) personal communications, should be included parenthetically in the text with investigators' names and initials.

Figures

Legends to Figures: Figure legends should be concise and clear and should not duplicate the body of the text. Each illustration must have a title and an explanatory legend. The title should be part of the legend and not be reproduced on the figure itself. The legends should be placed on a separate page at the end of the manuscript and begin with the number of the illustration they refer to. All symbols and abbreviations used in the figure including statistical information must be explained.

Figures and other graphic material: May be formatted in any common file format, such as TIFF, GIF, JPG, or BMP as long as quality and resolution are borne in mind.

All material submitted must have been originally produced with proportions that will remain legible when reduced to the width of a one-half page column in the final publication (Column width: 20 picas, 3?", 8.3 cm). Text font size should be consistent both within each figure and among all figures in the document.

Authors are responsible for applying for permission for both print and electronic rights for all borrowed materials and are responsible for paying any fees related to the applications of these permissions.

Color Reproduction: If a manuscript containing color figures undergoes peer review and acceptance, it must be published with color figures. Authors are required to pay for the printing of color figures ($650 for the first figure in an article, $100 for every additional figure in the article).. If the author does not wish to pay for printing color figures, then the manuscript's figures must be in black and white at the time of submission and during the review process.

Tables

These should be typed double-spaced with each table on a separate page. Legends should contain sufficient information to provide an adequate understanding of the table by the reader without reference to the text.

Copyright

Publications are made subject to copyright for the protection of the authors and the publisher. A Transfer of Copyright Agreement will be sent to the corresponding author along with the page proof. The form must be completed and returned to the publisher before the article can be published.

MANUSCRIPT PROCESSING AND REVIEW

Review Process: All contributions selected for peer review are sent to at least two, independent reviewers, designated by the editors. Authors are required to suggest suitable independent referees and may also request that Nutrition excludes one or two (but no more) individuals or laboratories if there is a specific, declared conflict of interest.

Nutrition's editors may seek advice about submitted papers from technical and statistical referees on any aspect of a paper that raises concerns. These may include ethical issues or issues of data or materials access. As in all publishing decisions, the ultimate decision whether to publish is the responsibility of the Editor of the journal concerned.

Decisions: The single most important criterion for acceptance is the originality of the work. However, a decision to accept is not solely based on the scientific validity of the paper's content. Other factors affecting decisions include the extent and importance of new information in the paper compared with papers previously published or under consideration; the Journal's need to represent a wide range of topics and the overall suitability for Nutrition. Decision letters usually, but not always convey all factors considered for a particular decision. Occasionally the comments to the author may appear to be inconsistent with the editorial decision, which takes into consideration confidential reviewers' comments to the Editor as well as the above factors.

Author Checklist for Manuscript Submission 1) Double-spaced manuscript in PDF or MS Word-compatible format; with structured abstract, pages numbered, running head, key words, author(s)' full names, degrees and affiliations.
2) Photos, legends, tables, and/or figures numbered sequentially (see Color Reproduction).
3) Cover letter including statement regarding declaration of authorship, of scientific integrity, and of any potential conflict of interest (See Competing Interest Form).
4) Address, e-mail, phone number and FAX number of corresponding author.
5) Names and e-mail addresses of 5 potential referees.

PUBLISHING AND REPRINT INFORMATION

Accepted papers are sent to the publisher, Elsevier, upon acceptance. They will be immediately copyedited, typeset, and sent to authors for review. Articles will be uploaded to Nutrition online under the heading 'Articles in Press' for preprint viewing by subscribers as soon as author corrections are implemented.

Reprints: Forms for ordering article reprints are e-mailed to each contributor with the page proof and should be returned with the correct proofs. Authors do not receive free reprints and therefore are responsible for ordering their own reprints from the publisher. Prospective ordering of reprints is less expensive than retrospective. Bulk reprints are arranged via Elsevier.

Manuscripts from outside of North America should be directed to the appropriate Regional Editor.

African Office
Demetre Labadarios, MD
Department of Nutrition
University of Stellenbosch
Tygerberg 7505 South Africa

Australasian Office
Ibolya Nyulasi, MSc, MDAA
The Alfred Healthcare Group
Nutrition Services, Alfred Hospital
Victoria, Australia

European Office
Alan Shenkin, PhD, FRCP, FRCPath
Department of Clinical Chemistry
University of Liverpool
Liverpool L69 3GA, UK

Japan Office
Harumasa Ohyanagi, MD, PhD
Department of Surgery II
Kinki University School of Medicine
Osaka, Japan

Latin American Office
Isabel Correia, MD, PhD
Belo Horizonte, MG
30140-090 Brazil

North American and India Office
Michael Meguid, MD, PhD
Editor-in-Chief
c/o Department of Surgery
SUNY Upstate Medical University
Syracuse, NY 13210 USA

Sponsored Articles:
Nutrition offers authors or their institutions the option to sponsor non-subscriber access to their articles on Elsevier's electronic publishing platforms. For more information please click here.



Updated January 2010