Instructions for Authors

Authors should supply a graphical abstract (a feature figure) if and when the manuscript is accepted for publication. The abstract should summarize the contents of the paper in a concise, pictorial form designed to capture the attention of a wide readership and for compilation of databases. Graphical abstract will be published online in the table of content. Carefully drawn figures that serve to illustrate the theme of the paper are desired. Authors may also provide appropriate text, not exceeding 30 words. The graphical abstract should be colored, and kept within an area of 12 cm (width) x 6 cm (height). Image should have a minimum resolution of 600 dpi and line art 1200 dpi. Note: Height of the image should be no more than half of the width. Graphical abstract can be provided in the format of jpg (preferred), PDF, Word, PowerPoint or png, when the manuscript is accepted.

Ethics Committee Approval and Patient Consent

Experimental research involving human or animals should have been approved by author's institutional review board or ethics committee. This information should be mentioned in the manuscript including the name of the board/committee that gave the approval. Investigations involving humans will have been performed in accordance with the principles of Declaration of Helsinki. Authors should also comply with the clinical trial registration statement from the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors, and the clinical trial registration number should be provided.

"The ICMJE accepts publicly accessible registration in any registry that is a primary register of the WHO International Clinical Trials Registry Platform (ICTRP) that includes the minimum acceptable 24-item trial registration data set or in ClinicalTrials.gov, which is a data provider to the WHO ICTRP. The ICMJE endorses these registries because they meet several criteria. They are accessible to the public at no charge, open to all prospective registrants, managed by a not-for-profit organization, have a mechanism to ensure the validity of the registration data, and are electronically searchable."

For research involving human subjects, informed consent from each patient or participant should be obtained. Patient or participants' identities and privacy must be fully protected in the manuscript. Please follow the guidelines from ICMJE on Protection of Research Participants:

"Patients have a right to privacy that should not be violated without informed consent. Identifying information, including names, initials, or hospital numbers, should not be published in written descriptions, photographs, or pedigrees unless the information is essential for scientific purposes and the patient (or parent or guardian) gives written informed consent for publication. Informed consent for this purpose requires that an identifiable patient be shown the manuscript to be published. Authors should disclose to these patients whether any potential identifiable material might be available via the Internet as well as in print after publication. Patient consent should be written and archived with the journal, the authors, or both, as dictated by local regulations or laws. Applicable laws vary from locale to locale, and journals should establish their own policies with legal guidance. Since a journal that archives the consent will be aware of patient identity, some journals may decide that patient confidentiality is better guarded by having the author archive the consent and instead providing the journal with a written statement that attests that they have received and archived written patient consent."

The information of whether informed consent has been obtained should be written in the manuscript, either in the Methods section, Acknowledgement, or in a separate section. If informed consent was obtained orally only or not obtained, the authors must clearly explain the reasons with a statement in the manuscript and this should have been approved by author's institutional review board or ethics committee.

Publication Fee

Publication fee is payable only if a manuscript is accepted for publication. There is no additional fee for color figures, and no submission charge. Instruction for payment will be sent during the publication process and invoice will be available in the manuscript login page after a manuscript is accepted. Payment can be made by credit card (Visa/MasterCard/UnionPay) or bank transfer. Publication fee is required to cover the cost of publication. The fee should be paid before copyediting and publication and within 3 months from the date of acceptance.

Research paper/
Review/
Others

$AUD 750

* $AUD: Australian dollar. Currency Converter (external source)

Authorship

It is the responsibility of every person listed as an author of an article submitted to this journal to follow the 4 criteria about the authorship recommended by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE):

Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; AND
Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content; AND
Final approval of the version to be published; AND
Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

Submission

★ To submit a new manuscript, please follow the new submission link.

★ To submit a revision, please login, select a manuscript and follow the "Submit revision" link. Do not submit a revision as a new submission.

All files should be submitted online in the journal's website. Submissions by email of any manuscript files, either to the editors or to the journal office, are not acceptable and are discarded automatically.

According to ICMJE definition, the corresponding author is the one individual who takes primary responsibility for communication with the journal during the manuscript submission, peer review, and publication process, and typically ensures that all the journal’s administrative requirements, such as providing details of authorship, ethics committee approval, and gathering conflict of interest forms and statements, are properly completed, although these duties may be delegated to one or more coauthors.

Manuscripts that have been previously posted to preprint servers (e.g. BioRxiv, MedRxiv, ChemRxiv, etc.) are allowed for submissions to our journal. Authors can also post their manuscripts to other preprint servers if the manuscripts are accepted by our journal.

Categories of Contributions

Nanotheranostics accepts original scientific and review articles. Letters commenting on previously published articles should be received within 1 year of the date of the referenced article’s publication. Case reports are not accepted.

Submission Checklist

A complete submission includes the following:

Cover letter to the editors
Full contact details of the corresponding author(s)
List of suggested referees
Manuscript file with embedded tables and figures
Supplementary files (optional)

Authors whose first language is not English are encouraged to ask a colleague to proofread the manuscript before submission.

Cover Letter

All manuscripts should be accompanied by a cover letter from the corresponding author. The cover letter should contain a statement that the manuscript has been seen and approved by all authors. If there are more than 10 authors, the specific contribution of each author must be substantiated in the cover letter. The cover letter should inform the editor of potential overlap with other material already published or submitted for publication and should provide a reference to or a copy of this material. The cover letter should also disclose any conflict of interest—financial or otherwise—that may directly or indirectly influence the content of the manuscript submitted. Finally, the cover letter should provide any additional information that may be helpful to the editor.

Manuscript File

Please embed figures and tables in the manuscript to become one single file for submission in Microsoft Word. Once submission is complete, the system will generate a manuscript ID and password sent to the corresponding author's contact email.

Supplementary Material

The initial submission allows one supplementary file to be submitted together with the main manuscript file and cover letter. If you have more than one supplementary file, you can submit the extra ones after the initial submission in the manuscript login page (under "Supplementary file" heading, click on the link "[Add More]").

The maximum file size for supplementary materials is 10MB each un-compressed. Please kept the files as small possible to avoid the frustrations experienced by readers with downloading large files. Large files can be compressed into a ZIP file when submitting, but not RAR. To zip files in Windows, select the files and right click "Send to > Compressed (zipped) folder". Supplementary materials appear online linked to the paper and are not edited.

Peer Review

Submitted manuscripts are reviewed for originality, significance, adequacy of documentation, composition, and adherence to these guidelines. However, editorial decisions are based not only on the technical merits of the work but also on factors such as priority for publication and relevance to the general readership of Nanotheranostics. All manuscripts are judged in relation to other submissions currently under consideration.

Manuscripts that are judged to be of insufficient quality or unlikely to be competitive enough for publication are rejected during initial screening. The remaining manuscripts go through a single-blind peer review process with two or more reviewers. In single-blind review, reviewers' identities are hidden from the authors but not vice versa. Possible decisions after review are: accept as is, minor revision, major revision, de novo resubmission, or reject.

Rebuttals to rejected manuscripts are strongly discouraged, and requests for resubmission of rejected manuscripts are generally not granted without significant demonstration of errors in the review or decision process. Most articles are rejected on grounds of insufficient priority or lack of relevance to Nanotheranostics, not data quality or technical issues.

A note on plagiarism: There is a zero-tolerance policy towards plagiarism (including self-plagiarism) in our journals. Manuscripts are screened for plagiarism before, during, and after publication, and if found they will be rejected at any stage of processing.

Revisions

Authors should submit back their revisions within 1 month in the case of minor revision, 3 months in the case of major revision, and 4 months in the case of de novo resubmission. To submit a revision please sign in at the manuscript login page and use the submit revision button at the right side of the page. Manuscripts with significant results are typically reviewed and published at the highest priority.

Acceptance

Important note: After the manuscript is accepted, any inquiry should be addressed to our publishing team only. Please do not send any publishing-related inquiry to our editors or editor-in-chief as they are not involved in the process after a manuscript is accepted.

License

Articles in our journal are now distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC-BY license) Authors retain copyright of the article.

For articles published before June 10 2019, the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License was used by default and copyright is with the publisher. Please refer to each individual article's copyright and open access statement.

Review Articles

A good review is expected to provide an authoritative and in-depth understanding of important topics in medicine. It gives a very high-quality state-of-the-art account of the subject matter and a balanced assessment of the current primary literature. The implications of recent developments for the wider scientific community are emphasized and authors should aim to stimulate progress in the field. Reviews must be of general interest and enticing to the journal’s broad readership. A good review should also be a timely account that is needed and adds genuinely to the existing literature. References should be selected to give a balanced view of the field. Special terms, acronyms and symbols should be defined and fundamental ideas explained in a simplistic way. We particularly encourage international and multidisciplinary collaborations among our authors.

All review content should consist of original text and interpretation, avoiding any direct reproduction. We encourage authors to create original figures that illustrate the subject matter and research themes. If a significant amount of other people's material is to be used, either textual or image-based, permission must be sought by the author in accordance with copyright law and must be made clear in the manuscript.

The majority of reviews will be solicited by members of the editorial board in accordance with editorial policy. However, the editorial office welcomes suggestions for reviews that would be suitable for the journal. If you are interested in writing a review, all authors should submit to the journal Editor-in-Chief a review proposal. The aim is to ensure the article will appeal to the journal's intended readership and to reduce the overall time and work needed in the preparation of the final manuscript. Acceptance of the proposal by the editorial office does not guarantee publication of the final manuscript. A review proposal should answer all the following:

Proposed title, authors, address, and submission date.
Please comment on the current importance of the field.
To which communities will your article appeal?
Please justify your review in comparison to any other reviews published on a similar topic.
Who can you collaborate with on writing the proposed review?
Provide section headings along with a brief discussion of each section and associated key references.
Please provide a brief CV of the leading author(s) and a list of their papers/reviews published in the last three years in the suggested topic area that qualify them for writing this review.

Style Guide

General Remarks

To expedite the publishing process, please closely follow this style guide.

Apply minimal additional formatting and stylization to the manuscript. During processing, all articles will be reformatted to Times New Roman font with left alignment. Authors whose first language is not English are encouraged to use Times New Roman font to avoid input of non-English characters.

In the main text or figure/table legends, please do not color the fonts or use smaller font size to distinguish one text from other texts. In our xml, only bold, italic, superscript and subscript are allowed.

Please note that supplementary material is not copy-edited. Authors are responsible for ensuring all supplementary material meets the scientific and style standards of the main text and figures.

Manuscript Format

All manuscripts should include the following sections, in order. All sections are mandatory unless designated "optional":

Title page
Abstract
Main text
Abbreviations
Acknowledgements (optional)
Contributions (optional)
Competing interests
References
Tables
Figures
Author biography (optional)

Title Page

Include in the title page the manuscript title, author’s name(s), affiliations, and corresponding author’s phone/fax number and/or email.

Title: Use sentence format; only the first word and proper nouns should be capitalized.

Authors: The list of authors and contributors should conform to the guidelines set out by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors. Provide full names of all authors.

Important: please write the first name and middle name before the surname, e.g., "Mike Johnson" (not "Johnson, Mike"; not "Johnson M."; not "M. Johnson").

Abstract: A structured abstract must be included with each original scientific manuscript with 4 clearly identifiable elements of content: rationale (goals of the investigation), methods (description of study subjects, experiments, and observational and analytic techniques), results (major findings), and principal conclusions. Except for the rationale, these sections should be preceded by headings (i.e., Methods, Results, and Conclusion). Abstract should not contain citations to references, any images or math equations.

Keywords: Submit 3-5 keywords with the abstract.

Graphical Abstract: Supply a graphical abstract (a feature figure) following the abstract. The graphical abstract should summarize the contents of the paper in a concise, pictorial form designed to capture the attention of a wide readership and for compilation in databases. The graphical abstract will be published online in the table of contents. Carefully drawn figures that serve to illustrate the theme of the paper are desired. Authors may also provide appropriate text, not exceeding 30 words. The graphical abstract should be colored, and kept within an area of 12 cm (width) × 6 cm (height). Images should have a minimum resolution of 600 dpi and line art 1200 dpi. Note: The height of the image should be no more than half of the width.

Main Text

Subsections: For original research articles, subdivide the main text into categories such as "Introduction", "Methods", "Results", "Discussion", "Conclusions". Results, discussion, and conclusion can be combined in one section and methods can come before or after the results. Please do not add numbers before subtitles. Write subtitles and headings in sentence case.

Citation of Tables and Figures: Tables and figures should be numbered consecutively using the format: Table 1, Table 2, Figure 1, Figure 2, etc. Parts of figures can be identified by A, B, C, D, etc. and cited as Figure 1A, Figure 1A-B, etc. Supplementary tables and figures should be identified with an "S": Table S1, Figure S1, etc. All tables and figures included with the manuscript must be cited in the main text.

Mathematical Formulas and Symbols: Simple mathematical formulas should be constructed using superscripts, subscripts, italics, and symbols in Microsoft Word. Please avoid using math equations in Microsoft Word whenever possible, as they have to be replaced by images in xml full text. To insert a symbol use Insert/Symbol/ in the Microsoft Word menu. Select symbols from the fonts "(normal text)" or "Symbol". Use "/" for "divide" or "over", e.g., 1/7, 5/(4+6). Use Symbol fonts for "±"; "≤" and "≥" (avoid underlining characters).

Scientific Units: Use the International System of Units (SI) to communicate numerical data. However, where the field standard differs from SI, use the most common unit in the field. For example, "mg/mL" and "mM" are acceptable non-SI units for concentration. Units of time (hours, minutes seconds) should be expressed as "h", "min", "s". A space must be added between all numerical values and their unit (e.g., 5 mL, 30 s, 37 °C), except for units %, $, ° (angular degrees), ′ (angular minutes), and ″ (angular seconds) (e.g., 25%, $10, 90°). Above all, communicate numerical data consistently throughout the manuscript and figures.

Abbreviations

Present abbreviations alphabetically in one paragraph, in the format: "term: definition". Separate the items by ";". Do not capitalize abbreviation definitions. Please strictly follow the format. E.g., HIV: human immunodeficiency virus; SIV: simian immunodeficiency virus; ....

Web pages and Web links

We strongly discourage any mentioning or citing web links/URLs in your paper, since web addresses are changed frequently by their owners. This often results in broken links (dead links) in your paper in the future. Inaccessible web links can cause frustrations for readers.

References

References should be numbered consecutively starting from 1. One article per reference only (not 1a, 1b, 1c). References should be cited in the manuscript text by numbers, e.g. [1,2], and should be inserted before punctuation with a space between the preceding word and the citation (e.g., "… as was observed previously [4-7]."). Do not include personal communications, unpublished observations, conference abstracts or conference papers in references. Please do not format references as footnotes. Please use plain text in references, no image or math equation.

EndNote: An EndNote reference style for our journal can be downloaded. Please put the style file in Windows C:\Program Files (x86)\EndNote X?\Styles ('?' is EndNote version number.) Then open MS Word. In the EndNote tab, select Style: ivyspring. The style is the same for other Ivyspring journals.

Journal Article:

[Author surname] [Author initials], [Other author surnames & initials]. [Article title]. [Journal name abbreviation]. [Year]; [Volume]: [First page number]-[Last page number].

Please use the NLM Catalog (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nlmcatalog/journals) to find the abbreviations of journals. Omit any "." in the journal abbreviations. It is not necessary to italicize or bold the title, journal name, or any other part of the references. For journals that do not use pagination, use the article number in place of the page range. Use sentence format for article titles (only capitalize the first word). Include names of the first six authors for multi-author articles. For articles with six or more authors, use "et al."

Example:
1. Eknoyan G, Beck GJ, Cheung AK, et al. Effect of dialysis dose and membrane flux in maintenance hemodialysis. N Engl J Med. 2002; 347: 2010-9.

Supplement example:
2. Volk HD, Reinke P, Krausch D, et al. Monocyte deactivation-rationale for a new therapeutic strategy in sepsis. Intensive Care Med. 1996; 22 (Suppl 4): S474-81.

No author given example:
3. [No authors listed]. Medicare program; criteria for Medicare coverage of adult liver transplants-HCFA. Final notice. Fed Regist. 1991; 56: 15006-18.

In press example:
4. Cheung TMT, et al. Effectiveness of non-invasive positive pressure ventilation in the treatment of acute respiratory failure in severe acute respiratory syndrome. Chest; in press.

Epub ahead of print example:
5. Li W, Chen Y, Cameron DJ, et al. Elovl4 haploinsufficiency does not induce early onset retinal degeneration in mice. Vision Res 2007; [Epub ahead of print].

Book:

[Author surname] [Author initials], [Other author surnames & initials]. [Book title]. [Edition] ed. [Place published]: [Publisher]; [Year].

Example:
1. Kiloh LG, Smith JS, Johnson GF, et al. Physical treatment in psychiatry. Boston, USA: Blackwell Scientific Publisher; 1988.

Chapter in Edited Book:

[Author surname] [Author initials], [Other author surnames & initials]. [Chapter title]. In: [Editor surname] [Editor initials], Ed. [Book title]. [Edition] ed. [Place published]: [Publisher]; [Year]: [First page number]-[Last page number].

Example:
1. Beckenbough RD, Linscheid RL. Arthroplasty in the hand and wrist. In: Green DP, Ed. Operative Hand Surgery, 2nd ed. New York: Churchill Livingstone; 1988: 167-214.

Website:

[[Internet]] [Title]. [Publish date]. [URL]

Examples:
1. [Internet] WHO. Summary of probable SARS cases with onset of illness from 1 November 2002 to 31 July 2003. Revised 26 September 2003. https://www.who.int/
2. [Internet] Kornberg R. https://nobelprize.org/

Tables

Insert tables as editable tables with minimal formatting. Do not insert tables as images.

Captions: Include a caption above each table. Number the captions with an Arabic numeral after the word "Table." Define all abbreviations used in one row at the bottom of the table.

Figures

Figures should clarify and augment the text. The selection of sharp, high quality figures is of paramount importance. The author will be required to correct or replace figures of inferior quality. Each submitted figure should clearly identify areas of interest with only enough surrounding white-space for orientation.

If possible, the figures should be submitted as the size they will appear when published so that no reduction is necessary. Figures should be either single-column format (published width, 8.5 cm; maximum submitted width, 11 cm), mid-size format (published width, 11.4 cm; maximum submitted width, 14 cm), or double-column format (published width, 17.4 cm; maximum submitted width, 22 cm).

The Arial lower case font should be used for all figure text, and the size should be 8–12 points. Composite figures should be preassembled, with each figure part (e.g., A, B, C) lettered in 12-point upper case Arial bold font type in the upper left corner.

Resolutions for photo images should be at least 600 dpi, and for line arts at least 1200 dpi. Graphics downloaded from Internet are not acceptable because the 72 dpi resolution is too low for satisfactory reproduction. The file format can be pdf (most preferred), ppt, doc, docx, png, tiff, or jpeg. Please submit one (1) highest quality PDF containing all figures (one figure per page).

Legends: Include a legend below each figure. Legends should be concise and should not repeat the text. Number the legends with an Arabic numeral after the word "Figure." If a figure has more than one part, describe each part clearly. Any letter designations or arrows appearing on the figures should be identified and described fully. Abbreviations used in each figure should be defined in the legend in alphabetical order. For figures adapted from other articles, write "Adapted with permission from [REFERENCE], copyright YEAR PUBLISHER".

Author Biography

Authors now have the option to publish a biography together with their paper, with information such as MD/PhD degree, past and present positions, research interests, awards, etc. This increases the profile of the authors and is well received by international readers. See examples of author biographies on the website (e.g., https://www.thno.org/v02p0283.htm#coraddress).

English-Language Editing Services

Author who would like to refine the use of English in their manuscript might ask a colleague whose native language is English to review your manuscript or consider using the services of a professional English-language editing company. Please be aware that an author's use of language editing services in no way guarantees that his or her submission will ultimately be accepted. Any arrangement an author enters into will be exclusively between the author and the particular company, and any costs incurred are the sole responsibility of the author.

Archiving

Our journal is fully open-access with articles freely available in the journal website including PDF, xml, and supplementary materials if applicable. All published articles of our journal are permanently archived by PubMed Central of US National Library of Medicine and Europe PMC. Authors are also encouraged to self-archive the published articles in their own or institutional websites as well as governmental websites, library websites, without permissions required.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools

Following the COPE guidelines, if any AI tool (such as ChatGPT) is used in any part of the manuscript, including: the writing of the manuscript, full or partial generation of images used in the manuscript, collecting data, or analysing data, the authors must fully disclose this in the Acknowledgements section, and also state in the Materials and Methods section how the AI tool was used, which tool was used, and what parts of the text or images were affected. Note that an AI tool cannot be listed as an author of a manuscript.

Competing Interests

Competing interests (also called "Conflict of interests") that might interfere with the objective presentation of the research findings contained in the manuscript should be declared in a paragraph heading "Competing interests" (after Acknowledgment section and before References).

According to the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors: Financial relationships (such as employment, consultancies, stock ownership or options, honoraria, patents, and paid expert testimony) are the most easily identifiable, the ones most often judged to represent potential conflicts of interest and thus the most likely to undermine the credibility of the journal, the authors, and of science itself. Other interests may also represent or be perceived as conflicts, such as personal relationships or rivalries, academic competition, and intellectual beliefs. Authors should avoid entering in to agreements with study sponsors, both for-profit and non-profit, that interfere with authors’ access to all of the study’s data or that interfere with their ability to analyze and interpret the data and to prepare and publish manuscripts independently when and where they choose. Policies that dictate where authors may publish their work violate this principle of academic freedom. Authors may be required to provide the journal with the agreements in confidence.

Authors should fully disclose their conflicts of interest. If there is no conflict of interest, please use the statement "The authors have declared that no competing interest exists".

Data Availability

Authors are recommended to deposit large data in a public repository. Small data sets may be published as supplementary materials. Authors may provide:

The location and method where the data can be downloaded or obtained. If all data are included in the manuscript or as supplementary material, please indicate so. If data will be shared upon request please provide detailed contact information.
If the data are deposited in a public repository, provide the URLs (and DOIs if available).
If the data cannot be openly shared, please explain why (e.g., to protect study participants or patient privacy).

Publication Ethics

Our journals follow the guidelines as set out in the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) in dealing with publication ethics issues. For details please visit our dedicated page on Publication Ethics.

Commercial advertising

Commercial advertising is not allowed in our journal.

For general information about preparing biomedical manuscripts, please consult the "Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals: Writing and Editing for Biomedical Publication", available from http://www.icmje.org/.