CATEGORIES OF MANUSCRIPTS
The following types of articles are accepted for publication in Romanian Archives of Microbiology and Immunology:
Reports of original research (up to 6,000 words; maximum number of references 70);
Reviews (comprehensive, balanced positive and negative studies) are appraisals of research in a field of current interest (up to 6,500 words; maximum number of references 75).
Short Communications are brief, definitive reports of highly significant and up-to-date findings in the field (up to 3,500 words; maximum number of references 25).
Case reports with discussions and comments (up to 4,000 words; maximum number of references 30). Cases which deserve to be made public will be presented. It is widely known that this type of article is a starting point in editing medical papers and that its strong point is not necessarily uniqueness but its educational value. This report may bring back into attention an issue already tackled in the past.
Editorials are short, invited opinion pieces that discuss an issue of immediate importance to the translational research community. Editorials should have fewer than 1000 words, no abstract, a minimal number of references (definitely no more than 5), and no figures or tables (although they may have a photograph of the author as an illustration).
Journal Club entries are summaries of important articles in the scientific literature related to clinical microbiology and infectious diseases published in main medical journals in the last few months (3,500 to 4,000 characters, with spaces).
Letters to the editor A letter to the editor provides a means of communication between the author of an article and the reader of a journal, allowing continued dialogue based on the journal content to take place. Although not original research per se, a letter may provide new insight, make corrections, offer alternative theories, or request clarification about content printed in the journal. By providing additional information, the evidence may be strengthened. Manuscripts submitted for evaluation in view of publication in Romanian Archives of Microbiology and Immunology should be written in English, with the Abstract (maximum 250 words) in both English and Romanian.
Abstracts of the articles submitted by foreign authors will be translated into Romanian by the Editorial Team of Romanian Archives of Microbiology and Immunology.
GUIDELINES FOR PREPARATION AND SUBMISSION OF MANUSCRIPTS
Manuscripts should be written in English and prepared in conformity to the Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals, published by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) (www.icmje.org).
Manuscripts and all attached files (tables and illustrations) should be submitted in electronic form to the Editorial Office, e-mail address: archives@cantacuzino.ro, revistarami@gmail.com The preferred software is Microsoft Word.
Manuscripts should be typewritten on A4 format (210×297 mm), with double spacing, margins of 25 mm, consecutively numbered. Times New Roman font, 12-point size is required.
In order to speed up the process of review, manuscripts should be prepared very carefully.
Manuscripts should include a Conflict-of-Interests Disclosure Statement (before References), a Financial Support Statement, a statement of human and animal rights in research involving live subjects and be accompanied by a Cover Letter.
COVER LETTER
The authors are fully and solely responsible for the contents of their manuscripts.
Authors are expected to present their results clearly, honestly and without fabrication, falsification or inappropriate data manipulation.
Each manuscript submitted to the Romanian Archives of Microbiology and Immunology should be accompanied by a Cover letter (signed by the first author/corresponding author on behalf of all authors) including an explicit statement that:
– The manuscript has not been published previously, and has not been submitted simultaneously for publication elsewhere.
– The manuscript, as submitted, has been reviewed and approved by all named authors and that all authors concur with the submission and are responsible for its content.
– The corresponding author is empowered by all of the authors to act on their behalf with respect to the submission of the manuscript.
The authors will include a list of 3 potential reviewers, stating their title and their institutional affiliation and as well as their e-mail address.
PREPARATION OF MANUSCRIPTS
Manuscripts should be divided into the following sections and order: Title page, Abstract and keywords, Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, Discussion, Conclusions, Acknowledgements, References, Tables, Figure Legends and Figures.
1. Title page contains:
– Article title. The article title should include a synthetic description of the complete article (80-100 characters, including spaces)
– Authors should also provide a short title of the article
– Author information (full name of the authors and their affiliation – name of the faculty/university/hospital/institute/centre, city and country where the work should be attributed) written in italics
– The author responsible for correspondence will be marked by an asterisk, and his telephone number, e-mail address and ORCID ID will be indicated
– Disclaimers – e.g. an author’s statement that the views expressed in the submitted article are his or her own and not an official position of the institution or funder
– Word count. A word count for the text of the manuscript, excluding its Abstract, Acknowledgements, tables, figure legends and references should be provided by the authors for the editors and reviewers to assess whether the submitted manuscript fits within the journal’s formats and word limits. A word count will be separately provided for the Abstract.
2. Abstract should not exceed 250 words and should reflect the content of the study. For original research studies, systematic reviews articles and clinical practice guidelines structured abstracts are required (Introduction, Objectives, Methods, Results, Conclusion).
A list of 3-5 keywords should be added below the Abstract.
The abstract and key words in Romanian should accompany and reflect the same information as in English, unless the article is submitted by foreign authors, in which case they will be translated into Romanian by the Editorial Team of Romanian Archives of Microbiology and Immunology.
3. Introduction containing a description of the problem under investigation and a brief survey of the existing literature on the subject.
4. Materials and Methods provide sufficient detail to allow the work to be reproduced.
The authors should clearly indicate in this section how and why a study was conducted in a particular way.
The same product names should be used throughout the text with the manufacturer’s name written in parentheses (at the first use).
5. Results should be clear and concise and be presented in a logical sequence in the text.
6. Discussion section should start by briefly summarizing the main findings. It should enrich and not repeat previous sections (3 or 5).
7. Conclusions. In this section, the author(s) can summarize the paper’s findings and generalize their importance. It is also where the writer can raise questions, discuss ambiguous data, and recommend places for further research.
8. Author Contributions. This section is mandatory. Please consider that authorship should be limited only to those who have contributed considerably to this work. For more information, please read the recommendations from International Committee of Medical Journals Editors (http://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/roles-and-responsibilities/defining-the-role-of-authors-and-contributors.html).
Please state the role of each of the authors: conceptualization, methodology, supervision, project administration, funding acquisition, software, validation, formal analysis, investigation, resources, data checking, writing original draft preparation, writing review and editing. (Please write First name LAST NAME: followed by role/roles.)
Please include the following statement which confirms that “All authors have read and agreed the final version of the article”.
9. Conflicts of Interest. This section is mandatory. In this section authors should declare any situations or interests which may be perceived to influence the data presented in the article. Please declare the possible conflict of interest OR use “The authors have no conflict of interest to disclose.”
Please state if the funders had any possible role in the mode the data were presented or state “The funders had no role in interpreting and presenting the data.”
For more information, please read the recommendations from International Committee of Medical Journals Editors (http://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/roles-and-responsibilities/defining-the-role-of-authors-and-contributors.html).
10. Funding. This section is mandatory. Grants, equipment, drugs and/or other support that helped authors conduct the work described in the article must be reported. Please state: “This work was supported by Name of project/institution/grant number (and any other details which might be important for the funding source)” OR “This work received no funding.”
For more information, please read the recommendations from International Committee of Medical Journals Editors (http://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/roles-and-responsibilities/defining-the-role-of-authors-and-contributors.html). Please carefully report the funding source.
11. Ethical Approval. This section is mandatory. If the article does not report studies on humans or animals, please state “Not applicable.”
All studies including animals must have been performed according to relevant national and international legislation (Law 43/2014 and Directive 2010/63/EU). All efforts were taken to minimize pain and discomfort to the animal while conducting these experiments. Papers should include details of the procedures and anaesthetics used. The principles of the 3Rs have been observed.
For studies involving animals, please add: “This study received a favourable opinion by the Ethics Committee of the Name of Institute/Hospital/University under the number of approval/date of approval and was approved by the Competent Authority under the number of approval/date of approval.”
Manuscripts reporting studies involving cell lines should include in the Methods section the origin of the cell line; for established cell lines the origin should be given and references must also be included to a published paper or to a commercial source.
For studies involving humans, please add: “The study presented in this article was conducted following the recommendations of the Declaration of Helsinki of 1975, revised in 2013 and the Declaration of Taipei of 2016 (https://www.wma.net/what-we-do/medical-ethics/declaration-of-helsinki/). This study was approved by the Ethics Committee of the Name of Institute/Hospital/University under the number of approval/date of approval.”
12. Informed Consent. This section is mandatory. If the article does not report studies on humans/animals please state “Not applicable.” Otherwise, please add “All participants included in this study signed the informed consent.”
13. Data Availability. This section is not mandatory. Please declare the link where the data supporting the results can be found or if they are available only upon request from the corresponding author.
14. Acknowledgements. This section is not mandatory. In this section authors can acknowledge any support given which does not fulfil the authorship criteria or funding; it can include technical, administrative support or donations.
15. Supplementary Files. This section is not mandatory. If you have any supplementary files, please state their name as following: Figure S1: title, Video S1: title, Table S1: title.
16. Patents. This section is not mandatory. Please add if you have any patents resulting from the study presented in the article.
17. References should be recent, with 70% of the titles dating from the past 5 years, unless it reflects the state of the art. They should be numbered consecutively in the order in which they are first mentioned in the text, without extra spaces. Identify references in text, tables, and legends by Arabic numerals in square brackets (e.g. [1], [2-6], etc.). Authors are responsible for the accuracy and completeness of all references.
For the style and format of the References, authors should follow the standards promoted by the NLM’s International Committee of Medical Journal Editors ICMJE (www.nlm.nih.gov/bsd/uniform_requirements.html)
Journals:
Hallal AH, Amortegui JD, Jeroukhimov IM, Casillas J, Schulman CI, Manning RJ, et al. Magnetic resonance cholangiopancreatography accurately detects common bile duct stones in resolving gallstone pancreatitis. J Am Coll Surg. 2005;200(6):869-75. doi: 10.1016/j.jamcollsurg.2005.02.028
Books:
Carlson BM. Human embryology and developmental biology. 4th ed. St. Louis: Mosby; 2009. 541 p.
Book chapters:
Blaxter PS, Farnsworth TP. Social health and class inequalities. In: Carter C, Peel JR, editors. Equalities and inequalities in health. 2nd ed. London: Academic Press; 1976. p. 165-78.
Web pages:
Diabetes Australia. Diabetes globally [Internet]. Canberra ACT: Diabetes Australia; 2015 [updated 2015 June 15; cited 2021 July 5]. Available from: https://www.diabetesaustralia.com.au/about-diabetes/diabetes-globally/
18. Tables with suitable captions at the top and numbered with Arabic numerals should be collected at the end of the text on separate sheets (one page per Table). Each column should be given a short or an abbreviated heading. Footnotes to tables should be marked with a) b) c) etc and *, **, *** should be reserved for p values. Each table must be understood independently of the text. All tables must be cited in the text.
19. Figures (illustrations) should be numbered in the order of their appearance with Arabic numerals and should be cited in the text, between round brackets (Fig. 1), (Figs. 1 and 2). Figures should be inserted in the text after their citation. Figures should be also submitted separately as TIFF files at a proper resolution as follows: Graphs at 800-1200 dpi; Photos at 400-800 DPI; Colour 300-400 DPI. Text in figures should be 8-10 point in size. Each figure must have a title, which will be inserted after the figure with the legend.
Units of measurement, Symbols and Abbreviations
Symbols for physical units should be those of the Système Internationale (SI) Bureau international des poids et mesures (e.g., millilitre should be abbreviated as mL; when mentioning degrees Celsius a space should be placed between number and degree sign; for percentages a space should be placed between number and percentage sign).
Symbols like >, <, ± should be preceded and followed by space.
Statistic symbols (e.g., p, t, z) should be written in italics.
Alternative or non-SI units may be used, but these must be defined at their first occurrence in the text.
Nomenclature of Microorganisms
Binary names, consisting of a generic name and a specific epithet (e.g., Escherichia coli), must be used for all microorganisms.
Genetic Nomenclature
To facilitate accurate communication, it is important that standard genetic nomenclature be used whenever possible and that deviations or proposals for new naming systems be endorsed by an appropriate authoritative body.
Peer-Review
Submitted manuscripts judged by the Editor-in-Chief and/or by the Editorial Board Members to be of potential interest to the biomedical scientific community are sent for formal review and critical assessment to expert reviewers (at least two/manuscript).
Reviewer selection is of utmost importance and the Editor-in-Chief bases his choice on such factors as expertise, scientific reputation, specific recommendations etc. Reviewer recommendations sent in from the authors will be judged on an individual basis and may or may not be taken into account. The work, effort and time spent by the reviewers on evaluating articles submitted for publication in Romanian Archives of Microbiology and Immunology are gratefully acknowledged and highly appreciated.
To the extent to which manuscripts are authors’ private property and authors may be harmed by premature disclosure of any or all of a manuscript’s details, reviewers should keep manuscripts and the information therein strictly confidential. Also, reviewers should declare their conflicts of interest and recuse themselves from the peer-review process if a conflict exists.
In a critical yet constructive manner, reviewers are expected to evaluate submitted manuscripts and comment on such aspects as:
– Relevance of the manuscript to the journal
– Novelty and originality
– Clarity
– Technical quality
– Importance of the subject matter related to state-of-the-art in the respective field
– Satisfactory presentation of data and conclusions that are clearly supported and derived from presented data
When reviewers accept to assess a paper, we understand that they implicitly agree to review all subsequent revisions, in case these are necessary.
After reading the manuscripts, the reviewers may make the following recommendations to the editor:
– Accept the manuscript, with or without minor/major revision
– Reject the manuscript, but indicate to the authors that further work might improve the paper and justify resubmission
– Reject the manuscript outright on lack of novelty of the information included in the paper, outdated references, major technical/interpretational problems etc.
The reviewers are kindly expected to write some comments about the manuscript in support of their recommendations, besides filling out the peer-review form.
In case one reviewer opposes publication and the other/others does/do not, the Editor-in-Chief may bring in additional reviewers to resolve the dispute.
The Editorial Team informs the corresponding author of the manuscript within 90 week days after submission if the paper is accepted for publication in the journal, needs minor / major revision or is rejected. Revised manuscripts should be resubmitted as soon as possible but not later than 14 week days.
Manuscripts revised by the authors according to reviewers’ observations and recommendations are revised by the reviewers/Editor-in-Chief.