a) please ensure that you have referred to the instructions to authors and know the journal, manuscript type and Editorial Office.

b) download below the appropriate version of the templates (for the manuscript and the graphical abstract) and save them to your word-processing package. These documents should be saved in the Templates folder with a .dot extension and will appear on the General tab in the New dialog box.

>> download the templates

There are a number of paragraph styles available for use in this template to identify the different parts of your manuscript, i.e. Title, Author Names, Abstract, etc. In Microsoft Word, the name of the paragraph style is displayed on the formatting toolbar on the top left side of your screen.
Use the styles provided in the template for each corresponding section of your paper. By using the paragraph styles, you identify the components of your paper, alerting the editorial offi ce to how the different parts of the paper should be formatted. Each paragraph must have a Word Style defining it. When you prepare a manuscript using the template, you will not actually see the formatting that appears in the published paper. Your paper will be formatted as part of the editorial production process.

help to use the templates

c) save your manuscript text and graphics in a single file in PDF format. The PDF file should be printed and carefully reviewed before final submission.

Your manuscript (MS Word file) should include all following items:
- title
- abstract
- keywords
- manuscript text
- references and listing of figure captions
- all fi gures as included graphics - at the end of manuscript - one graphic per page
(please indicate where graphics should be inserted in the text)
- tables - at the end of manuscript - one table per page (please indicate where tables should be inserted in the text)
- equations, if any, prepared with MathType (as MS Word equations)
as well as a graphical abstract as a separate MS Word file.

Your manuscript should be submitted both as:
- a Microsoft Word file
- an Acrobat PDF file

Note: in order to generate a complete PDF file of your article all tables and graphics must be included after the text. Graphics, tables and equations must be cited in the text and numbered by order of appearance with Arabic numerals.