Instructions for authors

Revista Argentina de Microbiología is an Open Access Journal published by the Asociación Argentina de Microbiología (AAM) on a quarterly basis. The aim of this journal is to publish current scientific works in the different areas of Microbiology and Parasitology. Some of the topics considered of special interest are: infections caused by bacteria, fungi, parasites, viruses and unconventional infectious agents; mechanisms of pathogenicity, and virulence factors; resistance to antimicrobial agents; taxonomy; epidemiology and phenotypic, immunologic and molecular diagnostic methods. RAM also publishes articles on microbial ecology and diversity, zoo- and phytopathogens and microorganisms of value for food, agronomic, industrial and environmental applications. Manuscripts on microorganism genomics, proteomics and enzymology, as well as articles of regional impact are eligible for consideration with the purpose of covering basic aspects of research in the area

RAM can publish the articles under the following sections:

• General microbiology
• Clinical microbiology and infectious diseases
• Antimicrobial agents
• Food microbiology
• Agricultural, environmental and industrial microbiology

The different types of articles that can be published in RAM are: a) editorials, b) original articles, c) brief reports, d) microbiological images, e) letters to the editor and f) special articles, on the different areas of Microbiology.

The Editorial Board reserves the right to reject those manuscripts whose contents partially or totally overlap with works already published or whose topics are irrelevant to those of RAM. Furthermore, reasons for rejection are non-compliance of editorial requirements, ethical violations, low scientific quality and poor use of language, either English or Spanish. The Editorial Board reserves the right to make all necessary grammatical and style modifications.

Editorials. They focus on current scientific topics of special relevance to the scientific community specialized in Microbiology, or are opinion works on scientific policies. This section is the sole domain of the Editorial Board, who will determine editorial policy and authorship, as well as the general guidelines.  Editorials shall not exceed 1.200 words and references should be limited to 5.

Original articles. They are full research paper, which must be submitted in accordance to the following sections: Title (in Spanish and English) and Short Title, Abstract and Keywords (in Spanish and English), Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, Discussion, Acknowledgements and References. Manuscripts shall not exceed 8,000 words including all the sections and shall include a maximum of 6 tables or figures. In order to support and improve the presentation of the research article, RAM accepts additional electronic data which will be published as Supplementary data.

Brief reports. They are less extensive works. They include case reports, descriptions of new techniques or equipment based on conclusive experimental work. Manuscripts should not be divided into sections and shall not exceed 3,000 words. References should be limited to 15 citations and a maximum of 3 tables and figures. Careful analysis of data presented should be observed so as to avoid their repetition in the text, tables and figures, in order to maintain the typical concision in style that characterizes this type of articles.

Microbiological images. They may include high quality pictures of bacteria, fungi, parasites and viruses, from direct observation or staining under optical, electronic or fluorescent microscopy. They may also include other photographic images of microorganisms in culture media, lesions in humans or laboratory animals, x-ray and ultrasound images, computed tomography scans, nuclear magnetic resonance, etc. These images having great instructional value though not necessarily ground-breaking, should be accompanied by an explanatory text and indicating arrows when necessary. The text should not exceed 300 words. Quality requirements for images are described under the “Figures” section below.

Letters to the Editor. Letters can include either comments or new data. The comments consist in observations made on articles published in the journal; the latter are aimed at communicating short pieces of work, which do not have the appropriate length to be published as original article or brief report. Both contributions must not exceed 500 words, they should include the title in Spanish and English, they must not have an abstract, and may contain only one figure or table. The authors’ names and affiliations should be placed at the bottom of the letter. Only the primary affiliation of each author should be indicated. The comments should mention the volume and issue number where the article was published, as well as the complete title and the first author’s last name. Furthermore, the bibliographical references (up to 5 citations) that support the letter contents should be mentioned. In order to publish a comment, the corresponding author of the published article will be first consulted about the final decision and publication will remain at the editor‘s discretion. Contributions of new facts will be submitted to a specialist editor with knowledge in the subject matter, who, along with external reviewers, will assess the information. It should be noted that some journal indexing services do not include Letters to the Editor in their databases.

Special articles. They are up dates or workshop results on topics of regional and international weight. Their authors must be specialists in their field of study. Texts must include updated and comprehensive bibliography. Updates may include up to10,000 words,8 tables or figures. References should be limited to100 bibliographic citations.

Supplements. They will consist of detailed reviews of a specific subject conducted by one or several scientific organizations or universities, as well as abstracts of contributions presented at scientific meetings or universities organized by the Asociación Argentina de Microbiología or any of its divisions or branches (oral communications, boards, lectures, round tables, etc.), and chaired by guest editors. Topics to be considered in the supplements and general outlines should be approved by the Editorial Board.

Revision of manuscripts under the Supplements section will be in charge of reviewers appointed by the Editorial Board in the case of extensive reviewing, and of guest editors in the case of abstracts of meetings. Supplements will be wholly financed by the body organizing the scientific meeting, which will bear in mind that supplements should be distributed among participants to the meetings and all members of the Asociación Argentina de Microbiología on-line. As regards style and format, supplements shall strictly conform to the standards of Revista Argentina de Microbiología in all respects (cover, paper quality, printing, tables and figures, illustrations, etc.), as described in the “Instructions to Authors” section. Supplements corresponding to abstracts of meetings shall include the following information in this order: names of members of the Editorial Board of Revista Argentina de Microbiología, data about the event (complete title, venue and date), content list of meetings (in Spanish and English), acknowledgements, names of organizing officers and message delivered by the Chair/s. Abstracts consecutively numbered in Arabic numerals as from 1 (one) should subsequently follow. An alphabetical index of authors and the English and Spanish versions of the instructions to authors of Revista Argentina de Microbiología should be printed next. The meeting schedule will only be included in the Supplement as a separate leaflet.

Manuscripts should be uploaded in the RAM website https://www.editorialmanager.com/ram

Manuscripts shall be written in Spanish or English.The Editorial Board encourages authors to use English as their language of choice so that their work reaches wider international scope and readership.

You can use this list to carry out a final check of your submission before you send it to the journal for review. Please check the relevant section in this Guide for Authors for more details.
Ensure that the following items are present:
One author has been designated as the corresponding author with contact details:
• E-mail address
• Full postal address
All necessary files have been uploaded:
Manuscript:
• Include keywords
• All figures (include relevant captions)
• All tables (including titles, description, footnotes)
• Ensure all figure and table citations in the text match the files provided
Graphical Abstracts / Highlights files (where applicable)
Supplemental files (where applicable)
Further considerations
• Manuscript has been 'spell checked' and 'grammar checked'
• All references mentioned in the Reference List are cited in the text, and vice versa
• Permission has been obtained for use of copyrighted material from other sources (including the Internet)
• Relevant declarations of interest have been made
• Journal policies detailed in this guide have been reviewed
• Referee suggestions and contact details provided, based on journal requirements

For further information, visit our Support Center.

Manuscripts should be addressed to the Editorial Board of Revista Argentina de Microbiología accompanied by a cover letter according to the following model:

“Dear Editors of Revista Argentina de Microbiología,

As corresponding author (to whom correspondence should be addressed), hereby declare that the coauthors have accepted to be represented by myself before RAM with regard to the submission of the manuscript “…Title…”, and they are jointly responsible with me for the contents of this work. Neither this manuscript (nor any other with similar contents) has been previously published or is being considered for publication by another journal. I also agree to transfer the copyright to Revista Argentina de Microbiología once published”.

A change of the corresponding author or the order of the list of authors shall only be considered by a note signed by all the authors to that effect.

The authors shall also disclose any existing conflict of interests that might affect the manuscript assessment on an attached letter. The Editorial Boards shall treat all received manuscripts in strict confidence.

Funding sources for research work described in the manuscript, either from public or private institutions, commercial affiliations or consultancies, as well as co-ownership of patents for business purposes by one or more authors shall be indicated under the Acknowledgements Section.

Contributions will be assessed by the Editorial Board and submitted to the consideration of at least two scientific referees appointed for each case. Authors should recommend at least 3 reviewers for evaluation of their manuscript.

Please see our information pages on Ethics in publishing and Ethical guidelines for journal publication.

If the work involves the use of human subjects, the author should ensure that the work described has been carried out in accordance with The Code of Ethics of the World Medical Association (Declaration of Helsinki) for experiments involving humans. The manuscript should be in line with the Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals and aim for the inclusion of representative human populations (sex, age and ethnicity) as per those recommendations. The terms sex and gender should be used correctly.

Authors should include a statement in the manuscript that informed consent was obtained for experimentation with human subjects. The privacy rights of human subjects must always be observed.

All animal experiments should comply with the ARRIVE guidelines and should be carried out in accordance with the U.K. Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act, 1986 and associated guidelines, EU Directive 2010/63/EU for animal experiments, or the National Institutes of Health guide for the care and use of Laboratory animals (NIH Publications No. 8023, revised 1978) and the authors should clearly indicate in the manuscript that such guidelines have been followed. The sex of animals must be indicated, and where appropriate, the influence (or association) of sex on the results of the study.

Studies on patients or volunteers require ethics committee approval and informed consent, which should be documented in the paper. Appropriate consents, permissions and releases must be obtained where an author wishes to include case details or other personal information or images of patients and any other individuals in an Elsevier publication. Written consents must be retained by the author but copies should not be provided to the journal. Only if specifically requested by the journal in exceptional circumstances (for example if a legal issue arises) the author must provide copies of the consents or evidence that such consents have been obtained. For more information, please review the Elsevier Policy on the Use of Images or Personal Information of Patients or other Individuals. Unless you have written permission from the patient (or, where applicable, the next of kin), the personal details of any patient included in any part of the article and in any supplementary materials (including all illustrations and videos) must be removed before submission.

All authors must disclose any financial and personal relationships with other people or organizations that could inappropriately influence (bias) their work. Examples of potential competing interests include employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, paid expert testimony, patent applications/registrations, and grants or other funding. Authors must disclose any interests in two places: 1. A summary declaration of interest statement in the title page file (if double-blind) or the manuscript file (if single-blind). If there are no interests to declare then please state this: 'Declarations of interest: none'. This summary statement will be ultimately published if the article is accepted. 2. Detailed disclosures as part of a separate Declaration of Interest form, which forms part of the journal's official records. It is important for potential interests to be declared in both places and that the information matches. More information.

The below guidance only refers to the writing process, and not to the use of AI tools to analyse and draw insights from data as part of the research process.

Where authors use generative artificial intelligence (AI) and AI-assisted technologies in the writing process, authors should only use these technologies to improve readability and language. Applying the technology should be done with human oversight and control, and authors should carefully review and edit the result, as AI can generate authoritative-sounding output that can be incorrect, incomplete or biased. AI and AI-assisted technologies should not be listed as an author or co-author, or be cited as an author. Authorship implies responsibilities and tasks that can only be attributed to and performed by humans, as outlined in Elsevier’s AI policy for authors.

Authors should disclose in their manuscript the use of AI and AI-assisted technologies in the writing process by following the instructions below. A statement will appear in the published work. Please note that authors are ultimately responsible and accountable for the contents of the work.

Disclosure instructions
Authors must disclose the use of generative AI and AI-assisted technologies in the writing process by adding a statement at the end of their manuscript in the core manuscript file, before the References list. The statement should be placed in a new section entitled ‘Declaration of Generative AI and AI-assisted technologies in the writing process’.

Statement: During the preparation of this work the author(s) used [NAME TOOL / SERVICE] in order to [REASON]. After using this tool/service, the author(s) reviewed and edited the content as needed and take(s) full responsibility for the content of the publication.

This declaration does not apply to the use of basic tools for checking grammar, spelling, references etc. If there is nothing to disclose, there is no need to add a statement.

Submission of an article implies that the work described has not been published previously (except in the form of an abstract or as part of a published lecture or academic thesis, see 'Multiple, redundant or concurrent publication' section of our ethics policy for more information), that it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, that its publication is approved by all authors and tacitly or explicitly by the responsible authorities where the work was carried out, and that, if accepted, it will not be published elsewhere in the same form, in English or in any other language, including electronically without the written consent of the copyright-holder. To verify originality, your article may be checked by the originality detection service Crossref Similarity Check.

Please note that preprints can be shared anywhere at any time, in line with Elsevier's sharing policy. Sharing your preprints e.g. on a preprint server will not count as prior publication (see 'Multiple, redundant or concurrent publication' for more information).

Reporting guidance
For research involving or pertaining to humans, animals or eukaryotic cells, investigators should integrate sex and gender-based analyses (SGBA) into their research design according to funder/sponsor requirements and best practices within a field. Authors should address the sex and/or gender dimensions of their research in their article. In cases where they cannot, they should discuss this as a limitation to their research's generalizability. Importantly, authors should explicitly state what definitions of sex and/or gender they are applying to enhance the precision, rigor and reproducibility of their research and to avoid ambiguity or conflation of terms and the constructs to which they refer (see Definitions section below). Authors can refer to the SSex and Gender Equity in Research (SAGER) guidelines and the S SAGER guidelines checklist. These offer systematic approaches to the use and editorial review of sex and gender information in study design, data analysis, outcome reporting and research interpretation - however, please note there is no single, universally agreed-upon set of guidelines for defining sex and gender.

Definitions
Sex generally refers to a set of biological attributes that are associated with physical and physiological features (e.g., chromosomal genotype, hormonal levels, internal and external anatomy). A binary sex categorization (male/female) is usually designated at birth ("sex assigned at birth"), most often based solely on the visible external anatomy of a newborn. Gender generally refers to socially constructed roles, behaviors, and identities of women, men and gender-diverse people that occur in a historical and cultural context and may vary across societies and over time. Gender influences how people view themselves and each other, how they behave and interact and how power is distributed in society. Sex and gender are often incorrectly portrayed as binary (female/male or woman/man) and unchanging whereas these constructs actually exist along a spectrum and include additional sex categorizations and gender identities such as people who are intersex/have differences of sex development (DSD) or identify as non-binary. Moreover, the terms "sex" and "gender" can be ambiguous—thus it is important for authors to define the manner in which they are used. In addition to this definition guidance and the SAGER guidelines, the Sresources on this page offer further insight around sex and gender in research studies.

All authors should have made substantial contributions to all of the following: (1) the conception and design of the study, or acquisition of data, or analysis and interpretation of data, (2) drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content, (3) final approval of the version to be submitted.

Authors are expected to consider carefully the list and order of authors before submitting their manuscript and provide the definitive list of authors at the time of the original submission. Any addition, deletion or rearrangement of author names in the authorship list should be made only before the manuscript has been accepted and only if approved by the journal Editor. To request such a change, the Editor must receive the following from the corresponding author: (a) the reason for the change in author list and (b) written confirmation (e-mail, letter) from all authors that they agree with the addition, removal or rearrangement. In the case of addition or removal of authors, this includes confirmation from the author being added or removed.
Only in exceptional circumstances will the Editor consider the addition, deletion or rearrangement of authors after the manuscript has been accepted. While the Editor considers the request, publication of the manuscript will be suspended. If the manuscript has already been published in an online issue, any requests approved by the Editor will result in a corrigendum.

Upon acceptance of an article, authors will be asked to complete a 'Journal Publishing Agreement' (see more information on this). An e-mail will be sent to the corresponding author confirming receipt of the manuscript together with a 'Journal Publishing Agreement' form or a link to the online version of this agreement.

Author rights
As an author you (or your employer or institution) have certain rights to reuse your work. More information.

Find out how you can share your research published in Elsevier journals.

You are requested to identify who provided financial support for the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the article and to briefly describe the role of the sponsor(s), if any, in study design; in the collection, analysis and interpretation of data; in the writing of the report; and in the decision to submit the article for publication. If the funding source(s) had no such involvement then this should be stated.

Please visit our Open Access page from the Journal Homepage for more information.

Researcher Academy is a free e-learning platform designed to support early and mid-career researchers throughout their research journey. The "Learn" environment at Researcher Academy offers several interactive modules, webinars, downloadable guides and resources to guide you through the process of writing for research and going through peer review. Feel free to use these free resources to improve your submission and navigate the publication process with ease.

Please write your text in good English (American or British usage is accepted, but not a mixture of these). Authors who feel their English language manuscript may require editing to eliminate possible grammatical or spelling errors and to conform to correct scientific English may wish to use the English Language Editing service available from Elsevier's Author Services.

Please submit your article via https://www.editorialmanager.com/ram.

including the following separate files: Cover letter, Ethical disclosures, Manuscript, Tables, Figures and when it is appropriate, Supplementary data.

Authors should revise this checklist file and verify that all requirements have been met.

Please submit the names and institutional e-mail addresses of several potential referees. For more details, visit our Support site. Note that the editor retains the sole right to decide whether or not the suggested reviewers are used.

This journal operates a double anonymized review process. All contributions will be initially assessed by the editor for suitability for the journal. Papers deemed suitable are then typically sent to a minimum of two independent expert reviewers to assess the scientific quality of the paper. The Editor is responsible for the final decision regarding acceptance or rejection of articles. The Editor's decision is final. Editors are not involved in decisions about papers which they have written themselves or have been written by family members or colleagues or which relate to products or services in which the editor has an interest. Any such submission is subject to all of the journal's usual procedures, with peer review handled independently of the relevant editor and their research groups. More information on types of peer review.

This journal uses double-blind review, which means the identities of the authors are concealed from the reviewers, and vice versa. More information is available on our website. To facilitate this, please include the following separately:
Title page (with author details): This should include the title, authors' names and affiliations, and a complete address for the corresponding author including an e-mail address.
Blinded manuscript (no author details): The main body of the paper (including the references, figures, tables and any Acknowledgements) should not include any identifying information, such as the authors' names or affiliations.

It is important that the file be saved in the native format of the word processor used. The text should be in single-column format. Keep the layout of the text as simple as possible. Most formatting codes will be removed and replaced on processing the article. In particular, do not use the word processor's options to justify text or to hyphenate words. However, do use bold face, italics, subscripts, superscripts etc. When preparing tables, if you are using a table grid, use only one grid for each individual table and not a grid for each row. If no grid is used, use tabs, not spaces, to align columns. The electronic text should be prepared in a way very similar to that of conventional manuscripts (see also the Guide to Publishing with Elsevier). Note that source files of figures, tables and text graphics will be required whether or not you embed your figures in the text. See also the section on Electronic artwork.
To avoid unnecessary errors you are strongly advised to use the 'spell-check' and 'grammar-check' functions of your word processor.

Divide your article into clearly defined sections. Each subsection is given a brief heading (Introduction, Material and methods, Results, Discussion and Conclusions). Each heading should appear on its own separate line. Subsections should be used as much as possible when cross-referencing text: refer to the subsection by heading as opposed to simply 'the text'.

It should provide sufficient and relevant information on the topic to be analyzed or allow the understanding of non-specialized readers. It should also include the hypothesis or scientific background that guided the experimental lay out of the work as well as its clearly defined objectives. References mentioned in this section should be the most relevant ones with respect to the topic and must be carefully chosen.

This section should include an accurate and detailed description of the methods, equipment, reagents and procedures used, so that the experiments could be replicated. Frequently used or routine procedures and techniques may be mentioned by specific reference (eg. MIC determination by the CLSI methods, 2013). New methods or those especially developed for the study should be described in detail, as well as infrequent drug sources or biological materials (bacterial, viral, fungal strains and plasmids, etc.).Trademarks and origin of reagents, culture means and equipment should be indicated in the text the first time they are mentioned, identifying the commercial brand name, state and country of origin.

It should include the experimental layout and its scientific background as well as the results obtained presented in a concise way preferably as text, or as table/s or figure/s). Unnecessary use of tables and figures to mention data should be avoided when they could be included in the text. Do not repeat the same information in the text and in the tables or figures. Limit the number of photographs to the minimum necessary to support experimental results. Number the tables and figures in the order they are mentioned in the text. Avoid repetitions and include only most relevant data. In-depth interpretation will be included in the Discussion section.

Emphasis should be placed on important cutting-edge findings; experimental data should be examined in the light of previously published works. Conclusions should be presented avoiding unnecessary repetition of data and concepts already included in preceding sections. Results and Discussion can be presented as a joint section.

The main conclusions of the study may be presented in a short Conclusions section, which may stand alone or form a subsection of a Discussion or Results and Discussion section.

• Title. Concise and informative. Titles are often used in information-retrieval systems. Avoid abbreviations and formulae where possible.
• Author names and affiliations. Please clearly indicate the given name(s) and family name(s) of each author and check that all names are accurately spelled. You can add your name between parentheses in your own script behind the English transliteration.  Present the authors' affiliation addresses (where the actual work was done) below the names. Indicate all affiliations with a lower-case superscript letter immediately after the author's name and in front of the appropriate address. Provide the full postal address of each affiliation, including the country name and, if available, the e-mail address of each author.
• Corresponding author. Clearly indicate who will handle correspondence at all stages of refereeing and publication, also post-publication. This responsibility includes answering any future queries about Methodology and Materials. Ensure that the e-mail address is given and that contact details are kept up to date by the corresponding author.
• Present/permanent address. If an author has moved since the work described in the article was done, or was visiting at the time, a 'Present address' (or 'Permanent address') may be indicated as a footnote to that author's name. The address at which the author actually did the work must be retained as the main, affiliation address. Superscript Arabic numerals are used for such footnotes.

Highlights are mandatory for this journal as they help increase the discoverability of your article via search engines. They consist of a short collection of bullet points that capture the novel results of your research as well as new methods that were used during the study (if any). Please have a look at the examples here: example Highlights.

Highlights should be submitted in a separate editable file in the online submission system. Please use 'Highlights' in the file name and include 3 to 5 bullet points (maximum 85 characters, including spaces, per bullet point).

A concise and factual abstract is required. The abstract should state briefly the purpose of the research, the principal results and major conclusions (Originals and Special Articles: 250 words/Brief Reports: 150 words). An abstract is often presented separately from the article, so it must be able to stand alone. For this reason, References should be avoided, but if essential, then cite the author(s) and year(s). Also, non-standard or uncommon abbreviations should be avoided, but if essential they must be defined at their first mention in the abstract itself.

Although a graphical abstract is optional, its use is encouraged as it draws more attention to the online article. The graphical abstract should summarize the contents of the article in a concise, pictorial form designed to capture the attention of a wide readership. Graphical abstracts should be submitted as a separate file in the online submission system. Image size: Please provide an image with a minimum of 531 × 1328 pixels (h × w) or proportionally more. The image should be readable at a size of 5 × 13 cm using a regular screen resolution of 96 dpi. Preferred file types: TIFF, EPS, PDF or MS Office files. You can view Example Graphical Abstracts on our information site.

Define abbreviations that are not standard in this field in a footnote to be placed on the first page of the article. Such abbreviations that are unavoidable in the abstract must be defined at their first mention there, as well as in the footnote. Ensure consistency of abbreviations throughout the article.

Massive data

For studies of massive data, such as transcriptomics, proteomics, and others high-throughput assays, detailed explanations of methodologies (including the number of biological replicas used), statistical analyses, and softwares must be explained in detail. Biological replicates are measurements obtained from independent experimental units that were treated under the same experimental condition. Measurements repeated from a single sample are considered technical replicates. Massive data studies with less than two biological replicates will not be accepted.

List funding sources in this standard way to facilitate compliance to funder's requirements:

Funding: This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health [grant numbers xxxx, yyyy]; the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Seattle, WA [grant number zzzz]; and the United States Institutes of Peace [grant number aaaa].

It is not necessary to include detailed descriptions on the program or type of grants and awards. When funding is from a block grant or other resources available to a university, college, or other research institution, submit the name of the institute or organization that provided the funding.

If no funding has been provided for the research, please include the following sentence:

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Whilst it is accepted that authors sometimes need to manipulate images for clarity, manipulation for purposes of deception or fraud will be seen as scientific ethical abuse and will be dealt with accordingly. For graphical images, this journal is applying the following policy: no specific feature within an image may be enhanced, obscured, moved, removed, or introduced. Adjustments of brightness, contrast, or color balance are acceptable if and as long as they do not obscure or eliminate any information present in the original. Nonlinear adjustments (e.g. changes to gamma settings) must be disclosed in the figure legend.

General points
• Make sure you use uniform lettering and sizing of your original artwork.
• Embed the used fonts if the application provides that option.
• Aim to use the following fonts in your illustrations: Arial, Courier, Times New Roman, Symbol, or use fonts that look similar.
• Number the illustrations according to their sequence in the text.
• Use a logical naming convention for your artwork files.
• Provide captions to illustrations separately.
• Size the illustrations close to the desired dimensions of the published version.
• Submit each illustration as a separate file.
• Ensure that color images are accessible to all, including those with impaired color vision.

A detailed guide on electronic artwork is available.
You are urged to visit this site; some excerpts from the detailed information are given here.

Formats
If your electronic artwork is created in a Microsoft Office application (Word, PowerPoint, Excel) then please supply 'as is' in the native document format.
Regardless of the application used other than Microsoft Office, when your electronic artwork is finalized, please 'Save as' or convert the images to one of the following formats (note the resolution requirements for line drawings, halftones, and line/halftone combinations given below):
EPS (or PDF): Vector drawings, embed all used fonts.
TIFF (or JPEG): Color or grayscale photographs (halftones), keep to a minimum of 300 dpi.
TIFF (or JPEG): Bitmapped (pure black & white pixels) line drawings, keep to a minimum of 1000 dpi.
TIFF (or JPEG): Combinations bitmapped line/half-tone (color or grayscale), keep to a minimum of 500 dpi.
Please do not:
• Supply files that are optimized for screen use (e.g., GIF, BMP, PICT, WPG); these typically have a low number of pixels and limited set of colors;
• Supply files that are too low in resolution;
• Submit graphics that are disproportionately large for the content.

Please make sure that artwork files are in an acceptable format (TIFF (or JPEG), EPS (or PDF) or MS Office files) and with the correct resolution. If, together with your accepted article, you submit usable color figures then Elsevier will ensure, at no additional charge, that these figures will appear in color online (e.g., ScienceDirect and other sites). Further information on the preparation of electronic artwork.

Ensure that each illustration has a caption. Supply captions separately, not attached to the figure. A caption should comprise a brief title (not on the figure itself) and a description of the illustration. Keep text in the illustrations themselves to a minimum but explain all symbols and abbreviations used.

Please submit tables as editable text and not as images. Tables can be placed either next to the relevant text in the article, or on separate page(s) at the end. Number tables consecutively in accordance with their appearance in the text and place any table notes below the table body. Be sparing in the use of tables and ensure that the data presented in them do not duplicate results described elsewhere in the article. Please avoid using vertical rules and shading in table cells.

It is convenient that 70% whenever possible of bibliographic citations in all manuscripts correspond to the last 10 years and the remaining 30% be distributed in key references from previous years. Names of authors cited shall be listed in alphabetical order and numbered in sequence with Arabic numerals on a separate page. Citations in the text should appear as superscript numbers, to coincide with the number they have in the References section. Reference to personal comments and un-published works should be presented as personal communication, written between parentheses.

References should include the name of all the authors and conform to the following models:

a.Periodical publications

Héritier C, Poirel L, Lambert T, Nordmann P. Contribution of acquired carbapenem-hydrolyzing oxacillinases to carbapenem resistance in Acinetobacter baumannii. Antimicrob Agents Chemother. 2005;49:3198-202.

b.Chapters of books/modules

Martins Teixeira L, Siqueira Carvalho M da G, Facklam RR. Enterococcus. En: Murray PR, Baron EJ, Jorgensen JH, Landry ML, Pfaller MA, editors. Manual of Clinical Microbiology, 9th edition. Washington DC, ASM Press, 2007, p. 430-42.

c.Presentations in scientific meetings or other events

Aguilar M, Punschke K, Touati D, Pianzzola MJ. Estudios fisiológicos y genéticos en la bacteria sulfato reductora Desulfoarculus baarsii. Terceras Jornadas Rioplatenses de Microbiología, 1997, Resumen J2, p. 102, Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires, Argentina.

d.Presentations in congresses or other scientific meetings in a supplement published by a periodic academic journal

Fellner MD, Correa RM, Durand K, Teyssié AR, Picconi MA. Análisis del ADN circulante de virus Epstein-Barr (EBV) en pacientes inmunosuprimidos con y sin linfomas asociados. VIII Congreso Argentino de Virología, Resumen 10416. Rev Argent Microbiol. 2005;37 Supl 1:95.

e.Institutional publications

Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute. Disk diffusion.Performance Standards for Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing; 15th Informational Supplement, 2005; M100-S15.Wayne, PA, EE.UU.

f.Theses

Brizzio A. Aplicación de una PCR múltiple para la identificación de cepas de Staphylococcus aureus toxigénicas. Tesis de Maestría en Microbiología Molecular 2009. ANLIS “Dr. Carlos G. Malbrán” y Universidad Nacional de San Martín.

g.On-line references

1. For on-line Books

Sullivan CJ, editor. 1999-2001. Fungi: an evolving electronic resource for the microbiological community. ASM Press. [On-line]

http://link.asmusa.de/link/service/books/91090. Last checked September 7^th, 2001.

2. For on-line versions of printed journals

van der Zeiss L, Danziger VB. History of clinical microbiology. Clin Microbiol. 1999;100:123-234. [On-line]

3. For journals only available on-line

Zellnitz F, Foley PM. October 1998, posting {or revision} date. History of virology. Am Virol J. 1998;1:30-50. [Online] http://www.avj.html.

4. For manuscripts published on line in advance of their publication

Zheng Z, Zou J. 5 September 2001. The initial step of the glycerolipid pathway: identification of glycerol-3-phosphate/dihydroxy-acetone phosphate dual substrate acyltransferases in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. J Biol Chem. 10.1074/jbc.M104749200.

5. For databases and websites not published in journals

Orpha.net [Internet]. Paris: Orphanet; 2000 [updated February14 2013; cited April 4 2013]. Available from: http://www.orpha.net/consor/cgi-bin/index.php

h. References to other data or to unpublished abstracts of meetings, data in the publishing process or under revision; personal communications; patents already applied for or pending; or information obtained from websites must be cited in the main text between parentheses, as indicated below:

… similar results (Gómez H, unpublished results)

… new protocol used for detection (González JL, sent for publication).

… novel species of cellulolytic bacteria (Márquez W, personal communication)

… mentioned previously on different sources (http://fcen.uba.edu.ar)

i. Reference to a dataset:

[dataset] Oguro M, Imahiro S, Saito S, Nakashizuka T. Mortality data for Japanese oak wilt disease and surrounding forest compositions, Mendeley Data. 2015;1.

Please ensure that every reference cited in the text is also present in the reference list (and vice versa). Any references cited in the abstract must be given in full. Unpublished results and personal communications are not recommended in the reference list, but may be mentioned in the text. If these references are included in the reference list they should follow the standard reference style of the journal and should include a substitution of the publication date with either 'Unpublished results' or 'Personal communication'. Citation of a reference as 'in press' implies that the item has been accepted for publication.

Increased discoverability of research and high quality peer review are ensured by online links to the sources cited. In order to allow us to create links to abstracting and indexing services, such as Scopus, CrossRef and PubMed, please ensure that data provided in the references are correct. Please note that incorrect surnames, journal/book titles, publication year and pagination may prevent link creation. When copying references, please be careful as they may already contain errors. Use of the DOI is highly encouraged.

A DOI is guaranteed never to change, so you can use it as a permanent link to any electronic article. An example of a citation using DOI for an article not yet in an issue is: VanDecar J.C., Russo R.M., James D.E., Ambeh W.B., Franke M. (2003). Aseismic continuation of the Lesser Antilles slab beneath northeastern Venezuela. Journal of Geophysical Research, https://doi.org/10.1029/2001JB000884. Please note the format of such citations should be in the same style as all other references in the paper.

As a minimum, the full URL should be given and the date when the reference was last accessed. Any further information, if known (DOI, author names, dates, reference to a source publication, etc.), should also be given. Web references can be listed separately (e.g., after the reference list) under a different heading if desired, or can be included in the reference list.

This journal encourages you to cite underlying or relevant datasets in your manuscript by citing them in your text and including a data reference in your Reference List. Data references should include the following elements: author name(s), dataset title, data repository, version (where available), year, and global persistent identifier. Add [dataset] immediately before the reference so we can properly identify it as a data reference. This identifier will not appear in your published article.

Where a preprint has subsequently become available as a peer-reviewed publication, the formal publication should be used as the reference. If there are preprints that are central to your work or that cover crucial developments in the topic, but are not yet formally published, these may be referenced. Preprints should be clearly marked as such, for example by including the word preprint, or the name of the preprint server, as part of the reference. The preprint DOI should also be provided.

Please ensure that the words 'this issue' are added to any references in the list (and any citations in the text) to other articles in the same Special Issue.

Most Elsevier journals have their reference template available in many of the most popular reference management software products. These include all products that support Citation Style Language styles, such as Mendeley. Using citation plug-ins from these products, authors only need to select the appropriate journal template when preparing their article, after which citations and bibliographies will be automatically formatted in the journal's style. If no template is yet available for this journal, please follow the format of the sample references and citations as shown in this Guide. If you use reference management software, please ensure that you remove all field codes before submitting the electronic manuscript. More information on how to remove field codes from different reference management software.

Abbreviations of journal´s titles must be in accordance the Index Medicus (the complete list can be found at https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nlmcatalog/journals).

Elsevier accepts video material and animation sequences to support and enhance your scientific research. Authors who have video or animation files that they wish to submit with their article are strongly encouraged to include links to these within the body of the article. This can be done in the same way as a figure or table by referring to the video or animation content and noting in the body text where it should be placed. All submitted files should be properly labeled so that they directly relate to the video file's content. In order to ensure that your video or animation material is directly usable, please provide the files in one of our recommended file formats with a preferred maximum size of 150 MB. Video and animation files supplied will be published online in the electronic version of your article in Elsevier Web products, including ScienceDirect. Please supply 'stills' with your files: you can choose any frame from the video or animation or make a separate image. These will be used instead of standard icons and will personalize the link to your video data. For more detailed instructions please visit our video instruction pages. 

Supplementary material such as applications, images and sound clips, can be published with your article to enhance it. Submitted supplementary items are published exactly as they are received (Excel or PowerPoint files will appear as such online). Please submit your material together with the article and supply a concise, descriptive caption for each supplementary file. If you wish to make changes to supplementary material during any stage of the process, please make sure to provide an updated file. Do not annotate any corrections on a previous version. Please switch off the 'Track Changes' option in Microsoft Office files as these will appear in the published version.

Elsevier encourages and supports authors to share raw data sets underpinning their research publication where appropriate and enables interlinking of articles and data. More information on depositing, sharing and using research data.

This journal supports Mendeley Data, enabling you to deposit any research data (including raw and processed data, video, code, software, algorithms, protocols, and methods) associated with your manuscript in a free-to-use, open access repository. During the submission process, after uploading your manuscript, you will have the opportunity to upload your relevant datasets directly to Mendeley Data. The datasets will be listed and directly accessible to readers next to your published article online.

For more information, visit the Mendeley Data for journals page.

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