Information for authors

"I found the process of going through submission, review, editing, and publication to be quite easy. Everything was handled professionally and competently. The quality of the reviews were as good as any I have experienced in 30 years of publishing in scientific journals."

Dr Bonnie Kaplan

Professor, Departments of Paediatrics and Community Health Sciences, University of Calgary.

"My experience with Libertas Academica was excellent. The review process was smooth and speedy. After publishing, I received a kind and favorable response from a reader. I have never experienced such a comment after my publications to orthodox journals."

Dr Hiro Koshiyama

Center for Diabetes and Endocrinology, The Tazuke Kofukai Foundation Medical Research Institute Kitano Hospital, Osaka, Japan, and the Department of Diabetes and Clinical Nutrition, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan

"The publishing experience in Libertas Academica journals is unique. Readers can feel satisfied that publications are peer reviewed. Authors follow simple steps to reach final stage of publication. All readers have access to articles. Journal subscriptions or medical library access is not needed."

Dr Akram Al-Hilali, MB,ChB, DCP, DPath, FRCPath

Consultant Hematopathologist, Dubai Health Auhority, Dubai.

Author-friendly

"I would like to say that this is the most author-friendly editing process I have experienced in over 150 publications. Thank you most sincerely."

Speed

"Within a couple of days the reviewers had been procured and the manuscript was out."

Communication

"The communication between your staff and me has been terrific. Whenever progress is made with the manuscript, I receive notice. Quite honestly, I've never had such complete communication with a journal."

"The publishing process of this journal was a most pleasant and productive experience. I was particularly impressed with the regular updates of the progress of my submission. Many other journals receive a submission and authors may not hear anything for months. I appreciate your notification policy."

Open access

"LA is different, and hopefully represents a kind of scientific publication machinery that removes the hurdles from free flow of scientific thought."

Decision in 2-4 weeks

Prompt and fair peer review

Updates on your paper's status through My LA

Friendly responsive staff

Submit a paper

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Standard services for authors

We offer a comprehensive set of standard services to all authors:

Fair and prompt peer review by two reviewers and an Associate Editor or Editor in Chief
Prompt processing of your paper
Frequent status updates on your paper via email and website
Easy communication with friendly staff
High quality typesetting
Continuous expansion of indexing services
Inclusion of your paper in opt-in journal email lists to thousands of enthusiastic subscribers working in your field.

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Optional services for authors

In this section: Copy editing | Reference formatting | Immediate publication on acceptance | Bound reprints of your article | Place a no-obligation enquiry

Copy editing:

Our technical editors are available to review and correct the English in your manuscript.

Copy editing generally takes 2-4 days.
Changes made by the editor are identified.
Available prior to submission or after peer review.
Where peer reviewers recommend copy editing, you must have your paper copy edited but use of our service is not compulsory.

Copy editing is charged per page for every page in the manuscript.

Location	Currency	Amount per double-spaced manuscript page
Authors in North America	US $	18.00
Authors in Japan	¥	2,000.00
Authors in United Kingdom	£	12.00
Authors in rest of world	€	13.00

Reference formatting:

Our technical editors can revise the formatting of your references to comply with our style requirements.

Reference formatting generally takes 4-7 days.
Changes made by the editor are identified.
Available prior to submission or after peer review.
Where peer reviewers recommend reference re-formatting, you must have your references re-formatted but use of our service is not compulsory.

Location	Currency	Amount per double-spaced manuscript page
Authors in North America	US $	18.00
Authors in Japan	¥	2,000.00
Authors in United Kingdom	£	12.00
Authors in rest of world	€	13.00

Immediate publication on acceptance:

We can provide an immediate provisional PDF as soon as your paper is accepted for publication.

Appears immediately upon acceptance of your manuscript for publication.
Comprises your revised manuscript and a cover page.

Location	Currency	Amount per manuscript
Authors in North America	US $	200
Authors in Japan	¥	19,000
Authors in United Kingdom	£	140
Authors in rest of world	€	160

Bound reprints of your article:

Distributing printed copies of your article is a great way to bring your article to the attention of your colleagues at your institution or during meetings and conferences. We can supply spine-bound, high resolution black and white or colour copies of your article in sharp digital reprography.

Other pages can also be added to the back or front of your article, such as your CV or biosketch, and covers and various delivery options are also available.

Place an enquiry:

Place a no-obligation enquiry about optional services. You will receive a quote within two working days.

Optional services are available to everyone. You do not need to be intending to submit your paper to a Libertas Academica journal.

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Fairness in Peer Review

Peer review is the cornerstone of credible scholarly publishing. Your peer review will be undertaken with by two qualified and experienced reviewers, in collaboration with the journal's Editor in Chief or Associate Editor.

By using our custom-built web-based editorial platform we can remove many of the delays from peer review without compromising on quality.

You can be confident that your peer review will be fair and balanced. Our Fairness in Peer Review policy has two elements:

Papers are reviewed once only: resubmitted manuscripts are not sent to peer reviewers. Evaluation of resubmitted manuscripts is undertaken by Editors in Chief or Associate Editors only.
Specific comments may be appealled: prior to or during resubmission authors may appeal against peer reviewers' comments which are unfair, unobjective or ill-founded. All appeals are considered by the Editor in Chief or Associate Editor.

Appeal procedure:

Appeal on re-submission:

Specify each comment under appeal in the cover letter of your resubmitted manuscript and provide a clear explanation of why the comment is unfair, ill-founded or unobjective.

Appeal prior to re-submission:

Authors may also appeal prior to re-submission by completing an appeal request.

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Favored author program

Authors who have previously published with us are elligible to join our favored author program.

You will receive:

Prioritised peer review of your paper
Prioritised author PDF
Opportunity to participate in an interview, to discuss your research with your colleagues
25% discount on the standard article processing fee for each registered paper

Authors will be invited to join when their first paper is published.

Terms and conditions:

To be elligible you must register each paper you submit
Registration is not transferrable to other authors
In the event of disputes the publisher's decision is final

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Supplementing your article with a video

Authors of published articles are invited to supplement their article with a short video. Your video will be added to your article's metadata webpage (not to the article PDF.)

In this video you may:

Discuss the contents of the article
Discuss the research behind it, your collaborators, or other aspects of the context to the article
Discuss issues of broader relevance to the area you work in.

Presentation and accessibility guidelines:

Your video must be clear, audible and in English
Your video must be freely accessible via YouTube or a similar video hosting service
Your video must contain material which is suitable and of relevance to its audience.

Recording your video and having it added to your article's metadata webpage:

The simplest way to record your video is using your computer's built-in webcam and microphone. Free software to capture the video and upload it to YouTube is available online. The YouTube website contains excellent information on how to create a video.
Once uploaded to YouTube (or another video hosting site) please with the title of your article and the location of the video.

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Article processing fees

Libertas Academica charges authors article processing fees rather than charging readers to access your paper.

Why pay an article processing fee? What do I get in return?

Our journals are open access and not supported by external funding agencies. Authors are asked to pay an article processing fee (APF) to fund the processing of their paper and support the journal. APFs are almost always paid by authors' employers.
The APF funds the cost of processing your paper now and in the future. It allows us to give you amongst the very highest standards of service and quality available anywhere.
Exceptional service, speed, and quality. Our staff are prompt and reliable and we provide peer review and typesetting which is high quality and fast. Articles are published immediately upon typesetting completion.
Open access. This means that your article is highly visible and that you retain copyright in it. Articles in our journals are viewed more than 8,000 times and cited more than 1,500 times.
We will continue to invest in your paper after publication by adding it to new indexing services and promoting the journal it appears in.

When do I have to pay?

You will be asked to pay after peer review when your paper is accepted for publication.

How can I pay?

You can pay by credit card (Visa or Mastercard), electronic bank transfer, or check/cheque.
An invoice will be provided with full payment details.

One fixed charge

The article processing fee is the only charge that will apply to your paper.
The article processing fee is a flat fee: no other charges will be levied.
It does not vary based on use of colour figures, word count, page count.
Additional fees apply for optional services.

No limits or surcharges

No limit on the number of figures in your manuscript, colour or black and white
No word limit
No page limit

Does charging an APF create a conflict of interest in editorial matters?

This is an argument sometimes made against open access publishing. We avoid a conflict of interest by maintaining a strict separation between editorial decisions, which are made by an Editor in Chief or Associate Editor in conjunction with peer reviewers, and commercial decisions which are made by the publisher.

Article processing fees

Location	Article processing fee
North America: US, Canada	US$1699
Japan	¥159,500
United Kingdom	£995
Europe and rest of world: Asia Pacific (except Japan and NZ), Middle East, Africa	€1178

Please note that we reserve the right to change APFs periodically.

Payment by check/cheque

We discourage use of checks. If you send a check please be aware that a delay of a minimum of several weeks will occur before we receive it. Unexpected costs arising from unclear, incorrect or otherwise un-processable checks will be passed back to the author's institution.

Clinical Medicine: Therapeutics and all Clinical Medicine Reviews journals

There are no fees for papers commissioned for CMT and Clinical Medicine Reviews journals. Papers commissioned for these journals are published at no charge.

Editorial board members and editors in chief

We welcome submissions from Editors in Chief, Associate Editors and editorial board members to the journals they are associated with. In recognition of your support we offer:

Priority peer review
Priority provision of author PDF
Opportunity to participate in an interview to discuss your work and recent publications
Discount on standard article processing fee: reduced to US495 from US$1699

Important: the corresponding author must be the editorial board member or editor in chief who seeks the discount.

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Fee waivers and discounts

Waivers are given to authors working in undeveloped nations. Discounts are given in situations of hardship to all authors, although precedence is given to authors working in less developed nations.

Fee waviers or discounts must be applied for before your paper is submitted. They are not available after submission. Waivers are given at the publisher’s sole discretion. Applicants must be able to verifiably demonstrate their eligibility. Waivers and discounts are only available for standard services.

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Manuscript presentation

In this section:

Manuscript template

Questions

Presentation

File formats

Length

Figures

Reference formatting

Description of the format

Examples of references:

Monographs

Monographs with specific pages or multiple authors

Monographs in second or later editions

Edited volumes

Articles or separately authored chapters in edited volumes

Where a monograph has no listed author or editor

Multi-volume works

Scholarly journals

Electronic or online resources

Manuscript template:

Download our manuscript template.

Questions:

If you have any questions about manuscript preparation please contact the .

Presentation:

Ensure that the front page of manuscript contains the following information:

Title
Forename(s) and surnames of all authors.
Each author’s affiliations. Department, institution, city, state, country should be stated.
An abstract of about 200 words.
3 to 6 keywords.
A running header: this is normally a shortened version of the title.
The corresponding author's name, physical address, phone, email.

Throughout your manuscript please use:

Page numbers.
American English spelling.
Indications of placement of tables and figures.

File formats:

For manuscripts the following formats are accepted:

Microsoft Word 97 to 2007 DOC or DOCX
Rich text format (RTF)
Open document format (ODF)
Adobe Acrobat PDF

Supplementary files may be presented in the following formats:

Figures may be presented in all common file formats
Tables should be presented in Microsoft Excel 97 to 2007 format
All common formats are accepted for other supplementary files

Length:

There is no prescribed word or page limit and no excess word or page counts are charged.

However, please be aware that clearly excessive word counts may attract adverse feedback during peer review.

Figures:

Figures should be:

Clear and legible without blurring or pixellation at normal size
In JPG, TIFF, EPS, PNG, or GIF format.
No smaller in dimensions than their desired size on the page

Reference formatting:

We use the AMA reference formatting style.

Description of the format:

References to a work or a part of a work inside the manuscript appear as numbered citations. At the end of the manuscript each reference is listed in full prefixed by the number used in the manuscript.

Within the manuscript numbered citations are generally formatted as superscripted numbers starting from 1 and numbered in the order in which they appear in the manuscript. Numbers appear after the closest following comma or full stop, but before the closest following colon or semicolon.

Where multiple sources need to be cited at the same point separate the numbers with commas.

Where page numbers need to be cited after a reference number, they should be placed in parentheses following the citation number.

Parenthetical citations are used within the text for sources not suitable for inclusion in the references list at the end of the paper. Typically personal communications and unpublished data would be treated in this way. Within the brackets, the author's name, including their initials, and an indication of the type of source, i.e. "unpublished data", and the month and year should be given.

Authors' surnames are given in full, and for their first and middle names only the initials are given following the surname. Where there are six or less authors each name is separated by a comma without any other words. Where there are more than six authors only the first three authors are given followed by "et al."

Examples of references:

Monographs:

Capitalize the significant words of the title. Words such as "and," "the," "to" and "or" are not capitalized unless they appear at the beginning of the title. Italicize the entire title.

Smith AA. Lorem Ipsum Dolor Sit Amet, Consectetuer Adipiscing Elit. New York: Oxford University Press; 1988.

Monographs with specific pages or multiple authors:

Note that more than six authors are treated differently. A page or page range is given after the copyright year and separated from the copyright year using a colon.

Smith AA, Brown BB, Jones CC. Lorem Ipsum Dolor Sit Amet, Consectetuer Adipiscing Elit. New York: Oxford University Press; 1988:23-36.

Monographs in second or later editions:

Smith AA, Brown BB, Jones CC. Lorem Ipsum Dolor Sit Amet, Consectetuer Adipiscing Elit. 9th ed. New York: Oxford University Press; 1988.

Edited volumes:

Indicate this using "ed." and by appending information indicating the series to which the book belongs where appropriate.

Smith AA, ed. Lorem Ipsum Dolor Sit Amet, Consectetuer Adipiscing Elit. New York: Oxford University Press; 1988. New American Latin Series; No. 4.

Articles or separately authored chapters in edited volumes:

Smith AA. Lorem Ipsum Dolor. In: Brown BB, Jones CC, eds. Lorem Ipsum Dolor Sit Amet, Consectetuer Adipiscing Elit. New York: Oxford University Press; 1988:32-46

Where a monograph has no listed author or editor:

Where this is the case, substitute the translator or editor's name.

Multi-volume works:

Smith AA, Brown BB, Jones CC. Lorem Ipsum Dolor Sit Amet, Consectetuer Adipiscing Elit. Vol 2. New York: Oxford University Press; 1988.

Scholarly journals:

Capitalize the first letter in the first word of article titles and also any proper names or abbreviations which are normally capitalized, i.e. IBM. Journal titles are fully capitalized and italicized.

Brown BB. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Lorem Ipsum Dolor. 1988;2:124-143.

Electronic and online resources:

Where the resource is accessed through a database indicate which database. If it is accessed through a website provide the URL. In both cases indicate the type of resource and when it was accessed.

Smith AA, Brown BB, Jones CC. Lorem Ipsum Dolor Sit Amet, Consectetuer Adipiscing Elit [e-book]. New York: Oxford University Press; 1988. Available from: Netlibrary. Accessed June 4 2004.

Smith AA, Brown BB, Jones CC. Lorem Ipsum Dolor Sit Amet, Consectetuer Adipiscing Elit [e-book]. New York: Oxford University Press; 1988. Available at: http://www.loremipsumdolor.net Accessed June 4 2004.

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How to submit and track the status of your manuscript

In this section:

Submitting your manuscript

Step 1: about you

Step 2: about your paper

Step 3: upload your files

Monitoring the status of your manuscript

Email notifications

Ensuring that you receive emails

My LA status notifications

Contacting LA staff

Status indications

Using our FTP server to send us large files

FTP server settings

Recommended software

Notifying us you have uploaded files

Submitting your manuscript:

Click above to submit a paper or on any journal home page click the Submit button:

Step 1: about you::

Complete your details so we can stay in contact with you while your paper is being processed.

Step 2: about your paper::

Provide us with information on your paper.

Step 3: upload your files:

The final stage is to upload your paper and any associated files.

Your submission is completed.

Monitoring the status of your manuscript:

Email notifications:

You will be sent emails by editorial staff to notify you of changes in the status of your manuscript.

Ensuring that you receive emails:

Please ensure that you add these email addresses to your safe sender list or white list:

[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]

A log of all emails sent to you by us is available in My LA.

My LA status notifications:

At any time you can determine the status of your manuscript by logging into my LA and clicking on Status of existing submission.

Contacting LA staff:

If you need to contact us please send us an email or instant message with us when we're online by clicking on this icon:

Status indications:

This table sets out the meanings of the status indications you will see associated with your submission at different stages in the process.

Unevaluated new submission	Your submission has been received but has not been processed in any way by us yet. Processing will commence on the next business day.
Awaiting author files	Your submission has been evaluated but we have identified potential issues with the files you sent.
First Report Returned	The first peer review report on your submission has been returned.
Second or more Peer Review Reports Returned	Peer review of your submission is complete.
Report: Accept	Your submission has been accepted for publication without any changes being recommended by the reviewers.
Report: Accept with changes	Your submission has been accepted for publication provided you make the changes recommended by the reviewers.
Report: Reject	Your submission has been rejected.
Resubmission pending	For authors whose papers are accepted subject to changes, this means that We are awaiting resubmission of your revised manuscript.
Resubmitted MS received	Libertas Academica has received your revised submission and it has been sent to the Editor in Chief or Associate Editor.
Sent to typesetting	Your paper is being typeset. This takes between a few days and a week depending on the complexity of your paper.
Proofs sent to author	Author proofs of the typeset version of your paper have been sent to you and we are awaiting submission of your corrections. Please take no longer than a week to submit your corrections.
Author returned proofs with corrections	Your corrections have been received.
Corrections sent to typesetting	Your corrections have been transferred to our typesetters.
Author approval received	We have received your author approval form and your paper will be published shortly.
Online Final - Published to website	Your paper has been published to our website.
Metadata uploaded to DOAJ	Details on your paper have been transferred to the Directory of Open Access Journals.
Archived - Published	Your paper has been published and archived in our database.

Using our FTP server to send us large files:

An FTP server is available if you need to send us large files.

FTP server settings:

Host	la-press.exavault.com
Login and password	author/author
Port	21

Recommended software:

We recommend using Filezilla which is available for Windows, Apple OSX and Linux. Use Filezilla's quick connect tool bar to connect:

Notifying us when you have uploaded files:

If you upload files to the server you must to inform us that you have done so.

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Special guidelines for authors submitting to Clinical Medicine Reviews journals and Clinical Medicine: Therapeutics

Article processing fees:

No article processing fees will be charged if Libertas Academica has commissioned your paper from you. If in doubt please ask us.

Copyright:

Authors must gain approval from copyright holders to reproduce all copyrighted material. Please remember that most publishers (except open access publishers) hold copyright in everything they publish.

Copyrighted material from Wiley publications may not be used without our prior consent owing to the time limitations Wiley's re-use agreements contain, which are virtually impossible for open access publishers to ensure compliance with.

Submitting your commissioned paper:

Please take care to submit your commissioned paper using the details Jan McIver has provided you with.

Questions and assistance:

Authors are welcome to contact at any time for assistance.

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Data sharing policy

Availability of Data:

Authors publishing in Libertas Academica journals must agree to make freely available to other academic researchers any of the cells, clones of cells, DNA, antibodies, or other material used in the research reported and not available from commercial suppliers.

Reporting requirements include chemical structures of drugs and sequences of oligonucleotides used in anti-sense strategies and RNA. Disclosure is also required of chemical structures of any unpublished synthetic, low molecular weight (<1,000 g/mol) chemical compounds used as part of the described research (including clinical studies in humans).

Authors may also be required to make primary data available to the Editor-in-Chief if the data needs to be examined to ensure its validity.

Depositing Data in Public Databases:

Authors submitting manuscripts describing microarray data are required to deposit the data with either of two public repositories: GEO or Array Express and to have the accession numbers available to be published in the article.

Authors of manuscripts with new nucleotide or amino acid sequences are asked to deposit the sequence information with GenBank (, ). Authors outside the United States may deposit sequence information in the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) database () or the DNA Databank of Japan ().

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Ethics

Scholarly publishing is a business founded on strict ethical standards. We will conduct processing of your paper in a responsible, transparent manner. We also request that authors ensure that they comply with some ethical standards:

Author’s declaration:

In submitting an article to any of the journals published by Libertas Academica authors must certify that:

I am authorized by my co-authors to enter into these arrangements.
I warrant, on behalf of myself and my co-authors, that:

The article is original, has not been formally published in any other peer-reviewed journal, is not under consideration by any other journal and does not infringe any existing copyright or any other third party rights;
I am/we are the sole author(s) of the article and have full authority to enter into this agreement and in granting rights to Libertas Academica are not in breach of any other obligation. If the law requires that the article be published in the public domain, I/we will notify Libertas Academica at the time of submission upon which clauses 3 through 6 inclusive do not apply;
The article contains nothing that is unlawful, libellous, or which would, if published, constitute a breach of contract or of confidence or of commitment given to secrecy;
An author of a submission to any Libertas Academica journal must inform Libertas Academica of any commercial associations or financial interests held by any of the authors or immediate members of their family, which might be construed as posing a conflict of interest, including but not limited to consultancies, employment, expert testimony, honoraria, retainers, stock holdings or options, and membership on boards of for-profit organizations with a financial interest in the Work.
I/we have taken due care to ensure the integrity of the article. To my/our - and currently accepted scientific - knowledge all statements contained in it purporting to be facts are true and any formula or instruction contained in the article will not, if followed accurately, cause any injury, illness or damage to the user.