 Author FAQ
Submission
- What journals does BioMed Central publish and what sorts of articles do they contain?
See the answer in our general FAQ.
- How do I find out if my manuscript is in scope for a journal published by BioMed Central?
- How do I submit my manuscript to a journal published by BioMed Central?
- Can I interrupt the submission process before it's complete?
- Is there a word or page limit for articles published by BioMed Central?
- How should I format my manuscript for submission?
- How do I prepare illustrations and figures to be submitted with my manuscript?
- Can I submit movies and large figure files with my manuscript?
- Can I carry on the submission of a manuscript when my colleague began the process?
- Can I submit my manuscript to you even though it is published elsewhere?
- What is BioMed Central's policy on patient consent?
Article processing charges
- See our separate APC FAQ
Peer review / editorial processes
- Are the journals published by BioMed Central peer reviewed?
- What is BioMed Central's editorial structure?
See the answer in our general FAQ.
- How long will it take to peer review my manuscript?
- What is 'open peer review', as operated by the medical journals in the BMC series?
Publication
- Does BioMed Central copy-edit manuscripts?
- How long will it take for my article to be available in its final form?
- Can an article be changed once it is published?
- How can I tell how many times my article has been viewed?
- Are articles published in journals published by BioMed Central available in printed form?
See the answer in our general FAQ.
Open Access
- What is BioMed Central's copyright policy?
- What types of articles do journals published by BioMed Central consider?
Citation, indexing and archiving
- How do I cite articles published in journals published by BioMed Central?
See the answer in our general FAQ.
- Do journals published by BioMed Central have impact factors and are their citations tracked?
See the answer in our general FAQ.
- Are articles included in PubMed and other bibliographic databases?
See the answer in our general FAQ.
- How long will it take for my article to be included in PubMed?
- How long will it take for my article to be available in PubMed Central?
- How is continued Open Access availability of my articles guaranteed?
See the answer in our general FAQ.
2. How do I find out if my manuscript is in scope for a journal published by BioMed Central?
To establish whether your article is suitable for a journal published by BioMed Central journal go to our Author Central home page, select the journal you are interested in, and then click on the 'view scope' button to display the scope of the selected journal.
The journals published by BioMed Central cover all areas of biology and medicine and include both broad interest and specialist titles. Use our journal overview page to get a better idea of the categories of journals that we publish.
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3. How do I submit my manuscript to a journal published by BioMed Central?
All articles must be submitted using BioMed Central's easy to use online submission system.
To submit a manuscript , either:
a. Go to our Author Central home page, select the journal you wish to submit to, and click on the 'submit' button to begin the process.
or
b. From any journal home page, click on the 'submit a manuscript' button.
The first step of the process is for you to read the 'submission checklist'. This is a list of things that you should do to ensure that you are ready to submit your manuscript. Once you have satisfied the submission checklist, the next step is for you to either register or, if you have already registered, log in.
You do not have to complete the submission process in one go; you can interrupt it at any time and return to it later (carrying on where you left off). All you need to do is log in with your email address and password and go to My BioMed Central.
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4. Can I interrupt the submission process before it's complete ?
Yes. You do not have to complete the submission process in one go; you can interrupt it at any time and return to it later (carrying on where you left off). All you need to do is log in with your email address and password and go to My BioMed Central.
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5. Is there a word or page limit for articles published by BioMed Central?
No, there is no absolute constraint on the length of articles published by BioMed Central. However, please remember that for the benefit of peer-reviewers and readers articles should be as concise as possible.
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6. How should I format my manuscript for submission?
Please refer to the 'Instructions for Authors' of the journal concerned. To view the 'Instructions for Authors', either:
a. Click on the 'submit a manuscript' button found on the journal home page
or
b. Go to the Author Central home page, select the journal that you wish to submit to, and click on the 'instructions' button.
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7. How do I prepare illustrations and figures to be submitted with my manuscript?
For information about preparing illustrations and figures, see BioMed Central's figure formatting guidelines.
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8. Can I submit movies and large figure files with my manuscript?
Yes. Given that the full text of each research article is published online rather than in print, we are able to consider large figure files (color or otherwise) and movies (or other interactive material) with your manuscript. There is no additional charge for these files.
See our formatting figure guidelines.
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9. Can I carry on the submission of a manuscript when my colleague began the process?
No. Once a submission has begun the submitting author takes responsibility for the manuscript during the entire submission, peer review, and, if accepted, publication processes.
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10. Can I submit my research article to you even though it has already been published elsewhere?
No. Journals published by BioMed Central only consider original articles. Articles must not have been published in any other journal. However, we do consider manuscripts that have been deposited on preprint servers.
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11. What is BioMed Central's policy on patient consent?
All manuscripts that include information or clinical photographs relating to individual patients must be accompanied by written and signed consent to publish from each patient. This should be mailed or faxed to the editorial staff. The manuscript should also include a statement to this effect in the Acknowledgements section, as follows: "Written consent was obtained from the patient(s) or their relative(s) for publication of study".
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12. Are the journals published by BioMed Central peer reviewed?
All articles published in journals published by BioMed Central have been peer-reviewed. The only exception to this is a small number of preprints that are hosted by Arthritis Research & Therapy, Breast Cancer Research, Critical Care, and Genome Biology; these are clearly labeled, either as 'Non-peer-reviewed research' or as 'Deposited Research'.
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14. How long will it take to peer review my manuscript?
The journals published by BioMed Central aim to provide a service that is faster than traditional journals, without compromising the quality of the peer review process. Some of the journals do this by using web-based technology to streamline the process. Many manuscripts accepted by journals published by BioMed Central go through the peer review process in two months or less.
Every effort is made to ensure that manuscripts are reviewed efficiently and to a high quality. The exact length of time will depend on many factors, such as whether peers agree to review a manuscript, and how quickly they submit their reports.
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15. What is 'open peer review', as operated by the medical journals in the BMC series?
"Open peer review" means that, firstly, the reviewers' names are included on the peer review reports, and secondly that, if the manuscript is published, the reports are made available online along with the final version of the manuscript. The published article will provide a link to its 'pre-publication history', which lists all the versions of the manuscript, all the signed reviews, and all responses to the reviewers since the submission of the manuscript until its publication. Here is an example of a medical article with a pre-publication history.
The biology journals within the BMC series operate a traditional, anonymous peer-review process. View a full list of the biology and medical journals within the BMC series.
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16. Does BioMed Central copy-edit manuscripts?
To keep the publication costs low, articles published in the BMC series and the independent journals are not generally copy-edited. Instead, peer reviewers are asked to indicate whether the standard of English used in is acceptable for publication. If the standard is not acceptable, authors will be asked to submit a revised, edited version.
The following journals, however, do copy-edit: Arthritis Research & Therapy, BMC Biology, BMC Medicine, Breast Cancer Research, Critical Care, Genome Biology, and Journal of Biology.
BioMed Central can provide details of companies that offer professional scientific copy-editing services, if required. Contact editorial@biomedcentral.com for details.
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17. How long will it take for my article to be available in its final form?
For most journals published by BioMed Central, publication occurs at the moment of acceptance.
The manuscript is published initially in 'Provisional PDF' form, which is the final version of the manuscript, as seen by the reviewers.
Within a few days, an HTML version of the article will be made available to the authors for checking. After any production errors have been corrected, the HTML version is made public as the 'full text' and a final PDF will be created.
The time between acceptance and the creation of the full text version depends on how quickly authors provide their corrections, but is normally around three weeks.
The following journals do not as yet publish at the moment of acceptance, but instead publish the article in final HTML and PDF form within a few weeks of acceptance: Arthritis Research & Therapy, Breast Cancer Research, Critical Care, Genome Biology, and Journal of Biology.
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18. Can an article be changed once it is published?
Once an article has been published it is part of the citable scientific record and in general changes cannot be made. Note that most journals published by BioMed Central publish at the moment of acceptance so corrections must be made during final revisions of a manuscript prior to acceptance. For more information about the acceptance and production procedure, see the FAQ, "How long will it take for my article to be available in its final form?".
Corrections and retractions can be published, and the corrected/retracted article will automatically include a prominent link to the correction or retraction. [more information]
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19. How can I tell how many times my article has been viewed?
All authors can see how many times their article has been viewed by logging in to the My Manuscripts section of My BioMed Central. Co-authors will need to register with BioMed Central if they have not done so already.
If, as a co-author, you find that all of your articles are not listed in My BioMed Central, it may be because the articles were published using a different email address. If you run into this problem, please contact BioMed Central Customer Services, who can resolve this issue.
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21. What is the copyright policy of journals published by BioMed Central?
Authors of research articles in any journal published by BioMed Central keep copyright to their work. Some journals charge a subscription for their non-research content and retain copyright for these articles. Find out more about our copyright policy and the type of journals that we publish.
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22. What types of articles do journals published by BioMed Central consider?
BioMed Central publishes over 189 journals, some of which publish only research, while others publish a combination of research, reviews, and commentaries.
The journals published by BioMed Central can be grouped into the following broad categories:
The BMC series: The journals in this series consider only research articles, and are entirely open access.
Independent journals: These journals consider both research and non-research articles (such as commentaries and reviews), and are entirely open access.
Other journals: Some of our journals offer open access to their research articles and charge a subscription for their non-research content (such as reviews and commentaries).
For more information, see our overview of journals published by BioMed Central.
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26. How long will it take for my article to be included in PubMed?
Articles published in the majority of journals published by BioMed Central are included in PubMed within 72 hours. Articles published in Arthritis Research & Therapy, Breast Cancer Research, Critical Care, and Genome Biology are included in PubMed shortly after publication of the relevant complete issue.
If your article is not present in PubMed within the above timeframe, please send an email, including the URL of your article, to our Production department: production@biomedcentral.com
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27. How long will it take for my article to be available in PubMed Central?
Articles published in the majority of journals published by BioMed Central are available in PubMed Central within two weeks of the final version being published. Articles published in Arthritis Research & Therapy, Breast Cancer Research, Critical Care, and Genome Biology are available in PubMed Central within two weeks of the relevant issue being complete.
If your article is not available within the above timeframe, please send an email, including the URL of your article, to our Production department: production@biomedcentral.com.
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