PUBLICATION PAGE CHARGES (Do not apply to invited authors)

After final layout for publication, each page of an article will incur a fixed charge of:

$97 per page for members of the ISCBFM

$130 per page for non-members

This charge is fully inclusive of colour reproduction of all colour images in print, HTML and PDF formats. It covers also a proportion of the costs of processing and producing the article for publication.

Optional open access publishing is available for a fee via the Sage Choice program, and Open Access agreements, where authors can publish open access either discounted or free of charge depending on the agreement with Sage. Find out if your institution is participating by visiting Open Access Agreements at Sage. Open Access agreement eligibility is determined by the corresponding author’s affiliation matching an agreement at acceptance. For more information on Open Access publishing options at Sage please visit Sage Open Access.

For information on funding body compliance, and depositing your article in repositories, please visit Sage’s Author Archiving and Re-Use Guidelines and Publishing Policies.

ISCBFM members are eligible for a discount on the article processing charge. The article processing charge for ISCBFM members is $3,000.

Your article must be within the scope of the journal and be of sufficient quality. If not, it will not be reviewed. Please read the journal’s Aims and Scope to see if your article is appropriate.

The manuscript must be your original work, you must have the rights to the work, and you must have obtained and be able to supply all necessary permissions for the reproduction of any copyright works not owned by you, including figures, illustrations, tables, lengthy quotations, or other material previously published elsewhere.

Article types

Please visit the Sage Journal Author Gateway for guidance on producing visual and/or video abstracts.

Although the Editors and referees make every effort to ensure the validity of published manuscripts, the final responsibility rests with the authors, not with JCBFM, its Editors, or the publisher. 

Originality: A submitted manuscript must be an original contribution not previously published (except as an abstract or preliminary report), must not be under consideration for publication elsewhere, and, if accepted, must not be published elsewhere in similar form, in any language, without the consent of Sage Publications. Each person listed as an author is expected to have participated in the study to a significant extent. Although the Editors and referees make every effort to ensure the validity of published manuscripts, the final responsibility rests with the authors, not with JCBFM, its Editors or the publisher.

Journal layout

Components of original articles should be in the following order:

- Title page

- Structured abstract (and graphical abstract)

- Five key words

- Introduction

- Material and Methods

- Results

- Discussion

- Acknowledgements

- Author contribution statement (only for original research papers, not for reviews)

- Disclosure/conflict of interest

- Sentence regarding supplementary information on JCBFM website, if any

References

- Figure legends

- Tables (in editable format, either in main document or as separate main document files)

- Figures (in separate image files, not inserted in main document)

Cover letter

A cover letter to the Editors should state that the material is original research, has not been previously published and has not been submitted for publication elsewhere while under consideration of JCBFM.

Title page of manuscript

The title page should include (a) the complete manuscript title; (b) all authors’ full names (listed as first name, middle initial, last name) and affiliations; (c) the name, postal address for correspondence, telephone number and e-mail address; and (d) a running headline of no more than 50 characters (including spaces) should be supplied which conveys the essential message of the paper.

If authors regard it as essential to indicate that two or more co-authors are equal in status, they may be identified on the manuscript title page by an asterisk symbol with the caption “These authors contributed equally to this work” immediately under the author affiliations list.

Please note that the title, keywords and abstract are key to ensuring that readers find your article online through online search engines such as Google. Please refer to the information and guidance on how best to title your article, write your abstract and select your keywords by visiting the Sage Journal Author Gateway for guidelines on How to Help Readers Find Your Article Online

Abstract and keywords on a separate page, following title page.

The abstract should be factual and comprehensive. The use of abbreviations and acronyms should be limited and general statements (e.g. “the significance of the results is discussed”) should be avoided. Five keywords should be provided in alphabetical order below the abstract.

Materials/subjects and methods section

This section should contain sufficient detail, so that all experimental procedures can be reproduced, and include references. Methods, however, that have been published in detail elsewhere should not be described in detail. Authors should provide the name of the manufacturer and their location for any specifically named medical equipment and instruments, and all drugs should be identified by their pharmaceutical names, and by their trade name if relevant.

Additional editorial policies

Statistical guidelines

For presenting continuous measures (e.g. infarct volume) in graphs, use dot plots or boxplots. Bar charts are not appropriate for continuous measures since they do not provide information about distribution of the data. Appropriate descriptive measures of the average and variability for continuous measures in tables, text, or graphs are the arithmetic mean and standard deviation if the data are sufficiently normally distributed, or the median and interquartile range [being the 25th and 75th percentile] if data are not sufficiently normally distributed, but not the standard error. The presentation of the standard error as measure of variability is not correct since it is a 67% confidence coefficient for the mean, meaning that the interval mean±standard error of the mean is a 67% confidence interval of the mean. For presenting model-based measures (e.g. from ANOVAs), please give effect estimates and 95% confidence intervals.

Where statistical analyses are described, please specify which formal tests for normality were used to assess data distribution. All data should be subject to tests for normality. Data that do not exhibit a normal/Gaussian distribution should be analyzed via a non-parametric equivalent. For bar graph presentations, please show exact data points (e.g. dot plots) rather than bar plots throughout the manuscript and supplemental files.

Altman, D. G., & Bland, J. M. (2005). Statistics notes - Standard deviations and standard errors. British Medical Journal, 331(7521), 903-903. doi:DOI 10.1136/bmj.331.7521.903

Lang, T. A., & Altman, D. G. (2015). Basic statistical reporting for articles published in Biomedical Journals: The "Statistical Analyses and Methods in the Published Literature" or the SAMPL Guidelines. International Journal of Nursing Studies, 52(1), 5-9. doi:10.1016/j.ijnurstu.2014.09.006

Spriestersbach, A., Rohrig, B., du Prel, J. B., Gerhold-Ay, A., & Blettner, M. (2009). Descriptive Statistics The Specification of Statistical Measures and Their Presentation in Tables and Graphs Part 7 of a Series on Evaluation of Scientific Publications. Deutsches Arzteblatt International, 106(36), 578-583. doi:10.3238/arztebl.2009.0578

Weissgerber, T. L., Milic, N. M., Winham, S. J., & Garovic, V. D. (2015). Beyond Bar and Line Graphs: Time for a New Data Presentation Paradigm. Plos Biology, 13(4). doi:ARTN e100212810.1371/journal.pbio.1002128

Reporting guidelines

Your manuscript must follow the relevant EQUATOR Network reporting guidelines, depending on the type of study. The EQUATOR wizard can help identify the appropriate guideline. You will need to upload the appropriate checklist with your submission.

Other resources can be found at NLM’s Research Reporting Guidelines and Initiatives.

If your research involves animals, you will be asked to confirm that you have carefully read and adhered to the ARRIVE guidelines.

As part of the submission process you will need to confirm that this is your original work, that you have the rights in the work, that this is for first publication in this Journal, that it is not being considered for/has not already been published elsewhere, and that you have obtained and can supply all necessary permissions for the reproduction of any copyright works not owned by you.

Please see our guidelines on prior publication and note that the journal may accept submissions of manuscripts that have been posted on preprint servers.

How to submit your revised manuscript

Authors submitting a revised manuscript after review are asked in the submission process to include a point-by-point response to reviewers’ comments. It is imperative that your response be entered as editable text into the box provided for it. This text may in addition be uploaded as a file with embedded figures and/or tables if authors consider it necessary (File name: Author response to referees, file type: Other).

Papers revised after a decision may NOT be submitted as new manuscripts. Revisions submitted as new papers will be withdrawn by the Editorial Office. If you encounter difficulties submitting your revision, please contact the Editorial Office for help.

Authors should submit two copies of the revised manuscript: one clean document (file type: Main Document) and one showing highlighted changes made in response to reviewers' comments (file type: Other). Changes should be indicated using colour markings of the text. Please do not use underlining or the track changes function to highlight changes. Comment boxes are allowed. If the paper is accepted, the clean document only will be forwarded to the publisher.

At the revision stage, authors of manuscripts that contain cropped gels/blots must submit the original, uncropped image of each cropped gel/blot appearing in the manuscript. Each unedited gel/blot should be clearly labeled as "Full unedited gel/blot for Figure X", and the lanes of the unedited gel/blot that appear in the cropped image in the manuscript should be highlighted. All blots should contain markers denoting the location of molecular weight standards (units in kDa). 

The original gel/blot images should be submitted in a single PDF file and uploaded with the file designation "Supplemental Files". The file of the unedited images will be made available in the online supplementary material if the manuscript is accepted.

Submission site

Submit your manuscript online via Sage Track.

IMPORTANT: Please check whether you already have an account in Sage Track before trying to create a new one. If you have reviewed or authored for the journal in the past year it is likely that you will have had an account created. For further guidance on submitting your manuscript online please visit ScholarOne Online Help.

Manuscripts should only be submitted with the consent of all contributing authors. The individual responsible for submitting the manuscript should carefully check that all those whose work contributed to the manuscript are listed as authors.

Ensure you upload all relevant manuscript files, including any additional supplemental files (including reporting guidelines where relevant).

Authorship

Please view our authorship policies, which includes information on criteria for authorship, who should be the corresponding author and more.

Please note that AI chatbots, for example ChatGPT, should not be listed as authors. For more information see the policy on Use of ChatGPT and generative AI tools.

Files

• Cover letter. To help the Editor in their preliminary evaluation, please indicate why you think the manuscript suitable for publication.
• Title page: please include all of the following information:
• Complete manuscript title
• Full names of all contributing authors (listed as first name, middle initial, last name) and their respective affiliations
• Name, postal address, telephone number and email address of the submitting author
• A running headline of a maximum of 50 characters (including spaces) which conveys the essential message of the paper
• Your manuscript, properly formatted according to all stipulations above, and within the scope of the journal.
• Figures and images.
• All figures must be numbered consecutively in the order in which they appear in the text – they will appear in the published article in the order they are numbered.
• Figure resolution is 300dpi. More information on figure/image preparation can be found here.
• Supplemental material. This journal can host additional materials online (e.g. datasets, podcasts, videos, images, etc) alongside the full-text of the article. Your supplemental material must be one of our accepted file types. For that list and more information please refer to our guidelines on submitting supplemental files.

Artwork, figures and other graphics

For guidance on the preparation of illustrations, pictures and graphs in electronic format, please visit Sage’s Manuscript Submission Guidelines.

Artwork Guidelines

Illustrations, pictures and graphs, should be supplied in the highest quality and in an electronic format that helps us to publish your article in the best way possible. Figures supplied in colour will appear in colour online and in the print issue. Colour reproduction of images in print is covered by the page charges for publication of a manuscript.

Please follow the guidelines below to enable us to prepare your artwork for the printed issue as well as the online version.

Format: TIFF, JPEG: Common format for pictures (containing no text or graphs).

EPS: Preferred format for graphs and line art (retains quality when enlarging/zooming in).

Placement: Please submit the figure files individually with the file designation "Images". They should be labelled sequentially and cited in the text. Do not embed figures in the text. Please provide figure legends in a double-spaced list on a separate manuscript page titled “Titles and legends to figures" after the Reference section.

Resolution: Rasterized based files (i.e. with .tiff or .jpeg extension) require a resolution of at least 300 dpi (dots per inch). Line art should be supplied with a minimum resolution of 800 dpi.

Dimension: Check that the artworks supplied match or exceed the dimensions of the Journal. Images cannot be scaled up after origination. The dimensions of the Journal are 280 (height) x 210 (width) mm, with 2 cm margins on each side, making the maximum dimensions for a figure 240 x 170mm.

Fonts: The lettering used in the artwork should not vary too much in size and type (usually sans serif font as a default).

Supplemental material

The Journal is able to host additional materials online (e.g. datasets, podcasts, videos, images, etc.) alongside the full-text of the article. These will be subjected to peer review alongside the article, but are not published in print.

Authors should submit supplementary information files in the final format as they are not edited and will appear online exactly as submitted. Supplementary material should be uploaded if possible as one supplementary file including figure and movie legends. Movies and extensive tables should be uploaded in separate supplementary files.

Supplementary files must be as small as possible so that they can be downloaded quickly. Images should not exceed 640 x 480 pixels. For movies we recommend 480 x 360 pixels as the maximum frame size and a frame rate of 15 frames per second. If applicable to the presentation of the information, use a 256-colour palette. Please consider the use of lower specification for all of these points if the supplementary information can still be presented clearly. Our recommended maximum data rate is 150 KB/s.

For more information please refer to our guidelines on submitting supplemental files.

Image integrity and standards

Images submitted with a manuscript for review should be minimally processed (for instance, to add arrows to a micrograph). Authors should retain their unprocessed data and metadata files, as Editors may request them to aid in manuscript evaluation. If unprocessed data is unavailable, manuscript evaluation may be stalled until the issue is resolved.

A certain degree of image processing is acceptable for publication, but the final image must correctly represent the original data and conform to community standards. The guidelines below will aid in accurate data presentation at the image processing level:

- Authors should list all image acquisition tools and image processing software packages used. Authors should document key image-gathering settings and processing manipulations in the Methods section.

- Images gathered at different times or from different locations should not be combined into a single image, unless it is stated that the resultant image is a product of time-averaged data or a time-lapse sequence. If juxtaposing images is essential, the borders should be clearly demarcated in the figure and described in the legend.

- Touch-up tools, such as cloning and healing tools in Photoshop, or any feature that deliberately obscures manipulations, is to be avoided.

- Processing (such as changing brightness and contrast) is appropriate only when it is applied equally across the entire image and is applied equally to controls. Contrast should not be adjusted so that data disappear. Excessive manipulations, such as processing to emphasise one region in the image at the expense of others (for example, through the use of a biased choice of threshold settings), are inappropriate, as is emphasizing experimental data relative to the control.

For gels and blots, positive and negative controls, as well as molecular size markers, should be included on each gel and blot – either in the main figure or an expanded data supplementary figure. The display of cropped gels and blots in the main paper is encouraged if it improves the clarity and conciseness of the presentation. In such cases, the cropping must be mentioned in the figure legend. At the revision stage, authors of manuscripts that contain cropped gels/blots must submit the original, uncropped image of each cropped gel/blot appearing in the manuscript (see 3.2 How to submit your revised manuscript).

- Vertically sliced gels that juxtapose lanes that were not contiguous in the experiment must have a clear separation or a black line delineating the boundary between the gels.

- Cropped gels in the paper must retain important bands.

- Cropped blots in the body of the paper should retain at least six band widths above and below the band.

- High-contrast gels and blots are discouraged, as overexposure may mask additional bands.

- Authors should strive for exposures with grey backgrounds. Immunoblots should be surrounded by a black line to indicate the borders of the blot, if the background is faint.

- For quantitative comparisons, appropriate reagents, controls and imaging methods with linear signal ranges should be used.

Microscopy adjustments should be applied to the entire image. Threshold manipulation, expansion or contraction of signal ranges and the altering of high signals should be avoided. If ‘pseudo-colouring’ and nonlinear adjustments (for example ‘gamma changes’) are used, this must be disclosed. Adjustments of individual colour channels are sometimes necessary on ‘merged’ images, but this should be noted in the figure legend. We encourage inclusion of the following with the final revised version of the manuscript for publication:

- In the Methods section, specify the type of equipment (microscopes/objective lenses, cameras, detectors, filter model and batch number) and acquisition software used. Although we appreciate that there is some variation between instruments, equipment settings for critical measurements should also be listed.

- The display lookup table (LUT) and the quantitative map between the LUT and the bitmap should be provided, especially when rainbow pseudo-colour is used. It should be stated if the LUT is linear and covers the full range of the data.

- Processing software should be named and manipulations indicated (such as type of deconvolution, three-dimensional reconstructions, surface and volume rendering, 'gamma changes', filtering, thresholding and projection).

- Authors should state the measured resolution at which an image was acquired and any downstream processing or averaging that enhances the resolution of the image.

The data will be published in the online version of JCBFM, or detailed information will be provided in the articles on how the data can be obtained.

Examples of data types include but are not limited to: statistical data files, replication code, text files, audio files, images, videos, appendices, and additional charts and graphs necessary to understand the original research. The Editors may also grant exceptions for data that cannot legally or ethically be released. All data submitted should comply with Institutional or Ethical Review Board requirements and applicable government regulations. For further information, please contact the Editorial Office.

• Complete list of authors, with their institutional affiliations.
• The author information you enter at submission must exactly match what is included on your manuscript and/or title page, including full names, academic affiliations, and corresponding author contact details.
• The listed affiliation should be the institution where the research was conducted. If an author has moved to a new institution since completing the research, the new affiliation can be included in a note at the end of the manuscript.
• All listed authors must meet the criteria for authorship (above).
• All persons eligible for authorship must be included at the time of submission.
• All authors must have given consent for the manuscript to be submitted in its current form.
• Keywords: During submission, you may be asked to select or enter keywords for your manuscript. These keywords are used to match appropriate reviewers to your manuscript.
• The number of figures, tables, and words in your manuscript.
• Funder information: Name, grant/award number.
• You may be required to enter your declaration of conflicting interest as part of the submission process, in addition to listing it on your manuscript and/or title page. Please have it on hand.

• If you have posted your manuscript to a preprint server, you will be asked to supply the DOI (this does not prohibit submission, but no changes should be made to the preprint version while your manuscript is under evaluation in this journal). Please see our guidelines on prior publication. If the article is accepted for publication, the author may re-use their work according to the journal's author archiving policy. If your manuscript is accepted, you must include a link in your preprint to the final version of your published article.

The following summary describes the peer review process for this journal:
Identity transparency: Single anonymised
Reviewer interacts with: Editor
Review information published: Reviewer identities (reviewer opt in)

JCBFM does not release reviewers' identities to authors, except when reviewers specifically ask to be identified.

We ask reviewers not to identify themselves to authors without the Editors' knowledge. If they wish to reveal their identities while the manuscript is under consideration, this should be done via the Editor; if this is not practicable, we ask authors to inform the Editor as soon as possible after the reviewer has revealed his or her identity. We deplore any attempt by authors to confront reviewers or try to determine their identities. Our own policy is to neither confirm nor deny any speculation about reviewers' identities, and we encourage reviewers to adopt a similar policy.

Upon accepting an invitation to evaluate a manuscript, reviewers must keep the manuscript and associated data confidential, and not redistribute them without the Journal’s permission. If a reviewer asks a colleague to assist in assessing a manuscript, confidentiality must be ensured and their names must be provided to the Journal with the final report.

Your manuscript will undergo an initial evaluation. If it does not conform to the requirements laid out in these guidelines, it will be returned to you for amendments prior to peer review. Manuscripts may be desk rejected without peer review at this point if they are out of scope for the journal or otherwise unsuitable.

After passing the initial evaluation, your manuscript will then be peer reviewed. You can log in at any time to check the status of your manuscript. We will notify you when a decision has been reached.

The journal adheres to an anonymized peer review process in which the reviewer’s name is routinely withheld from the author unless the reviewer requests a preference for their identity to be revealed.

To ensure the integrity of the peer review process we assign reviewers and cannot accept author recommendations.

All manuscripts are reviewed as rapidly as possible, while maintaining rigor. Reviewers make comments to the author and recommendations to the Editor-in-Chief and Associate Editors who then makes the final decision on all manuscripts, including those appearing in a special issue or special collection. The Editor or members of the Editorial Board may occasionally submit their own manuscripts for possible publication in the Journal. In these cases, the peer review process will be managed by alternative members of the Board and the submitting Editor/Board member will have no involvement in the decision-making process.

The journal relies on a strong crop of respected experts on its board who serve as external peer reviewers. Additionally, the journal receives support from a group of Consulting Editors and a Publication Committee. All three of these groups comprise the wider Editorial Boards. Each member of the Editorial Board are active researchers in the field and selected based on strict criteria, ensuring they possess the necessary expertise and experience. The Editor(s) may use one Editorial Board Member as a reviewer for each manuscript, and will then reach beyond this pool to include additional reviewers to meet the required number before a decision can be made. This ensures a comprehensive and robust peer review process, aligning with our commitment to publish the most credible and valid research. Care is taken not to invite any Editorial Board Member that has any potential conflict of interest with any author of the paper. 

As a COPE member we engage with multiple forms of post-publication discussion in line with wider guidance from Sage: Commentaries, Critiques and Responses.

You can view our complaints and appeals policy here.

Read Sage's complete peer review policy.

Plagiarism

The journal and Sage take issues of copyright infringement, plagiarism or other breaches of best practice in publication very seriously. Please read Sage's complete policy on plagiarism and the actions we may take.

JCBFM Express

JCBFM now makes articles that have been accepted following peer review available immediately on the Journal website, before they have gone through the production process at Sage. These accepted manuscripts are published within the Online First programme on Sage Journals Online upon peer review acceptance for publication and before copyediting, typesetting and other value added by the Editorial staff and Sage.

Contributor’s Publishing Agreement

Before publication, we require the author as the rights holder to sign a Journal Contributor’s Publishing Agreement. Sage’s Journal Contributor’s Publishing Agreement is an exclusive license agreement which means that the author retains copyright in the work but grants Sage the sole and exclusive right and license to publish for the full legal term of copyright. Exceptions may exist where an assignment of copyright is required or preferred by a proprietor other than Sage. In this case copyright in the work will be assigned from the author to the society. For more information please visit the Sage Journal Author Gateway.

Preprints

If your manuscript was posted on a preprint server prior to acceptance, you must include a link in your preprint to the final published version of your published article.

Production

Your Sage Production Editor will keep you informed as to your article’s progress throughout the production process. Proofs will be made available to the corresponding author via our editing portal, Sage Edit, or by email, and should be returned promptly to avoid delaying publication. Authors are reminded to check their proofs carefully to confirm that all author information, including names, affiliations, sequence, and contact details are correct, and that Funding and Conflict of Interest statements, if any, are accurate. This is the final opportunity to make changes to your manuscript. Further corrections will not be possible after publication. Changes to the author list are not permitted at this stage.

Publication

OnlineFirst publication: This enables us to publish final articles online immediately, without waiting for assignment to a future issue of the Journal. This usually significantly reduces publication lead time. Visit the Sage Journals help page for more details, including how to cite OnlineFirst articles.

Access to your published article: We provide you with online access to your published article and one print copy of the issue in which the article is published per contributor. The online access link is provided to the corresponding author for sharing with their co-authors.

Promoting your article

Publication is not the end of the process. Between us, we can ensure that your article is found, read, downloaded and cited as widely as possible. Many of the most effective tactics are those you can do quickly and easily to your network of contacts and peers. Visit the Promote Your Article page on the Sage Journal Author Gateway for numerous resources to help you promote your work.

The Sage Journal Author Gateway has some general advice on how to get published, plus links to further resources. Sage Author Services also offers authors a variety of ways to improve and enhance your article including English language editing, plagiarism detection, and video abstract and infographic preparation.

If you have any questions about publishing with Sage, please visit the Sage Journals Solutions Portal.

You can view our complaints and appeals procedure.

Contact us

You can direct any questions to the journal’s editorial office:

Journal of Cerebral Blood Flow and Metabolism Editorial Office: kknaustjcbfm@gmail.com.

For inquiries related to advertising, reprints or publishing a supplement, please contact the publisher’s office: UKAdvertising@sagepub.co.uk.