ISSN 0074-0276 printed version
ISSN 1678-8060 online version

INSTRUCTIONS TO AUTHORS

• Scope and policy
• Format style

The Memórias do Instituto Oswaldo Cruz is a multidisciplinary journal which publishes original research throughout the fields of tropical medicine (including pathology, field epidemiology and clinical studies) medical and veterinary parasitology (including protozoology, helminthology, entomology and malacology), and medical microbiology (virology, bacteriology and mycology). It particularly welcomes basic and applied research in biochemistry, immunology, molecular and cell biology, physiology, pharmacology and genetics related to these fields. Short communications are also considered. Review articles are invited. The journal publishes eight issues constituting one volume per year. Occasionally papers presented at symposia or congresses are published as supplements.

Submitted papers must be written in Portuguese or English. English of low quality is a major cause of delay in publication and we strongly advise authors with English as a foreign language to have their manuscripts checked by someone with English as a first language, preferably a scientist.

Submission of a paper to the Memórias is understood to imply that is has not previously been published (except in an abstract form), and that it is not being considered for publication elsewhere. Responsibility for the accuracy of the material in the manuscript, including bibliographic citations, lies entirely with the authors.

Manuscripts will be peer-reviewed; acceptance will be based on scientific content and presentation of the material.

Submission of manuscripts will only be accepted when submitted electronically using the following link: http://submission.scielo.br/index.php/mioc/login.

With this service you can submit manuscripts, you will be able to check the content of your submission, the electronic file will be used for editorial assessment and online refereeing, and the editorial decision on the manuscript will be communicated to you.

By using this service you will guarantee fast and safe submission of your manuscript, and speed the assessment process.

The manuscript should be prepared according to Author Guidelines

Authors submitting a manuscript do so on the understanding that if accepted for publication, copyright of the article, including the right to reproduce the article in all form and media, shall be assigned exclusively to the Memórias. The journal will not refuse any reasonable request by authors for permission to reproduce any contribution.

For other instructions the authors should consult and follow the most recent number of the Memórias or consult the home-page of the Memórias (http://memorias.ioc.fiocruz.br/), or contact the Editorial Office by phones (+55-21-2598.4335/2561-1442), Fax (+55-21-2280.5048), or e-mails (memorias@fiocruz.br /memorias@ioc.fiocruz.br).

The manuscript should be prepared using standard word processing software and should be printed (font size 12) double-spaced throughout the text, figure captions, and references, with margins of at least 3 cm. The figures should come in the extension tiff, with a minimum resolution of 300 dpi. Tables and figures should come in separate documents.
The manuscript should be arranged in the following order:

Running title: with up to 40 characters (letters and spaces)

Title: with up to 250 characters

Author's names: without titles or graduations

Intitutional affiliations: full address of the corresponding author only

Summary: up to 200 words (100 words in case of short communications). It should emphasize new and important aspects of the study or observations.

Key words: 3-6 items must be provided. Terms from the Medical Subject Headings (Mesh) list of Index Medicus should be used.

Sponsorships: indicating the sources of financial support and change of address

Introduction: should set the purpose of the study, give a brief summary (not a review) of previous relevant works, and state what new advance has been made in the investigation. It should not include data or conclusions from the work being reported.

Materials and Methods: should briefly give clear and sufficient information to permit the study to be repeated by others. Standard techniques need only be referenced.

Ethics: when reporting experiments on human subjects, indicate whether the procedures followed were in accordance with the ethical standards of the responsible committee on human experimentation (institutional or regional) and with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975, as revised in 1983. When reporting experiments on animals, indicate whether the institution's or a national research council's guide for, or any national law on the care and use of laboratory animals was followed.

Results: should be a concise account of the new information discovered, with the least personal judgement. Do not repeat in text all the data in the tables and illustrations.

Discussion: should be limited to the significance of the new information and relate the new findings to existing knowledge. Only unavoidable citations should be included.

Acknowledgements: should be short and concise, and restricted to those absolutely necessary.

References: must be accurate. Only citations that appear in the text should be referenced. Unpublished papers, unless accepted for publication, should not be cited. Work accepted for publication should be referred to as "in press" and a letter of acceptance of the journal must be provided. Unpublished data should only be cited in the text as "unpublished observations", and a letter of permission from the author must be provided. The references at the end of the paper should be arranged in alphabetic order according to the surname of the first author.

The titles of journals should be abbreviated according to the style used in the Index Medicus. Consult:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db=journals&TabCmd=Limits

• In the text use authors' surname and date:
Lutz (1910) or (Lutz 1910)

With two authors it is:
(Lutz & Neiva 1912) or Lutz and Neiva (1912)

When there are more than two authors, only the first is mentioned:
Lutz et al. (1910) or (Lutz et al. 1910).

• At the end of the paper use the following styles:
Journal article
Chagas C, Villela E 1922. Forma cardiaca da tripanosomiase americana. Mem Inst Oswaldo Cruz 14: 15-61.

Book and Thesis
Forattini OP 1973. Entomologia Médica. Psychodidae, Phlebotominae, Leishmaniose, Bartonelose, Vol. IV, Edgard Blucher, São Paulo, 658 pp.

Morel CM 1983. Genes and Antigens of Parasites. A Laboratory Manual, 2nd ed., Fundação Oswaldo Cruz, Rio de Janeiro, xxii + 580 pp.

Mello-Silva CC 2005. Controle alternativo e alterações fisiológicas em Biomphalaria glabrata (Say, 1818), hospedeiro intermediário de Schistosoma mansoni Sambom, 1907 pela ação do látex de Euphorbia splendens var. hislopii N.E.B (Euphorbiaceae), PhD Thesis, Universidade Federal Rural do Rio de Janeiro, Seropédica, 85 pp.

Chapter in book
Cruz OG 1911. The prophylaxis of malaria in central and southern Brasil. In R Ross, The Prevention of Malaria, John Murray, London, p. 390-398.

Journal article on the Internet
Abood S. Quality improvement initiative in nursing homes: the ANA acts in an advisory role. Am J Nurs [serial on the Internet]. 2002 Jun [cited 2002 Aug 12];102(6):[about 3 p.]. Available from:
http://www.nursingworld.org/AJN/2002/june/Wawatch.htm

Monograph on the Internet
Foley KM, Gelband H, editors. Improving palliative care for cancer [monograph on the Internet]. Washington: National Academy Press; 2001 [cited 2002 Jul 9]. Available from: http://www.nap.edu/books/0309074029/html/.

Homepage/Web site
Cancer-Pain.org [homepage on the Internet]. New York: Association of Cancer Online Resources, Inc.; c2000-01 [updated 2002 May 16; cited 2002 Jul 9]. Available from: http://www.cancer-pain.org/.

Part of a homepage/Web site
American Medical Association [homepage on the Internet]. Chicago: The Association; c1995-2002 [updated 2001 Aug 23; cited 2002 Aug 12]. AMA Office of Group Practice Liaison; [about 2 screens]. Available from:
http://www.ama-assn.org/ama/pub/category/1736.html

DATABASE ON THE INTERNET

Open database:
Who's Certified [database on the Internet]. Evanston (IL): The American Board of Medical Specialists. c2000 - [cited 2001 Mar 8]. Available from: http://www.abms.org/newsearch.asp

Closed database:
Jablonski S. Online Multiple Congenital Anomaly/Mental Retardation (MCA/MR) Syndromes [database on the Internet]. Bethesda (MD): National Library of Medicine (US). c1999 [updated 2001 Nov 20; cited 2002 Aug 12]. Available from: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/mesh/jablonski/syndrome_title.html

Part of a database on the Internet
MeSH Browser [database on the Internet]. Bethesda (MD): National Library of Medicine (US); 2002 - [cited 2003 Jun 10]. Meta-analysis; unique ID: D015201; [about 3 p.]. Available from:
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/mesh/MBrowser.html Files updated weekly. Updated June 15, 2005

• Illustrations: figures and tables must be understandable without reference to the text.

- Figures presented in tiff format with a minimum of 300 dpi and photographs must be sharply focused, well contrasted, and if mounted onto a plate, the figures should be numbered consecutively with Arabic numbers. Magnification must be indicated by a line or bar in the figure, and referenced, if necessary in the caption (e.g., bar = 1 mm). Plates and line figures should either fit one column (8 cm) or the full width (16.5 cm) of the page and should be shorter than the page length to allow inclusion of the legend. Letters and numbers on figures should be of a legible size upon reduction or printing. A colour photograph illustrates the cover of each issue of the Journal and authors are invited to submit illustrations with legends from their manuscript for consideration for the cover.

- Tables should supplement, not duplicate, the text and should be numbered with Roman numerals. A short descriptive title should appear above each table, with any explanations or footnotes (identified with a, b, c, etc.) below.

•Short communications: should communicate rapidly single results or techniques. They should occupy no more than three printed pages including figures and/or tables. They should not contain excessive references. References should be cited at the end of the paper using the same format as in full papers. A brief summary and three key words must be provided.

• Alternative format: manuscripts may be submitted following the "Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals" produced by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors also known as the Vancouver Style. In this case, authors should follow the guidelines in the fifth edition (Annals of Internal Medicine 1997; 126: 36-47, or at the website http://www.acponline.org/journals/resource/unifreqr/htm) and will be responsible for modifying the manuscript where it differs from the instructions given here, if the manuscript is accepted for publication.
Authors should also follow the Uniform Requirements for any guidelines that are omitted in these Instructions.

Once a paper is accepted for publication, the authors must provide:

• an affidavit, provided by the Editorial Office, signed by all authors. Authors from different countries or institutions may sign in different sheets containing the same basic statement;
• a copyright assignment form, provided by the Editorial Office, signed by the corresponding author.
•Page charges: there will be no page charges.
•Proofs: one set of page proofs will be supplied for the author to check for typesetting accuracy, to be returned by the stipulated date. No changes to the original manuscript will be allowed at this stage.