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Author Guidelines

The guidelines for authors are based on the CSE's White Paper on Promotion Integrity in Scientific Journal Publications (2012 Update) CSE's White Paper on Promotion Integrity in Scientific Journal Publications and ICMJE Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals, December 2019.

The editorial board of MIR Journal is committed to promoting wide international coverage of advances in microbiology and increasing the availability of published materials. To achieve this goal, all articles are published in English and are available in open access on the journal’s website.

One of the main goals of MIR journal is to increase the number of publications by Russian scientists in English in order to make them accessible to the world scientific community.

The journal accepts manuscripts from graduate students, Ph.D. students, specialists and experts in the fields of virology, bacteriology, mycology, and drug discovery.

I. Recommendations for the author before submitting a manuscript

Submission of a manuscript for publication to the MIR Journal implies that:

• the article has not been previously published in another journal;
• the article is not under consideration in another journal;
• all co-authors agree with the publication of the current version of the article.

Before submitting a manuscript for consideration, make sure that the file(s) contains all the necessary information in Russian and English, that the sources of information presented in the figures and tables are referenced, and that all references are given in the correct format.

The editors of the MIR Journal recommend authors to use the following checklists and schemes developed by international health organizations:

• when preparing original manuscripts and other materials – EQUATOR, Enhancing the Quality and Transparency of Health Research;
• when preparing articles that discuss the results of randomized clinical trials – CONSORT 2010 checklist of information to include when reporting a randomized trial;
• when preparing articles presenting the results of non-experimental studies – The Strengthening the Reporting of Observational Studies in Epidemiology (STROBE) Statement: guidelines for reporting observational studies;
• when preparing systematic reviews – PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses);
• when preparing articles that describe clinical case studies – The CARE Guidelines: Consensus-based Clinical Case Reporting Guideline Development;
• when preparing articles presenting the results of qualitative research –SRQR (Standards for reporting qualitative research);
• when preparing articles presenting the results of predictive research – STARD 2015: An Updated List of Essential Items for Reporting Diagnostic Accuracy Studies.

Language policy

Manuscripts are accepted for publication both in Russian and in English. Articles written in English are published only in the original language (in American spelling). Abstracts of these articles are translated into Russian and are published on the Russian-language web page of the journal website. All articles submitted in Russian, after reviewing and acceptance for publication, are translated into English with proofreading by a native English speaker. Both the Russian and English versions of the article are assigned a DOI index. Both versions are posted on the corresponding web pages of the journal website in open access.

Letter to the editor

The article submitted to the journal must be accompanied by a letter to the editor, which should reflect the following aspects:

• The manuscript corresponds to the scope of the MIR Journal.
• All authors agree with the publication and approve the manuscript.
• The results have not been published elsewhere and the manuscript has not been submitted to another journal.
• Conflict of Interest Statement: Authors are solely responsible for resolving all financial conflicts between themselves or with any third party.

Article types

The journal accepts for publication editorial articles, original research articles, short communications, reviews, mini-reviews, case studies and reports, clinical trials reports, hypotheses, and comments.

The research article should describe a completed research and include the following sections: Abstract, Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, Discussion, Acknowledgments, Conflicts of Interest, Citations, Copyright, and References. The research article should not exceed 7000 words, including a list of references, tables, and figure captions.

The short communication should briefly describe a completed study and include the following sections: Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results and Discussion, Acknowledgments, Conflicts of Interest, Citations, Copyright, and References. The short communication should not exceed 3000 words, including a list of references, tables, and figure captions.

Reviews are published by invitation of the editorial board or by the initiative of the author. The maximum volume of the review corresponds to the maximum volume of the research article.

Article format

Manuscripts submitted to the MIR Journal must be in the format approved by the editorial board.

For details on the language of the publication, see the Language Policy section. The text including the names of tables and figures and captions under the tables and figures should be written using the 12 points Arial or Times New Roman font with double line spacing.

Pages should be A4 (210 x 297 mm) format. All the symbols that are used in the manuscript should be available in Microsoft Office Word documents. All pages, including the first one, should be numbered. Tables and figures captions should correspond to the references to them.

Only at the initial submission of the manuscript, in order to facilitate peer review process, figure captions should be placed right after the corresponding figure. In the final edition, when the manuscript is accepted for publication, figure captions are placed after the list of references.

The title of each subsection should be in bold.

It is recommended to use the past tense to describe the results. Generally accepted facts and conclusions should be written in the present tense.

The following should be placed on the title page of the article:

i. Name(s) of the author(s)

Authors are individuals identified by the research team as key contributors to the work presented in the manuscript and who have agreed to take responsibility for their work. In addition to being responsible for his/her part of the work, the author should be able to point out who from his co-authors is responsible for other parts of the work.

The activities that prevent a research participant from being recognized as an author of the manuscript include: search for the project funding, general leadership of the research team, general administrative support, assistance in the manuscript writing, technical editing, scientific editing and proofreading of the manuscript. An author identified as a corresponding author is responsible for obtaining written permission from all contributors mentioned in the Acknowledgments section.

If, after accepting the manuscript for publication, it becomes necessary to change the list of the authors, a letter should be sent to the editorial board of the journal with an explanation of the reason for this change. The main responsibility for the exchange of information with the journal’s editorial board in the process of submitting, reviewing and publishing an article lies on the corresponding author. The corresponding author is responsible for submitting all required documents, including ethics committee approval, clinical trial registration documents, and conflict of interest statements. The corresponding author is also responsible for responding in a timely manner to critical comments on the article that arise after its publication.

The MIR Journal accepts the following criteria for authorship:

1. Substantial contributions to study design and experimental design, data collection, or data analysis and interpretation.
2. Preparation of an article or its critical revision in terms of meaningful intellectual content.
3. Final approval of the version of the article for publication.

The list of authors does not include persons who are not the authors of the article. The names of individuals who are not the authors, but provided other support, are listed in the Acknowledgments section.

When listing the authors of the article, first name comes first, then the middle name initial (when available) follows, followed the last name/surname (Peter S. Ivanov). The last name in English should be written using the spelling used in previously published papers in English. If the author does not have any publications, the BSI standard must be used to transliterate the first and last names.

ii. Information about the author(s)

This section lists titles, positions and degrees. It also contains the e-mail and full postal address of the corresponding author, with whom members of the editorial board can correspond. The name of this author should be marked with a sign (#).

iii. Affiliation of the author(s)

Affiliation includes the following: full official name of the organization, full postal address (including postal code, city and country). Authors are required to list all the workplaces related to conducting the research study.

If authors from different institutions participated in the preparation of the article, it is necessary to indicate the affiliation of each author to a specific institution using a superscript index.

iv. Article title

The title should fully correspond to the meaning of the research study described in the article.

Additionally, it is necessary to provide the short title (no more than 50 characters).

v. Abstract

The article is accompanied by an Abstract. The Abstract of the paper must reflect its main content and cannot exceed 250 words. It should be clear, complete and contain the main findings of the study.

vi. Keywords

5-7 words corresponding to the topic of the article. It is desirable that the keywords complement the abstract and title of the article.

vii. Acknowledgments

In this section, all sources of funding for the study are listed. Also, in this section, thanks are given to the persons who participated in the research study described in the article and in the preparation of the manuscript, but are not the authors of the article. This implies such activities as recommendations for improving the research, providing space for research, departmental control, obtaining financial support, conducting certain types of analysis, providing reagents / patients / animals / other materials for the research as well as assistance in the manuscript writing, technical editing, scientific editing and proofreading of the manuscript.

vii. Conflicts of interest

Conflicts of interest are conditions that lead to authors having conflicting or competing interests that can influence their editorial decisions. Conflicts of interest can be potential or perceived, as well as real. Personal, political, financial, scientific or religious factors can influence the objectivity of the assessment of the conflict.

A conflict of interest arises when professional judgment is influenced by financial gain. Financial benefits may include, but are not limited to, employment, consulting, shareholding and additional opportunities, royalties, patents, paid expertise, etc. Authors should avoid entering into agreements with research project sponsors that prevent access to any research data or the ability to analyze and interpret the data.

Submitting the manuscript, authors are responsible for disclosing any financial and personal relationships that may cause any conflict of interest. Authors should describe sources of support for the project, including the names of sponsors and their role in planning the study, as well as in collecting, analyzing and interpreting data and writing the manuscript. If the personnel of the supporting organizations are not involved in the research process, then a corresponding statement should be provided.

corresponding author should sign the Conflict of Interest Disclosure Form developed by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors ICMJE http://www.icmje.org/disclosure-of-interest/

The authors are obliged to notify the editor of a real or potential conflict of interest by including information about the conflict of interest in the appropriate section of the article.

If there is no conflict of interest, the author should also declare this. An example of the wording for this declaration: "The author declares no conflicts of interest."

Article text

The journal adopted the IMRAD format (Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion)

Introduction. The Introduction section should contain background information on the problem under study. At the end of the Introduction, a working hypothesis or purpose of the research study should be stated. Research findings should not be included in the Introduction section.

Materials and methods. In the Materials and Methods section all materials, methods and experimental conditions used in the research study should be described so that they can be reproduced by other scientists. If the method is known and has been described in other publications, then a reference on the published method description should be provided. If the previously published method has been modified, all the changes should be described in detail. The name, purity and manufacturer of all reagents as well as the name and manufacturer of the equipment should be given. When describing centrifugation conditions, centrifuge model, rotor model and acceleration (g) should be given. All microbial and viral strains used in the study should be named according to the currently used and internationally accepted taxonomic classification system. All chemicals should be named according to the rules of nomenclature of the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC). If the article describes any animal experiments or clinical studies involving humans, then all appropriate approvals should be given. The date of issue and the registration number for the approval of the study by the local ethics committee should also be given in the Materials and Methods section.

Results. All experimentally discovered facts should be given in the Results section. This section may contain subsections according to the study design. The number of repetitions of the experiments, the number of replicas or the number of animals at each time point should be given.

A complete statistical analysis should be submitted, including the used software and the likelihood. Extensive interpretation and discussion of the results should be avoided in this section. All tables and figures should be numbered and the references to them should be in the text.

Discussion. The main topic of discussion is the interpretation of the results in accordance with the latest published data. Duplication of results in the Discussion section should be avoided. In Short Communications the results and discussion should be combined in one section (Results and Discussion).

Drawings and other illustrations

MIR Journal accepts uncompressed high-resolution images in black and white or color composed of lines and text in TIFF or EPS format (900-1200 dpi); photographs, which contains no text in TIFF (300 dpi); images containing halftone and text or line art elements in TIFF, and EPS formats (500-900 dpi). The minimum resolution is 300 dpi. More detailed instructions on formatting graphic images can be found on the website: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/pub/filespec-images/#fig-format

References to figures should be given as follows: “In Fig. 3 it is shown that ... “ or “It is shown that ... (Fig. 3)”. If there is only one figure in the text, then it should not be numbered.

Each figure must be accompanied by a title and a separate caption that discloses the contents of the figure, so that there is no need to refer to the Materials and Methods section. All symbols on the picture should be explained in the caption to it. All titles and captions to the figures in the submitted manuscript should be located in the text after the References and tables. When submitting the manuscript, the figures should not be included in the main text and should be submitted as separate files.

It is recommended to use only one type of font for each illustration. Graphic files should not contain wide margins.

Important: at the initial submission of the manuscript, in order to facilitate reviewing, figures with their titles and captions are uploaded in PDF format. After the manuscript is accepted for publishing in the final version of the manuscript, the figures are uploaded as separate files in TIFF or EPS format in good quality without titles and captions; titles and captions should be located in the text of the article after the References and tables in the order in which the corresponding figures are mentioned in the text of the manuscript.

Footnotes

Footnotes are numbered in Arabic numerals and placed page by page. Footnotes may contain: links to anonymous sources on the Internet, references to textbooks, teaching aids, state standards, statistical reports, articles in newspapers and magazines, dissertations (if it is not possible to cite the articles published as a result of the corresponding research), author's comments.

Tables

At the initial submission of the manuscript, the tables should be placed after the References. Tables should be numbered with Arabic numerals and accompanied by appropriate headings. Column headings should be as concise as possible. Tables created in Microsoft Excel are not accepted; they must be in the Microsoft Word format. The table can contain notes marked with superscript letter indexes (for example: a, b, c ...). Explanations for each letter index should be placed below the table.

Proteins, amino acid sequences, or nucleotide sequences

All new protein or nucleotide sequences presented in the manuscript must be submitted to one of the international depositories and have the corresponding registration number. In the manuscript such sequences should be presented as figures.

Acknowledgments

The Acknowledgments section should list all the sources of financial support for the research project. In addition, all acknowledgments of personal support and assistance are given in this section.

References

The journal uses the Vancouver citation format, which implies a reference to the source in square brackets in the text and the subsequent description of sources in the References section in the order of their appearance in the text.

Reference numbers for published papers should be given in square brackets in the order of their appearance in the text. The References section should include all the sources mentioned in the text: articles, books, patents, web documents. The description of the sources in the References section should contain the names of all authors with their initials, the title of the article, the abbreviation of the journal, year, volume, first and last page, and DOI. If there are more than six authors, the names of the first six authors should be given followed by "et al.". Journal abbreviations should match their spelling in the PubMed Journal Database.

The list of references should include only peer-reviewed sources (articles from scientific journals and monographs) that are mentioned in the text of the manuscript.

It is undesirable to include dissertations, textbooks, teaching aids, state standards, information from websites, statistical reports, and articles in newspapers, and blogs in the list of references. If such information needs to be cited, the source information should be included in a footnote.

References to manuscripts that have been submitted for publication, but have not been accepted for publication yet, should be given in the text and indicated as unpublished data, but should not be included in the References section. References to conference proceedings should be given in brackets and also should not be included in the References section. The References section should not contain any text in italics or bold.

References to Russian sources are provided both in Russian and in English translation.

Below are some examples of the references:

Articles

1. Collins PL, Wertz GW. cDNA cloning and transcriptional mapping of nine polyadenylylated RNAs encoded by the genome of human respiratory syncytial virus. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 1983; 80(11), 3208-12.
2. Sigurs N, Bjarnason R, Sigurbergsson F, Kjellman B. Respiratory syncytial virus bronchiolitis in infancy is an important risk factor for asthma and allergy at age 7. Am J Respir Crit Care Med 2000; 161(5), 1501-7. doi: 10.1164/ajrccm.161.5.9906076.
3. 3. Карпова ЛС, Ишкина ЕР, Столяров КА, Поповцева НМ, Столярова ТП, Забайкин АВ. Смертность от соматических и инфекционных заболеваний и ее корреляция с заболеваемостью гриппом иОРВИ населения Санкт-Петербурга (2004-2010гг.). Эпидемиология и вакцинопрофилактика 2012; 4(65), 29-36. [Karpova LS, Ishkina ER, Stolyarov KA, Popovtseva NM, Stolyarova TP, Zabaykin AV. Mortality from infectious and somatic diseases and its correlation with the incidence of influenza and ARVI for the population of St. Petersburg (2004-2010). Epidemiologiya i vaktsinoprophilaktika 2012; 4(65), 29-36. doi: 10.1007/s12250-011-3203-z. (In Russian)].

Websites

Recommended composition of influenza virus vaccines for use in the 2012-2013 Northern hemisphere influenza season. Available: www.who.int/influenza/vaccines/virus

Books

Bates B. Bargaining for life: A social history of tuberculosis. 1st ed. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press; 1992.

Chapters from books

Lindenbach BD, Murray CL, Thiel H-J, Rice CM. Flaviviridae: The Viruses and Their Replication. Chapter 26 in D. M. Knipe et al. (eds.), Fields Virology, 6th Edition. Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, New York, NY. 2013

Supporting information

The essential supporting files and multimedia files can be submitted along with the manuscript, which will be subject to peer review.

II. How to submit an article for publication

The manuscript should be sent to the editor using the corresponding link on the journal website: https://www.mir-journal.org/jour/author

The file with the manuscript that is uploaded to the journal website should be in the Microsoft Word format (have the *.doc or *.docx extension).

It is also possible to send the manuscript directly to the editor e-mail address: editor@mir-journal.org.

III. Interaction between the editorial office of the journal and the author of the manuscript

The editorial office of the journal maintains correspondence with the corresponding author, however, e-mail messages could be sent to all authors who have their e-mail addresses listed in the manuscript, if the team of authors wishes to do so. All manuscripts submitted to MIR Journal are pre-checked by the executive secretary of the journal for compliance with formal requirements. At this stage, the manuscript could be returned to the author(s) for revision with a request to correct errors or add missing data. Also at this stage, the manuscript may be rejected due to mismatch with the scope of the journal, lack of originality, and low scientific value.

After a preliminary check, the editor-in-chief submits the article to the reviewers, setting up the time frame of the review. An appropriate notification is sent to the corresponding author.

In controversial cases, several specialists as well as the editor-in-chief could be involved in the peer review process.

After at least two positive reviews are received for the manuscript, it is passed to the editor for the preparation for publication.

When it is necessary to revise the manuscript, all the comments and commentaries of the reviewers are sent to the corresponding author. The authors are given 2-4 weeks to revise the manuscript. If during this period the authors have not notified the editorial office of the planned actions, the manuscript is removed from the queue for publication.

When a decision is made to decline the manuscript publication, the corresponding decision of editor-in-chief is sent to the corresponding author.

If the manuscript is accepted for publication, the final version of the manuscript layout is sent to the corresponding author for review. A response is expected from the corresponding author within 2 days. In the absence of a response from the corresponding author, the layout of the manuscript is considered approved.

IV. Procedure for revising decisions of the editor / reviewer

If the author(s) does not agree with the conclusion of the reviewer and/or editor or with their particular comments, he/she can challenge the decision. To do this, the author needs:

• correct the manuscript according to reasonable comments from the reviewers and editors;
• clearly state his/her position on the issues in dispute.

The editors promote resubmission of manuscripts that could potentially be accepted, but were rejected due to the need for significant changes or additional data collection, and are ready to explain in detail to the corresponding author what needs to be corrected in the manuscript in order for it to be accepted for publication.

V. Actions of the editors in case of detection of plagiarism, fabrication or falsification of data

In case of revelation of unfair behavior on the part of the author(s), detection of plagiarism, fabrication or falsification of data, the editors proceed according to the COPE rules.

By unfair behavior, MIR Journal recognizes any actions of a scientist, including improper handling of objects of study or deliberate manipulation of scientific information, that lead to incorrect observation of phenomena and wrong conclusions, as well as the behavior of a scientist that does not meet accepted ethical and scientific standards.

MIR Journal does not classify as unfair conduct the honest error or honest discrepancy in the design, conduct of experiments, interpretation, or evaluation of research methods or results, or any unfair conduct not related to the scientific process.

VI. Correction of errors and revocation of the published article

If errors are found in the text of the published article that affect its perception, but do not distort the stated research results, they can be corrected by replacing the PDF file of the article and indicating the error in the article file itself and on the corresponding page on the journal website.

If errors are found in the text of the article that distort the results of the research, or in the case of plagiarism, the discovery of unfair behavior of the author(s) associated with falsification and/or fabrication of data, the article may be withdrawn. The revocation of an article can be initiated by the editorial board, the author, an organization, or an individual.

The withdrawn article is marked with the sign "Article withdrawn", the information about the reason for the withdrawal of the article is published on the article webpage. Information about the revocation of the article is sent to the databases in which the journal is indexed.

Submission Preparation Checklist

As part of the submission process, authors are required to check off their submission's compliance with all of the following items, and submissions may be returned to authors that do not adhere to these guidelines.

1. The manuscripts are accepted if has not been published or submitted for publication elsewhere.

2. The materials should be prepared in a format OpenOffice, Microsoft Word, RTF, or World Perfect.

3. Internet links are provided as a complete URL. 

4. Text should be typed with an interval of one and a half line spacing, font Times New Roman, 14 pt; to highlight the accents it is recommended to use italics rather than underlining (except Internet links). All images, graphics and tables are placed within the text according to the meaning of the particular part of text  (and not at the end of the document).

5. Text should follow the stylistic and bibliography requirements as stated in  Regulations  located in the Part "About Us." 

6. Please, remove the authors' names from the title of the article and other parts of the document to ensure the  anonymity of reviewing.

Copyright Notice

The authors who publish papers in this journal agree to the following:

1. The authors retain the copyright for the paper and grant the journal the right to first publish the paper under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International Public License (CC BY-NC-SA), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, as long as the material is not used for commercial purposes, provided that the original author and source are cited.
2. The authors reserve the right to enter into separate contractual agreements regarding the non-exclusive distribution of the version of the paper published here (for example, placing it in the institution's repository, publication in a book), with the reference to its original publication in this journal.
3. Authors have the right to post their manuscript on the Internet (for example in open-access repository of electronic preprints, in an institute repository or personal website) before and during the review process by this journal, as this may lead to productive discussion and more references to this work (See The Effect of Open Access).

Privacy Statement

Specified when registering the names and addresses will be used solely for technical purposes of a contact with the Author or reviewers (editors) when preparing the article for publication. Private data will not be shared with other individuals and organizations.