ISSN 2446-4732 printed version
ISSN 2446-4740 online version

INSTRUCTIONS TO AUTHORS

• Scope and Policy
• Form and preparation of manuscripts
• Send of the manuscripts

Research on Biomedical Engineering (RBE) is the official journal of the Brazilian Society of Biomedical Engineering and is dedicated to publishing research in all fields of Biomedical Engineering. In addition, this journal aims to provide educational material and professional updating, as well as serving as a forum for the establishment of developing policies and incorporation of health technologies by the public or private sectors.

RBE is an English-language journal and publishes original research, reviews, technical communications and letters to the editor on current topics in all fields of Biomedical Engineering. Prospective authors should follow the general instructions given below. Submission of a manuscript implies that it has not been published or is currently under consideration for publication elsewhere. Form more information please contact the editorial office.

Submitted articles will be subjected to peer review, ensuring the excellence of the researches published by RBE. The submitted manuscript is always considered a confidential document. Therefore, during review, no one is allowed to share the manuscript without the explicit permission of the Editor, who should ask for the permission of the authors, if necessary.

For an in-depth review, at least two referees are consulted and their identity will not be disclosed. The reviewers’ comments and recommendation will be shared only with the authors, and possibly with other reviewers and the Editorial Board of RBE. Articles accepted for publication become the property of the journal.

The Journal adopts iThenticate system for identifying plagiarism.

Manuscript Categories

Research on Biomedical Engineering encourages submissions of Original articles, Reviews, Technical communications and Letters to the editor, written in English.

Original articles

These articles describe significant methods and results of original research and developments in the area.

Reviews

Review articles should cover themes that are relevant to the area, describing the state of the art with a critical view of recent developments and/or introducing original points of view – they should not be limited to a simple review of the literature. The submission of this type of article must be made upon invitation or previous consult to the Editor-in-Chief.

Technical communication

Technical communications are considered important tools for disseminating ingenious solutions for design, maintenance, experimental techniques and applied informatics. While not considered as a full scientific article, a technical communication allows readers to benefit from the ingenuity and creativity of the authors.

Letters to the editor

Those letters normally should contain comments or discussion of previously published papers or other topics of interest to the community. Whenever necessary, we shall give the opportunity to authors, organizations or individuals, mentioned in the letter, to respond. The letters are not submitted to peer review and are published at the discretion of the Editorial Board.

Peer Review

Manuscripts submitted in the first three categories (Original Articles, Reviews and Technical Communications) are reviewed by at least two expert consultants, chosen by the associate editor appointed for each article. In addition to the reviewers, the Editor may issue comments and criticism regarding the style and/or the content of the manuscript.
Upon submission of the revised manuscript, authors must provide responses to all of the reviewers’ and editor’s comments and recommendations on a point-to-point basis.

Language

Manuscripts must be submitted in English.

Clear English phrasing is mandatory for review and publication.

The authors are the sole responsible for the contents of the text, including the appropriate use of English language, which is a requirement for review and publication. Submitted manuscripts may be turned out or rejected for poor use of language.

For nonnative speakers, professional English editing services may help improve the presentation of the manuscript prior to journal submission and publication. Examples of such external professional services (not excluding others) are: American Journal Experts (www.journalexperts.com); Scribendi (www.scribendi.com); Nature Publishing Groups Language Editing (https://languageediting.nature.com/login); Enago (http://www.enago.com.br); Edanz (http://www.edanzediting.com/); Editage (http://www.editage.com.br/). Authors are free to use the service that best suits their needs.

Even when external services are used, the sole and final responsibility regarding the manuscript contents remains with the authors.

Manuscript Preparation

• Manuscripts must be posted in a single ".doc", ".docx" or ".rtf" file, containing the main text, references, figures and tables.
• Adjust paper size to A4, margins 2.0 cm, single column, double spaced and Times New Roman font-size 12.
• All pages and lines must be numbered continuously.
• Manuscripts must begin with a front page containing: title of the article, full names and addresses (department, faculty, university, city and country) of all authors, full address and email of the corresponding author, and a running title (short title).
• Please use no more than three heading sublevels (unnumbered). Some examples of heading formats are:
• Heading level 1: Times New Roman, 12pt, bold.
• Heading level 2: Times New Roman, 12pt, bold, italic.
• Heading level 3: Times New Roman, 12pt, italic.
• Figures and Tables must be numbered as they appear in the text and come, in the body of the text, immediately after being cited for the first time. Legends must contain all relevant information, including the definition of all abbreviations used in the figure or table, independent of their previous definition in the manuscript text. You may use lower resolution figures in the body of the text, as long as they can be read accurately. However, when submitting your manuscript, you must also submit the figures in a separated file with at least 300 dpi resolution.
• When using previously published illustrations, authors should upload permission for reproduction from the copyright owner of the original source during submission of the manuscript.
• Metric units (System of International Units - SI) must be used for equations, figures, tables and throughout the text.
• Equations must be numbered consecutively, e.g. (1), (2), (3a), (3b), and justified to the right.

Letters to the editor

Although there is no specific format for those letters, they may be edited for clarity or length at the editor´s discretion. Manuscripts must be limited to 4 pages of text, including references, but not figures and tables (limited to 2).

Reviews

These manuscripts must be structured as follows:

1. Front page: as described above;
2. Abstract: provide a concise presentation of no more than 250 words, in a single paragraph, followed by three to six keywords. Do not use references, footnotes and undefined abbreviations. The abstract must be written in structured format, according to the main headings of the text (e.g. “Introduction”, “Methods” and “Discussion”);
3. Review: the main body of the text can be divided in headings, subheadings and paragraph titles at the discretion of the authors. However, the final structure may be adjusted by the editorial board, if necessary;
4. Acknowledgment: please include financial support; and
5. References: see below for reference and citation styles.

Original articles and Technical communications

Original articles must be limited to 25 pages, including the references. Figures and tables must be limited to 8.

These manuscripts must be structured as follows:

1. Front page: as described above;
2. Abstract: provide a concise presentation of no more than 250 words, in a single paragraph, and followed by three to six keywords. Do not use references, footnotes and undefined abbreviations. The abstract must be written in a structured format, according to the following headings: “Introduction”, “Methods”, “Results” and “Conclusion”;
3. Introduction: describe the subject of investigation, with a brief review of the literature, showing how it relates to other studies in the field, along with the objectives of the work;
4. Methods: give clear and sufficient information to allow other researchers to replicate the work;
5. Results: present the results clearly, including the results of the statistical analysis when applicable;
6. Discussion: the discussion should present a critical analysis of the new findings in the light of existing knowledge and available literature. Repeating information provided earlier should be avoided. The limitations of the study and its implications should be provided here. This section should be concluded with the major scientific contribution of work and its relevance to the current state of the art.
7. Acknowledgments: please include financial support; and
8. References: see below for reference and citation styles.

References and Citations

Research on Biomedical Engineering adopts a style based on the standards of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) - http://www.nlm.nih.gov/bsd/uniform_requirements.html - for references.

List of references

Only citations that appear in the text should be referenced.

The list of references should be arranged in alphabetical order according to the surname of the first author. In case of more than one paper of the same first author and the same year, distinguish them with a lowercase letter after the year (2010a, 2010b). The surnames of all the authors are listed if six or fewer, followed by their initials, and, if there are more than six authors, only the first six authors are listed followed by ‘et al.’. Journal titles should be written in abbreviated form. 

Format of the references

Some examples:

Journal article

Author(s). Article title. Journal Title. Year of Publication; Volume(Issue):page numbers.

Moraes MC, Furuie SS. An approach to automatically segment the media-adventitia borders in IVUS. Rev Bras Eng Biomed. 2010; 26(3):219-33.

Hallal AH, Amortegui JD, Jeroukhimov IM, Casillas J, Schulman CI, Manning RJ, et al. Magnetic resonance cholangiopancreatography accurately detects common bile duct stones in resolving gallstone pancreatitis. J Am Coll Surg. 2005; 200(6):869-75.

Zaphiropoulos PG, Soderkvist P, Hedblad MA, Toftgard R. Genetic instability of microsatellite markers in region q22.3-q31 of chromosome 9 in skin squamous cell carcinomas. Biochem Biophys Res Commun. 1994; 201:1495-501. DOI: 10.1006/bbrc.1994.1873.

Agarwal S, Rao A. Modulation of chromatin structure regulates cytokine gene expression during T-cell differentiation. Immunity. 1998; 9(6):765-75. PubMed: PMID 12000309.

Yu WM, Hawley TS, Hawley RG, Qu CK. Immortalization of yolk sac-derived precursor cells. Blood. 2002; 100(10):3828-31. Epub 2002 Jul 5.

Online Journal Article

Author(s). Article title. Journal Title [Medium]. Date of publication [cited Date];Volume Number(Issue Number):Page numbers. Available from: URL

Abood S. Quality improvement initiative in nursing homes: the ANA acts in an advisory role. Am J Nurs [internet]. 2002 Jun [cited 2002 Aug 12]; 102(6):[about 1 p.]. Available from: http://www.nursingworld.org/AJN/2002/june/Wawatch.htmArticle.

Journal article with organization as author

Organization. Article title. Journal Title. Date of Publication;Volume(Issue):page numbers.
(Omit any “the” at the beginning of an organization’s name).

Parkinson Study Group. A randomized placebo-controlled trial of rasagiline in levodopa-treated patients with Parkinson disease and motor fluctuations: the PRESTO study. Arch Neurol. 2005; 62(2):241-8.

Conference

Author(s). Title of paper. In: Editor A, Editor B, Editors. Title of Published Proceedings: Proceedings of the Title of Conference: subtitle of Conference; Year Month Date; Location. Place of publication: Publisher; Year. p. inclusive page numbers.

Christensen S, Oppacher F. An analysis of Koza's computational effort statistic for genetic programming. In: Foster JA, Lutton E, Miller J, Ryan C, Tettamanzi AG, editors. EuroGP 2002: Proceedings of the 5th European Conference on Genetic Programming; 2002 Apr 3-5; Kinsdale, Ireland. Berlin: Springer; 2002. p. 182-91.

Book

Author(s). Title. Edition. Place of Publication: Publisher; Date of Publication.

Murray PR, Rosenthal KS, Kobayashi GS, Pfaller MA. Medical microbiology. 4th ed. St. Louis: Mosby; 2002.

Book with Organization as Author/Editor

Organization. Title. Edition. Place of Publication: Publisher; Date of Publication.

Advanced Life Support Group. Acute medical emergencies: the practical approach. London: BMJ Books; 2001.

Book chapter

Author(s). Title of chapter or part. In: Editor A, Editor B, editors. Title: subtitle of book. Edition(if not the first). Place of publication: Publisher; Year. p. page numbers.

Meltzer PS, Kallioniemi A, Trent JM. Chromosome alterations in human solid tumors. In: Vogelstein B, Kinzler KW, editors. The genetic basis of human cancer. New York: McGraw-Hill; 2002. p. 93-113.

Thesis, dissertation and monograph

Author. Title of thesis: subtitle. Unpublished thesis type [format]. Location of University: University; Year.

Borkowski MM. Infant sleep and feeding: a telephone survey of Hispanic Americans. PhD [dissertation]. Mount Pleasant (MI): Central Micihigan University; 2002.

Hincks CL. The detection and characterisation of novel papillomaviruses. Biomedical Science, Honours [thesis]. Murdoch (WA): Murdoch University; 2001.

Database on the Internet

Author/Organization. Database [internet]. Institution; City, Country; year [cited year month day]. Available from: web address. 

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo. Bireme. Scielo [Internet]. Botucatu: FAPESP; São Paulo: Bireme; 2000. [cited 2011 Jul 06]. Available from: www.scielo.br.

Citations

References must be cited in the text using the style “author data”, e.g., citations should indicate the surname of the authors and year of publication.

Some examples:

• single author: Sayers (1970); (Sayers, 1970).
• two authors: Moraes and Furuie (2010); (Moraes and Furuie, 2010).
• more than two authors: Ferreira et al. (1984); (Ferreira et al., 1984).
• multiple citation: Ferreira et al. (1984), Moraes and Furuie (2010) and Sayers (1970); (Sayers, 1970; Ferreira et al., 1984; Moraes and Furuie, 2010).
• multiple citation of the same author and year: Santos (2003a; 2003b; 2007); (Santos, 2003a; 2003b; 2007).

Authors are responsible for the accuracy of the references and their correct citation in the text.

Manuscripts must be submitted in a single file containing the body of the text and all figures and tables.

Manuscripts and other associated files must be sent through the journal’s Electronic Submission System.

Submission of manuscripts should be accompanied by the following documents (PDF format or scanned image files and compressed in ZIP format):

1. Presentation Letter (template at http://www.rbejournal.org);
2. Authorship responsibility and copyright transfer (template at http://www.rbejournal.org) - this form must be signed by all authors and should contain a declaration of copyright transfer and any financial or similar relationship that may lead to possible conflict of interest - financial and/or professional relation with organizations associated with the products and/or equipment involved in the research (sponsorship, financing, ownership etc);
3. Approved protocol of an accredited Ethics Committee - for research involving humans or animals;
4. Clinical trials must provide registration that satisfies the requirements of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), e.g.http://clinicaltrials.gov/, http://anzctr.org.au/. The complete list of all clinical trial registries can be found at: http://www.who.int/ictrp/network/primary/en/index.html.

There are no fees for submission and evaluation of articles.