Author Guidelines
Our Author Guidelines provide a comprehensive framework for preparing and submitting manuscripts. Covering journal‑specific requirements, supporting authors in presenting clear and well‑structured research contributions.
Journal Specific Instructions
Physioscience Autorguidelines V. 09.2026
English Translation of Your Article
Our service for you: Articles and original research papers submitted in German are translated into English by Thieme upon acceptance. To enhance the international visibility of your article, it is then published online in both languages.
Concept and Scope of physioscience
physioscience is a scientific journal dedicated to publishing research reports from all areas of physiotherapy that are relevant to clinical practice, research, and education. Authors are invited to submit original research, reviews, case reports, study protocols, short reports, viewpoints, and letters to the editor. We welcome contributions on professional and health policy issues, as well as articles that contribute to scientific discourse both within the profession and across disciplinary boundaries.
physioscience is published by an international team of physiotherapists engaged in clinical practice, research, and education, and is organizationally supported by an editorial team of the Thieme Group.
physioscience is the official journal of the German Society for Physiotherapy Science (DGPTW; www.dgptw.org
). The journal and several of its editors are members of the International Society of Physiotherapy Journal Editors (ISPJE).
Since 2017, physioscience has been indexed in the Web of Science Core Collection (Emerging Sources Citation Index, ESCI). We are pursuing timely indexing in PubMed Central, including listing in the PubMed Journal List. This highlights the journal’s importance as an attractive scientific forum for physiotherapy and strengthens physioscience's international visibility and reputation.
There are no publication fees for authors unless they choose to publish their article as Gold Open Access. For this publication model, the publisher charges an Article Processing Charge (APC) of EUR 2,500 excluding VAT. Authors must decide prior to submission whether they wish to publish their article as Open Access. Further information is available on the website under “Overview.” If you have any questions, please contact physioscience@thieme.de.
Accepted manuscripts are published online in eFirst format at www.thieme-connect.de
prior to the release of the print version.
Subscribers receive the journal by mail four times per year. In addition, they have electronic access via www.thieme-connect.de
to the complete archive dating back to the journal’s launch in 2005.
The publication languages are German and English. All German-language articles are translated into English by the publisher and published online.
General Principles
Publication Language
Manuscripts written in German or English are generally accepted.
Publication Ethics
Only manuscripts that have not been previously published, either domestically or internationally, will be considered. Submitted manuscripts must not be under consideration by any other journal at the same time. It is assumed that the corresponding author holds the copyright and that all co-authors have granted permission for publication.
Learn more about the ethical guidelines of our journal at our journal policies
.
Peer Review Process
All submitted manuscripts undergo a single-blind peer review process prior to publication (authors and institutions are not anonymized). Following the reviewers' evaluation, the corresponding author will be informed whether the manuscript has been accepted for publication, rejected, or requires revisions to be considered for publication.
Scientific Standards
physioscience requires all authors to adhere to the guidelines of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) and the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).
Generative AI
Thieme endorses the COPE Position Statement on Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Authorship. AI tools may contribute to the preparation of manuscripts. The use of generative AI tools must be disclosed explicitly, comprehensively, and transparently in the declarations section of the manuscript. AI tools must not be listed as authors, as they do not meet all criteria for authorship: they cannot assume responsibility for the integrity and content of a manuscript, nor can they bear legal responsibility.
Authors are responsible for all parts of their manuscript, including content generated with the assistance of AI tools.
Further guidance on the use and disclosure of AI can be found in the Journal Policies under “Artificial Intelligence and Authorship.”
Open Science
We support the adoption of Open Science practices to promote reproducibility, transparency, knowledge sharing, and scientific collaboration. This includes, among other measures, the (prospective) registration of study protocols for all research projects and studies in order to enhance transparency and credibility (“pre-registration”).
In accordance with the FAIR principles (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable), research data should be prepared to be findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable for both humans and machines (“open data”).
In connection with manuscript submissions to physioscience, we encourage authors to make their research data available in accordance with these principles and, where appropriate, to publish data analysis plans, code used for data analysis, datasets, and metadata (“open source”).
Manuscript Preparation
Please refer to the guidelines for scientific publications provided in the Thieme Author Lounge (see here
). Please use appropriate and internationally recognized reporting guidelines for manuscript preparation (www.equator-network.org
). Please submit the fully completed checklist(s) together with the manuscript. The checklists will be considered during the peer review process but will not be published.
All texts published in physioscience must use gender-sensitive language. Authors should use inclusive wording throughout and avoid gendered terms wherever possible. Examples include chairperson instead of chairman, staff instead of manpower, and they/them instead of he/she when referring to a person of unknown or irrelevant gender.
Overview of article categories with key formal requirements
Review articles: max. 4000 words, max. 60 references
Original articles: max. 4000 words, max. 60 references
Case reports: max. 2000 words, max. 20 references
Short reports: max. 2000 words, max. 20 references
Study protocols: max. 3000 words, max. 30 references
Viewpoints: max. 3000 words, max. 30 references
Guest editorials: max. 1000 words, max. 20 references
Letters to the editor: max. 500 words, max. 10 references
Commentary: max. 500 words, max. 10 references
Article Types
Review
Review articles are characterized by a systematic literature search in scientific databases and should be prospectively registered (e.g., in PROSPERO or the Open Science Framework
). This category includes all types of reviews, such as systematic reviews, scoping reviews, rapid reviews, realist reviews, reviews of reviews, and qualitative reviews. Narrative reviews are not accepted under any circumstances.
A review must not exceed 4,000 words (excluding the title page, abstract, tables, figures, references, declarations, and supplementary material). A total of no more than 4 figures and/or tables is permitted. Additional figures and tables must be submitted as “Supplemental material” in the submission system. A maximum of 60 references is permitted.
Reviews should be reported in accordance with an appropriate reporting guideline (see examples below).
Examples of suitable reporting checklists for reviews include:
- The PRISMA 2020 statement: Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses
- PRISMA-S: an extension to the PRISMA Statement for Reporting Literature Searches in Systematic Reviews
- PRISMA Extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR): Checklist and Explanation
Please structure reviews in the following sections:
- Introduction: Please outline the background and aim of the review in the context of the existing evidence and relevant literature.
- Methods: See PRISMA guidelines.
- Results: Please report all study findings based on the described methods, in the text and/or in tables/figures.
- Discussion: This section should first summarize the main findings and then discuss them in the context of the relevant literature and existing evidence. Please describe strengths and limitations.
- Conclusions: In this section, please briefly describe the main conclusions of the review. Derive implications or recommendations for clinical (physiotherapeutic) practice and/or for future research questions.
Original Research
Original research articles include, for example, clinical trials (randomized and non-randomized experimental studies), observational studies, case studies (N-of-1 trials), qualitative studies, or surveys. An original research article must not exceed 4,000 words (excluding the title page, references, declarations, and supplementary material). A total of no more than 4 figures and/or tables is permitted. Additional figures and tables must be submitted as “Supplemental material” in the submission system. A maximum of 60 references is permitted. Original research articles should be prospectively registered (e.g., in the German Clinical Trials Register (DRKS) or the Open Science Framework). Clinical trials must be prospectively registered in a publicly accessible trial registry prior to the start of participant recruitment.
- Original articles should be reported in accordance with an appropriate reporting guideline (see examples below):
- Randomized controlled trials: CONSORT
- Observational studies: STROBE
- Case studies (N-of-1 trials): CONSORT extension for reporting N-of-1 trials (CENT) 2025
- Qualitative studies: COREQor SRQR
Please structure original articles as follows:
- Introduction: Please outline the background and aim of the study in the context of the existing evidence and relevant literature.
- Methods: Study design, setting, inclusion and exclusion criteria for study participants, description of all relevant procedures, interventions, measurements, and statistical analyses.
- Results: Please report all study findings based on the described methods, in the text and/or in tables/figures.
- Discussion: This section should first summarize the main findings and then discuss them in the context of relevant literature and existing evidence. Please describe strengths and limitations.
- Conclusions: In this section, please briefly describe the main conclusions of the study. Derive implications or recommendations for clinical (physiotherapeutic) practice and/or for future research questions.
Case Report
A case report describes in detail a physiotherapeutic case involving one individual (e.g., a patient) or several individual cases (a case series).
A case report must not exceed 2,000 words (excluding the title page, abstract, tables, figures, references, declarations, and supplementary material). A total of no more than 4 figures and/or tables is permitted. Additional figures and tables must be submitted as “Supplemental material” in the submission system. A maximum of 20 references is permitted.
Please use the CARE-Guideline
for reporting the manuscript.
Please structure case reports as follows:
- Introduction: Description of the background including relevant literature; justification of the case report.
- Case information / case description: e.g. description of the patient(s), diagnosis, examination findings (please note that all personal data must be removed from text and images for manuscript submission
→ see the Author Lounge section “Prepare your manuscript
” → “Guidelines for Scienctific articles
”).
- Intervention: Detailed description of the intervention(s).
- Outcome and/or results, follow-up assessment
- Patient perspective: where appropriate, the perspective of the described case(s), informed consent of the patient(s).
- Discussion: Strengths and limitations, discussion in the context of relevant literature.
- Conclusions: Conclusions for physiotherapeutic practice.
Short Report
Short reports are intended to rapidly and concisely communicate new, relevant, or unexpected findings to a scientific audience. They are usually limited to the essential elements and provide a compact presentation of methods and results.
Results from an original research article or review may be submitted as a short report with a maximum of 2,000 words (excluding the title page, key messages, references, declarations, and supplementary material). A total of no more than 2 figures and/or tables is permitted. Additional figures and tables must be submitted as “Supplemental material” in the submission system. A maximum of 20 references is permitted. Short reports are suitable, for example, for feasibility and pilot studies, secondary analyses, small case-control or cross-sectional studies, or other empirical studies addressing a limited dataset or a specific research question. Short reports must not be “summaries” or secondary publications of already published studies or research projects; they must present new results and findings.
The structure of a short report corresponds to that of an original article (Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, Conclusions) with a maximum of 2 figures/tables. Instead of an abstract, 2 to 4 key messages and a maximum of 5 keywords must be provided at the beginning of the manuscript. Short reports must include title, key messages, and keywords in both German and English.
As no abstract is required for a short report, please enter “N/A” in the mandatory “Abstract” field in the submission system.
Study Protocol
The publication of a study protocol for (larger) research projects contributes to transparency, reduces publication bias, and promotes reproducibility of studies.
A study protocol must not exceed 3,000 words (excluding the title page, abstract, tables, figures, references, declarations, and supplementary material). A total of no more than 4 figures and/or tables is permitted. Additional figures and tables must be submitted as “Supplemental material” in the submission system. A maximum of 30 references is permitted. The structure of a study protocol should follow SPIRIT
(Introduction, Methods, Ethics, and Dissemination) and may optionally include a short discussion. Please use the corresponding SPIRIT-Guideline
for structuring and reporting your manuscript.
Viewpoint
Viewpoint articles provide a scientifically grounded and critically reflected perspective on current topics, challenges, methodological approaches, or developments in the field of physiotherapy. The aim of these contributions is to provide impulses for reflection, question existing paradigms, and/or promote discussion within the physiotherapy professional community.
Contributions may be written in an argumentative and pointed style; however, they must be scientifically sound and based on clear logic. Typical topics include, for example, new therapeutic approaches, professional ethical issues, methodological and health policy developments, or conceptual advancements in clinical practice and research. This category also includes position statements from professional societies.
A Viewpoint article is clearly structured, analytically precise, and written in an objective scientific style. Quantitative data are not the focus; instead, the argumentative coherence and scientific logic of the contribution are decisive. Viewpoints do not contain extensive datasets or detailed methodological descriptions. A limited but targeted use of relevant and up-to-date literature is expected to support key statements.
A Viewpoint must not exceed 3,000 words (excluding the title page, unstructured abstract, tables, figures, references, declarations, and supplementary material). A total of no more than 2 figures and/or tables is permitted. Additional figures and tables must be submitted as “Supplemental material” in the submission system. A maximum of 30 references is permitted. The structure is not predefined and should be agreed in advance with the Editor-in-Chief (contact: physioscience.EIC@posteo.de
). Viewpoint manuscripts are generally subject to peer review.
Guest Editorial
A Guest Editorial is a topic-specific scholarly contribution written by external experts on a current topic from science, practice, or professional and educational policy. Guest editorials are commissioned exclusively by the editors and provide an opportunity to present specific viewpoints, new developments, or discussion impulses independently of regular research articles. Guest editorials are intended to enrich the thematic scope of physioscience and serve as a platform for open scientific dialogue. They are editorially reviewed but generally do not undergo peer review.
A Guest Editorial must not exceed 1.000 words (excluding references; max. 20 references). Guest editorials must include the following mandatory declarations: funding, conflicts of interest, Author’s Contributions (for two or more authors), and a generative AI statement.
As no abstract is required for a guest editorial, please enter “N/A” in the mandatory “Abstract” field in the submission system.
Letter to the Editor
Letters to the Editor provide an opportunity to respond to articles published in physioscience, to comment on subject-specific aspects, or to contribute additional perspectives on existing topics. The aim of this section is to promote scientific and professional discourse within the physiotherapy community.
A Letter to the Editor may express agreement, provide a critical response, or offer a factual supplement to a published article. The argumentation should be precise, respectful, and based on scientific evidence and/or professional experience. Personal or inappropriate statements are not permitted.
Letters to the Editor are subject to editorial review but do not usually undergo peer review. The editorial team reserves the right to edit submissions. Letters to the Editor reflect solely the opinions of the authors and not those of the editorial office. The editors or publishers reserve the right to forward submitted letters to the authors of the respective article prior to publication and to invite them to respond (in the form of a Letter to the Editor).
A letter to the Editor must not exceed 500 words and should focus on the essential points. References are only required if they contribute to substantiating the argument (maximum of 10 references). Letters to the Editor must include the following mandatory declarations: funding, conflicts of interest, and a generative AI statement.
Current research: summarized and commented This article type can only be submitted in German. Please refer to the German version of the author guidelines.
As no abstract is required for a letter to the editor, please enter “N/A” in the mandatory “Abstract” field in the submission system.
Erratum (Correction)
An erratum is a post-publication correction to an article. It serves to correct factual errors, incorrect data, or important inaccuracies that may affect the scientific value or interpretation of the article. Authors and editors of physioscience are committed to promptly and transparently correcting identified errors in order to preserve the integrity of the scientific record. The correction is clearly indicated in the journal, and the original article is appropriately amended or updated.
Retraction
A retraction refers to the withdrawal of a scientific article after publication when serious errors, violations of good scientific practice, or scientific misconduct have been identified. Retracted articles are considered no longer reliable and should not be cited further. The reason for the retraction, such as data manipulation, plagiarism, or serious methodological flaws, is disclosed, and a retraction notice is published on the physioscience website.
Manuscript Structure
Title Page
Title: The title should be as short, informative, and concise as possible and, where applicable, include the study design. Abbreviations should be avoided. The title may contain a maximum of 200 characters.
Examples: “A versus B in the treatment of C: a randomized controlled trial”; “X is a risk factor for Y: a case-control study”; “What are the effects of factor X on subject Y: a systematic review”.
Authors: Please provide the full, correct, and unabbreviated names, affiliations (university, department/faculty, clinic, or practice where the work was conducted), and email addresses of all authors, as these will be indexed in official archives. ORCID iDs of all authors are mandatory.
Corresponding author: Please designate the person responsible for the manuscript (marked with an asterisk *), who will serve as the contact person during the publication process. Please include the full postal address and email address of this person.
Equal contributions: Authors who have contributed equally to the work should be indicated in the author list of the submitted documents using a symbol (†).
Please use the following standard formulations to indicate equal contributions:
- First authorship: These authors share first authorship.
- Last authorship: These authors share last authorship.
Word count: Please also state the current word count of the manuscript (excluding abstract, declarations, references, tables, and appendices).
Abstract: The abstract must not exceed 2,000 characters (checked by ScholarOne upon submission) and must be provided in both German and English. It should summarize the key aspects of the manuscript. Its structure should correspond to the structure of the manuscript (e.g., for reviews and original articles: Introduction, Methods, Results, Conclusions). No references may be included. Avoid uncommon abbreviations whenever possible (if used, they must be defined). The German and English versions of the abstract must be identical in content. If the study has been registered, this must be stated at the end of the abstract (registry, registration number, date of registration).
Keywords: Directly following the German and English abstracts, please provide a minimum of 5 and a maximum of 8 keywords. These keywords should, where possible, be selected from the Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) of the Index Medicus (MEDLINE) and should appropriately reflect the content of the manuscript.
Main Text: Please follow the guidelines provided in the Author Lounge regarding file format, general formal requirements, and writing style for scientific publications
.
Declarations
All manuscripts must include the following sections under the heading “Declarations”. These must be placed at the end of the manuscript between the main text and the references:
- Ethical aspects
- Consent for publication
- Availability of data and materials
- Registration
- Funding
- Conflicts of interest
- Authors’ contributions
- Generative AI statement
- Acknowledgements (optional)
If any of the sections is not relevant to your manuscript, please include the heading and state “not applicable” in the respective section. If an aspect has not been implemented, this must be explicitly and transparently stated (e.g., “This study was not registered in a trial registry”).
Details on the information to be included in these sections are provided below.
Ethical aspects
Manuscripts reporting studies involving humans, health-related personal data, or human biological material (e.g., tissue, blood, urine) must:
- include a statement on ethical approval and consent
- specify the name and location of the ethics committee that approved the study, the date of approval, and the reference number, if applicable
In addition, this section must describe the extent to which the study was conducted in accordance with national law and the principles of the Declaration of Helsinki (in its current version).
The following example formulations may be used verbatim to describe ethical aspects in the manuscript:
- “This study was approved on DD.MM.YYYY by the Ethics Committee of [name and location of EC] under reference number [insert number].”
- “All procedures were performed in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki (in its current version) or comparable ethical standards.”
- “All procedures were performed in accordance with national law.”
- “All procedures were performed in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee.”
- “All study participants gave (written) informed consent to participate in the study.”
- “For this type of study, formal approval by an ethics committee was not required.”
If you have conducted a study involving humans, health-related personal data, or human biological material (e.g., tissue, blood, urine), have formally assessed the need for ethical review by an ethics committee prior to study initiation, and the ethics committee has declared the research project or study as “not subject to review” or as “not within its remit,” your manuscript may still be considered for publication in physioscience. This regulation applies in particular to studies involving healthy adult healthcare professionals (e.g., qualitative studies or survey studies with physiotherapists).
In these cases, complete information on the following three points must be provided:
- Name and location of the ethics committee that was consulted for review of the study;
- Review or case number (must be issued by the ethics committee);
- Date of the committee’s decision.
A possible formulation is:
“The Ethics Committee of [INSTITUTION XYZ] decided on DD.MM.YYYY that this research project does not require formal ethical review (case number: 0123456789).”
If an ethics vote is missing or insufficiently justified, the submitted manuscript will be rejected immediately.
If your study does not use health-related personal data or human biological material, or if such data are not reported in your manuscript, please state:
“This article does not contain any studies involving human participants or human biological material, and no health-related personal data are reported.”
Consent for publication
If your manuscript contains any form of data relating to an individual person (including individual photographs, radiographic images, etc.), consent for publication must be obtained from that person, or from legal guardians in the case of children, using forms provided by Thieme. Templates for printing can be found under the following links:
- Declareation of Consent (Patient): Consent Patient.pdf
- Declaration of Consent (Model): Consent Model.pdf
Case reports must be approved for publication by the individuals concerned. A consent form should be used for this purpose. This consent form should not be submitted with the manuscript; however, we reserve the right to request a copy of these documents at any time (including after publication).
All data relating to real individuals must be systematically anonymized in accordance with Thieme guidelines, even if consent has been obtained, in order to protect personal rights and to ensure that pseudonyms can always be clearly identified as such. If one or more individuals are assigned fictitious names in figures and text, please follow the relevant guidelines provided in the Author Lounge.
If you wish to publish photographs, the following applies: In order to protect usage rights, copyright, and personal rights in photographs, consent from the depicted individuals is required at the time of manuscript submission. Please use the forms provided in the Author Lounge.
If your manuscript does not contain any personal data, please state “not applicable” in this section.
Availability of data and materials
All manuscripts must include a data and materials availability statement. Data availability statements should provide information on where the data underlying the results reported in the article can be found or obtained. Data refers to the minimum dataset required to interpret, replicate, and build upon the results reported in the article. This also applies to data such as interview transcripts, audio and video recordings, or code. Please ensure that data are made available in accordance with the FAIR principles (https://www.go-fair.org/fair-principles
).
Please use one of the following statements:
- “The datasets generated and/or analyzed during the current study are available in the [NAME] repository [PERMANENT INTERNET LINK TO DATASETS].”
- “The datasets generated and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.”
- “All data generated and/or analyzed during this study are included in this published article [and its supplementary information/appendices].”
If your manuscript does not contain or analyze any data, please state “not applicable” in this section.
Registration
We support the prospective registration of clinical and empirical-experimental studies, systematic reviews, and research projects in appropriate registries to ensure transparency.
Clinical trials: In Germany and Austria, clinical trials can be registered free of charge, for example in the “German Clinical Trials Register” (DRKS; www.drks.de
). In Switzerland, the free “Kofam – Portal for Human Research in Switzerland” (www.kofam.ch
) is available. Study registration is also possible in international trial registries such as the EU Clinical Trials Register (www.clinicaltrialsregister.eu
), ClinicalTrials.gov (www.clinicalTrials.gov
), or the WHO International Clinical Trials Registry Platform (ICTRP) (www.who.int/clinical-trials-registry-platform
).
If your clinical trial has been registered in a trial registry, please provide the registry name, registration number, and date of registration. Please also explicitly state whether the study was registered prospectively or retrospectively (i.e., after study initiation or completion).
Example: “This clinical trial was prospectively registered on DD.MM.YYYY in the German Clinical Trials Register (DRKS: xyzxyz).”
If a clinical trial has not been registered, please state: “This clinical trial was not registered in a trial registry.”
Other empirical-experimental studies: Depending on the study type, study protocols of observational studies, surveys, qualitative studies, and other empirical-experimental studies may also be prospectively registered or uploaded to scientific repositories such as the Open Science Framework (OSF; https://osf.io/
) or Zenodo (https://zenodo.org/
).
Reviews: Reviews may, for example, be registered in the International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews (PROSPERO; www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero
). Alternative registries for research projects are also available, such as the Open Science Framework (OSF; https://osf.io/
).
For all non-clinical studies, please provide the registry name, registration number, and registration date if applicable.
If the study has not been registered, please state: “This study was not registered.”
If registration is not possible or not applicable, please state: “not applicable.”
Funding
Please indicate under this heading whether and, if applicable, by whom the study or publication was financially supported. Please also describe the role of the funder in the design, conduct, analysis, interpretation, and publication of the research project.
If the funder had no such role, please state verbatim in this section: “The funding body had no influence on the design, conduct, analysis, interpretation, or publication of the study.”
If the study did not receive financial support, please state verbatim in this section: “This research received no specific funding from public, commercial, or not-for-profit funding agencies.”
Conflicts of interest
physioscience aims to enable readers to assess potential conflicts of interest of the authors of an article. Therefore, all financial and non-financial competing interests must be disclosed in this section. If you are unsure whether you or any of your co-authors have a competing interest, please consult the Author Lounge or contact the editors. Please use initials to refer to individual authors’ competing interests in this section.
If you have no competing interests, please state verbatim in this section:
“The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.”
“The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.”
In any case, please complete the COI form provided below:
Authors’ contributions
In this section, the individual contributions of the authors to the manuscript are listed. physioscience requires all authors to adhere to the guidelines of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE). Please use initials to indicate each author’s contribution in this section. Contributions should be described using the 14 roles of the CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy) statement (https://credit.niso.org/
).
- Conceptualization: Ideas; formulation or evolution of overarching research goals and aims.
- Data curation: Management activities to annotate (produce metadata), scrub data and maintain research data (including software code, where it is necessary for interpreting the data itself) for initial use and later re-use.
- Formal analysis: Application of statistical, mathematical, computational, or other formal techniques to analyse or synthesize study data.
- Funding acquisition: Acquisition of the financial support for the project leading to this publication
- Investigation: Conducting a research and investigation process, specifically performing the experiments, or data/evidence collection.
- Methodology: Development or design of methodology; creation of models.
- Project administration: Management and coordination responsibility for the research activity planning and execution.
- Resources: Provision of study materials, reagents, materials, patients, laboratory samples, animals, instrumentation, computing resources, or other analysis tools.
- Software: Programming, software development; designing computer programs; implementation of the computer code and supporting algorithms; testing of existing code components.
- Supervision: Oversight and leadership responsibility for the research activity planning and execution, including mentorship external to the core team.
- Validation: Verification, whether as a part of the activity or separate, of the overall replication/reproducibility of results/experiments and other research outputs.
- Visualization: Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work, specifically visualization/data presentation.
- Writing – original draft: Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work, specifically writing the initial draft (including substantive translation).
- Writing – review & editing: Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work by those from the original research group, specifically critical review, commentary or revision – including pre- or postpublication stages.
This section must be structured in a way that lists the contributions of each author individually. In addition, two statements regarding approval for publication must be included verbatim. As shown in the following example:
AA: Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing.
BB: Investigation, Methodology, Project administration, Writing – review & editing.
CC: Supervision, Validation, Visualization, Writing – review & editing.
All authors give final approval of the published version.
All authors have read and approved the final version. All authors agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work and ensure that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.
Generative AI statement
If authors use tools for text generation, their use must be documented transparently in this section. Guidance on the use of generative AI can be found in the Journal Policies
under “Artificial Intelligence and Authorship”.
Please use the following wording, which should be adapted accordingly: “During the preparation of this article, the authors used the tool [name of tool] to [description]. The authors have reviewed and revised the text and take full responsibility for the content of the article.”
Acknowledgements
Please briefly mention here all individuals who contributed to the manuscript but do not meet the criteria for authorship, including any individuals who provided professional writing services or materials. Please obtain permission to acknowledge all persons named in this section. If there are no persons to acknowledge, please state “not applicable” in this section.
References
Please strictly follow the guidelines provided in the Publication Guidelines for Scientific Articles
under “Bibliography”, as well as the maximum number of references allowed for the respective article type.
Tables
Please follow the specifications under the “Tables” section in the Publication Guidelines for Scientific Articles
.
Please include tables at the end of the manuscript as editable text and not as figures. Number tables consecutively according to their order of appearance in the text, provide a title (above the table), and, if applicable, an explanatory legend (below the table). Avoid duplication of information in both the text and tables.
For extensive tables, it may be necessary to publish them as online supplementary material rather than in the print version. Please assess for each table whether it must be included in the article or whether it could be provided as supplementary digital material instead.
Figures
Please strictly follow the specifications for file formats and general formal requirements provided in the Publication Guidelines for Scientific Articles
under “Figures: rights of use / copyright / personal rights”. Upload figures separately from the main manuscript in ScholarOne.
For each figure, please assess whether it is essential for inclusion in the article or whether it could alternatively be provided as supplementary digital material.
Supplementary material (online only)
To ensure complete and transparent reporting, the permitted word count is sometimes insufficient. We therefore invite you to provide datasets, tables, figures, or other information as supplementary material.
All supplementary material will be published online together with the accepted article. Do not submit files such as patient consent forms, ethics applications or approvals, individual participant data, or similar documents as supplementary material. Under no circumstances should files containing personal data be submitted. The maximum file size for each supplementary file is 8 MB. All supplementary files should be referenced in the main text at the appropriate place.
If supplementary material is provided, please list the following information in a separate section of the manuscript text (PDF files are preferred):
- File name (e.g., “Supplementary material 1”) with the corresponding title/description of the content.
Supplementary files must be named “Supplementary material 1”, etc., and explicitly referenced by file name in the main text of the article, e.g., “A figure in the appendix provides further detail (see Supplementary material 1).”
Supplementary material will be made available exclusively online on the publisher’s website. The authors are solely responsible for the content of the supplementary material; it is not subject to review by editors, reviewers, or the publisher.
Cover Letter
A cover letter serves as a formal accompanying document and ensures transparency regarding the submission and compliance with ethical standards. It should be clearly structured and should not contain overly detailed scientific explanations.
Please submit a cover letter (mandatory) that is concise (max. one page) and clearly presents the key information about the submitted manuscript. This includes:
- The manuscript title.
- An explanation of the scientific relevance of the work.
- A confirmation that the work is original, has not been published elsewhere, and is not under simultaneous consideration by another journal.
- Information on potential conflicts of interest and ethical approval, if applicable.
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