Authors' Guide

Completion and signing the ICMJE Form for Disclosure of Potential Conflicts of Interest is necessary for all authors and the articles submission won’t be accepted without filling this form. Also all authors must sign the Authors Introduction and Commitment Form and declare the number, order of appearance, contribution and affiliation of authors and transfer the right of publishing to Infection Epidemiology and Microbiology.
The submitted articles will be sent to the reviewers after primary acceptance by the Editor-in-Chief according to the adaptation of the subject to Infection Epidemiology and Microbiology scopes and also the structural principles of the article that must be as this instruction. Infection Epidemiology and Microbiology has the right of rejection or acceptance and also editing the articles. After final acceptance by Infection Epidemiology and Microbiology Editorial Board, the articles will be completely revised by the Editorial Team members scientifically, structurally and methodologically and the galley proof will be sent back to the corresponding author for final confirmation. The authors are responsible for the precision and correctness of the content.
 
How to submit your article
Article admission can only be performed electronically via Infection Epidemiology and Microbiology exclusive website. Please avoid postal or email submitting.
The steps of electronic submission of the article are as follows (submitting, reviewing and publishing article are completely free of charges):
  1- Go to the Infection Epidemiology and Microbiology exclusive site: iem.modares.ac.ir
  2- Select "submit an article" in For Authors section in the left menu bar of the site.
  3- If you are a site member you can start the process; If not, first register and wait for administrator confirmation.
  4- Select and confirm the number of authors, article type and subject(s) of the article in step 2.
  5- All parts should be filled in step 3. Note that even if the system confirms the submission, in case of insufficiency of the data or not sending the article's files by the mentioned order, the article will be sent back by the administrator. The Main file must be a Microsoft Office Word 2003 file containing the whole article parts.
Notice: The article submitter is considered as the connector author for all affairs about the article and all further connections and data transmission will be done with him/her. The connector MUST be from authors.
 
How to prepare the article file
The entire text should be typed as single column (Font size: 12; Font type: Cambria; Line spacing: 1) in A4 paper size with 3cm margins from top, bottom, left and right of the page. The article file should contain 4 separate parts: Cover Page (1 page), Abstract (1 page), Text Body(several pages), References List (appropriate number according to article type) and Figures (1 figure per each 1000 words of the Text Body)
 
Cover Page
1- The title of the article should be written at the top (Write the running title below the title of the article).
2- Authors must be mentioned separately in order of appearance on the article with following data (Please notice the authorship principles from here):
First name & Surname
Academic Degree (PhD, MD, MSc, etc.)
Affiliation (Department/Research Center, School/Institute, University, City, Country)
(Cell Phone Number, Telephone Number, Fax Number, Post Address and Email are just necessary for the correspondent).
 
Abstract
1- The abstract of all type of articles must have AimsMethodsFindings and Conclusion sections and should not be less than 150 and more than 250 words.
Notice: The abstract does not have any introduction at all and is not an introduction to the article. An abstract should express the maximum data related to the article in the minimum possible volume.
2- The keywords must be 3 to 6 MeSH (Medical Subject Headings) words with the url of them at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/mesh/
 
Text Body
1- The section titles and word numbers of the text bodies are different according to the type of the article.
Original Research
Description: These articles are the result of authors’ researches and must have intervention and data analysis processes (not descriptive).
Sections: Introduction, Materials & Methods, Findings, Discussion, and Conclusion
Authors Limitation: Accorded to the research size
Words Limitation: 3000 to 4000 words
References Limitation: Min. 25 and Max. 40
Diagrams Limitation: 3 to 4 (Tables, Charts or Pictures)
Qualitative Research
Description: In the fields that the direct investigation of parameters is not possible, the research can be done regarding to the opinion of the experts qualitatively by appropriate documentation.
Sections: Introduction, Participants & Methods, Findings, Discussion, and Conclusion
Authors Limitation: 2 authors
Words Limitation: 3000 to 4000 words
References Limitation: Min. 25 and Max. 40
Diagrams Limitation: 3 to 4 (Tables, Charts or Pictures)
Short Communication
Description: Original researches in the novel fields of research with low number of references that mainly introduce new achievements although having low number of words.
Sections: Introduction, Materials & Methods, Findings, Discussion, and Conclusion
Authors Limitation: 1 author
Words Limitation: 1500 to 2000 words
References Limitation: Min. 10 and Max. 15
Diagrams Limitation: 2 (Tables, Charts or Pictures)
Descriptive & Survey
Description: Articles that just report descriptive data by checklists or questionnaires and have no intervention and data analysis. These are not considered as research articles and can be just accepted according to their strong practical aspects.
Sections: Introduction, Instrument & Methods, Findings, Discussion, and Conclusion
Authors Limitation: 3 authors
Words Limitation: 3000 to 4000 words
References Limitation: Min. 35 and Max. 50
Diagrams Limitation: 3 to 4 (Tables, Charts or Pictures)
Systematic Review
Description: Review article with research structure that is written by experts in the field of research. The material of these articles are other research papers in the field that should be analyzed completely. 
Sections: Introduction, Information & Methods, Findings, Discussion, and Conclusion
Authors Limitation: 2 authors
Words Limitation: 4000 to 6000 words
References Limitation: Min. 50 and Max. 60 (At least 5 references from the authors)
Diagrams Limitation: 1 (Tables, Charts or Pictures)
Analytic Review
Description: Review articles that are written by one expert in the field of research. The author is usually invited by the Editor in Chief to write a review in the desired field and this kind of article is not accepted from newcomers without enough original researches in the field.  
Sections: Introduction, Sections by Author (6 to 8), and Conclusion
Authors Limitation: 1 author
Words Limitation: 8000 to 10000 words
References Limitation: Min. 80 and Max. 100 (At least 10 references from the author)
Diagrams Limitation: Accorded to the author
Case Report/Series
Description: In exposure to rare case(s), the researcher can report the patient condition, treatment methods and the conclusion. 
Sections: Introduction, Information & Methods, Findings, Discussion, and Conclusion
Authors Limitation: 1 authors
Words Limitation: 1500 to 2000 words
References Limitation: Min. 10 and Max. 15
Diagrams Limitation: 2 (Tables, Charts or Pictures)
Letter to the Editor
Description: This kind of article is written in answer or in critic of the published articles of the journal.  
Sections: Introduction, Sections by Author (1 to 2), and Conclusion
Authors Limitation: 1 author
Words Limitation: 800 to 1000 words
References Limitation: Min. 3 and Max. 5
Diagrams Limitation: No Diagrams
 
2- All articles MUST have AcknowledgmentsEthical PermissionAuthors ContributionConflicts of Interests, and Funding/Supports sections at the end. If there is nothing to report in each case use “None declared by Authors”.
 
3- Tables & Figures
1All tables, charts, and pictures are numbered in order of appearance in the article under the title of "Table" (for tables) and “Figure” (for charts and pictures).
2- Tables and Figures must not repeat each other’s data or text data.

3- The description of figures should be clear and complete without the need to refer to the text.
4- Each Table & figure should be placed in a separate page in the original size and the description should be written in the same page above (tables) or below (charts and pictures).
5- In the case of charts, the original excel file (or other formats) must be sent.

References List
Mentioning the references in all necessary cases should be fully observed (the referencing guide can be found here). To mention a reference, the numbering system should be used (Vancouver Style). Thus, the references should be listed in the reference list based on the order of use in the main text and they should be numbered orderly. Where ever necessary, the number of the given reference should be brought in brackets []. If there is more than one number in a [], the numbers must increase from left to right and be separated by “,” (e.g., [8, 11, 42]. If there are more than two following numbers, they must separate with “-“ (e.g., [12, 25, 32-38, 44-51].
Notice that the only valid references for scholarly articles are those with peer-reviewed content, mean published articles in peer reviewed journals; books, web pages, conference papers and posters, thesis and dissertations and so on are not appropriate references for scholarly articles. Due to this, at least 80% of the cited references of the submitted articles MUST be published articles in peer-reviewed journals.