Authors, to submit a manuscript, please click on "Register" in the top navigation panel and create an account through which you will be able to upload your manuscript and track its progress in the review process. Please be sure to check the box for the role of "author" when you register. When you log in, you should be able to begin the submission process by clicking "new submission." Please remember to submit a signed copy of the license form (linked here), and signed mentor consent (linked here) along with your manuscript. Also, make sure to complete the process by the priority deadline to be considered for the VURJ Manuscript Competition, January 26th, or February 9th, the general deadline for the 2025 issue.
- If the work was done under a faculty member or research mentor, permission must be obtained from them to submit (you must complete and submit the form posted above).
- The VURJ does not accept submissions from undergraduates outside Vanderbilt. Furthermore, the manuscript should only contain research done while the author is attending Vanderbilt.
- This excludes research done during high school or after graduation. However, recently graduated students (students enrolled in Fall 2021 and graduated early) may still publish work they did while they attended Vanderbilt.
- This does not exclude research done at an external institution, as long as the institution signs off on the publication of data collected under their supervision.
- A maximum of two articles will be accepted per author. Please do not submit more than two manuscripts.
- Manuscripts that have been published in other journals or any other periodicals cannot be re-published in the VURJ.
- Manuscripts must not exceed 5000 words (excluding figures/figure captions, references, and abstract).
- Manuscripts must include an abstract, which must not exceed 250 words.
- Manuscripts should be submitted in "docx" (Word document) format.
- Manuscripts must be formatted according to the APA 7th edition style guide (including in-text citations and references).
- If the work contains human experimentation, human interviews, animal test subjects, or involves sentient organisms in any other way, you must attach IRB approval verification or verification of appropriate approval from another board.
- You must also explicitly mention the protocol followed to conduct the research in the methods section.
- Research ethics is extremely important to us. If there is any ambiguity about the ethics of your study we cannot publish your work.
If you have any questions, please email vurj@vanderbilt.edu.
General Formatting Guidelines
Font and spacing: The entire manuscript should be 12 pt Times New Roman, double-spaced. All text should be black.
Margins: Each page of the manuscript should have 1-inch margins on all sides.
Abbreviations: Include the full term at first use and provide the abbreviation in parentheses. Abbreviations should be omitted from the title and abstract. If an abbreviation must appear in a section or subsection title, include the expanded term and repeat the abbreviation in parentheses.
- Example: Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is a highly infectious disease. SARS-CoV-2 can cause the development of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in infected patients.
The Oxford Comma: This publication requires the use of the Oxford comma, as it improves the clarity of sentences. Please ensure all sentences with three or more listed items include a comma before the “and” or “or.”
Dashes: Make sure to use an EN dash (–) to separate numbers or years rather than a hyphen, with no spaces in between the dash and the number (e.g. 94–95). Make sure to use an EM dash (—) when separating words, with no spaces in between the dash and the words (e.g. wow—he won!).
Headings: Follow the below format for formatting headings and subheadings.
Section Heading
Body text here
Level 2 Subsection Heading
Body text here
Level 3 Subsection Heading
Body text here
Level 4 Subsection Heading: Body text here
References and In-Text Citations
All references and in-text citations must be in APA format. The reference list should be located at the end of the document after a section header called “References.” We recommend using a citation manager (such as Zotero or Mendeley) to aid you in this process, but all citations must be verified for correctness by the submitting authors to ensure all of the appropriate metadata has been included.
For further specific instructions on citations and the reference list, please consult any of the following links:
- https://www.mendeley.com/guides/apa-citation-guide/
- https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/in_text_citations_author_authors.html
- https://apastyle.apa.org/
Tables
Tables must be formatted according to the APA style guide (see https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/tables-figures/tables), with one exception. The table number, title, and legend should be formatted as one block of text as shown below.
- All tables must include an in-text citation, either directly in a sentence or as a parenthetical citation.
- Tables must be supplied as editable text (i.e. use the Table tool in Microsoft Word to create them) and not as embedded figures. They should have a bold title and appear in the text following the references.
- Footnotes should be used only if information cannot be included in the legend; they should be indicated by lowercase letters in a superscript.
- All columns should have a heading; units should appear under the column heading(s).
Example of Properly Formatted Table:
Table 2. Descriptive Title. Legend.
|
|
Group 1 |
Group 2 |
||
|
Statistic |
Condition 1 |
Condition 2 |
Condition 1 |
Condition 2 |
|
Mean |
100 |
200 |
300 |
400 |
|
Standard Deviation |
500 |
600 |
700 |
800 |
|
Sample Size |
50 |
49a |
50 |
50 |
|
Mean Difference |
150* |
350** |
||
* p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01
a A single participant was removed from the trial due to a medical emergency unrelated to the experimental treatment.
Figures
Figure legends: Figure legends should appear in the text document following the references, each with a title, and be comprehensible without reference to the text. The figure title must be relevant to the entire figure. Supplementary figure legends should be included in the actual supplementary figure files.
If applicable, error bars should be defined as s.d. or s.e.m. and a precise n value given. Where statistical tests have been used to calculate significance (or lack thereof) the exact p-value should be defined and the name of the statistical test provided in the relevant legend.
Submission guidelines:
- Figures must be submitted as a .TIFF or .TIF file with a 600 dpi resolution or greater. If this is not possible, we will also accept extremely high resolution .PNG images (>300 dpi resolution). Authors are responsible for the quality of their submitted images.
- All figures must be submitted to the VURJ workflow inside a single .ZIP folder named “Figures_####”, with “####” being replaced by the submission ID assigned to your paper. Each individual figure should be named “Figure_#”, with the figure number in the manuscript replacing “#” in the name. While figures may continue to be embedded in the manuscript, only figures submitted in the .ZIP folder.
Sizing Guidelines
- Supply figures at final size widths: 3.4 inches (single column); 7 inches (double column); or 5.3 inches (intermediate). Maximum height is 8 inches. Larger figures will be reduced as appropriate, so please ensure that any line widths and lettering are in proportion to the size of the figure. Figures saved as .tiff, or containing embedded .tiffs, will not be enlarged, as this leads to loss of resolution.
- Use sans serif, true-type fonts for labels if possible (preferably Arial or Helvetica), and Times (New) Roman if serif fonts are required. Use Courier or Courier New for sequence data.
- Line drawing lettering/lines must be clear. The axes of each graph should be lettered with the numerical scale and the measured quantity with units.
- Photographs must have scale bars where applicable.
- Multipart figures should be supplied in the final layout in one file, with each part labeled.
Guidelines for Common Article Sections
- Note: for literature reviews, each section of the article’s body should be given a brief descriptive title. Titles of common sections (e.g. Introduction, Conclusion, Methods, Discussion) should not be modified. Otherwise, the below guidelines still apply.
Title Page
Title: This should be concise but informative and avoid uncommon abbreviations. Please do not phrase your title in the form of a question.
Authors' names: These should appear below the title, with the first or middle name of each author given in full. Given names should appear first. Author affiliations should be noted by numerical superscripts. The corresponding author should be indicated by an asterisk and their email should be provided.
Abstract: The abstract should give a concise statement of the problem, the experimental approach, and the major findings and conclusions. The abstract should be carefully worded to reflect desired search terms. It should not contain more than 250 words and should be intelligible without reference to other parts of the paper. There should be no references or field-specific abbreviations in the abstract (though common abbreviations, such as DNA or COVID-19, are permitted). Abstracts should be formatted as one paragraph and should not be separated into separate sections (i.e. do not designate sentences in the abstract as “Background:”, “Purpose:”. etc.).
Introduction: No special formatting guidelines.
Methods: For sentences containing measurements, make sure to use only Arabic numerals to represent numbers, even if those numbers are less than ten. When possible, restructure sentences to avoid starting with an Arabic numeral.
- Example: A maximum of 10 zebrafish were kept in each 2 L tank, which was filled with 998 mL of system water and 2 mL of the specified treatment solution. Tank water was changed twice daily, and 10 minutes prior to each water change, 3 mL of TetraMin Tropical Flakes (Tetra, Blacksburg, VA) was added to each tank.
Results and Discussion: The authors may use their own discretion in deciding whether it is appropriate to combine these sections or retain them as separate sections.
Endnotes
This section will contain the various notes that may be found at the end of an article, including funding and conflict of interest disclosures, acknowledgments, and a description of author contributions.
Author Contributions: This is an optional section for articles with multiple authors.
It should include a short description of each author's contribution (distinguished by initials only).
Acknowledgments: Authors must identify sources of financial support (including grant numbers, if applicable) for the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the article and briefly describe the role of the sponsor(s) if any. People or organizations that aided experiments, analyses, or reviewing the manuscript, but are not authors of the article, may be mentioned in this section.
Conflicts of Interest: Any real or perceived conflicts must be disclosed in this section