Vocabulary

Sentence case

Sentence case is the conventional way of using capital letters in a sentence. That is, you only capitalize the first letter of the first word – like you would in a sentence. Proper nouns (including abbreviations, gene names, journal titles, scientific databases, etc.) have initial capitals as well.

Examples:
The cat sat on the mat.
London is a capital of The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

Title case

Title case is the conventional way of using capital letters in a sentence. That is, you capitalize all principal words. Articles, conjunctions, and prepositions do not get capital letters unless they start the title.

Examples:
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.
Seven Habits of Effective People.

Plain text

“Normal” text which does not have any special text formatting (i.e. it has default font, size and is not styled into bold or italics).


Mononym

Person who has only last name (no first name or middle name(s)).


Group authorship

Group Authorship is a large numbers of investigators working under a single group name. Group-author articles involve the following parties: the overall group, members of the group who take responsibility for authorship of the article (named individual authors), and members of the group who do not take responsibility for authorship of the article but have contributed to the work that led to the article (nonauthor group members).

Examples:
Cancer Genome Atlas Research Network
North Central Cancer Treatment Group Study N0177

En dash

The en dash (–) is slightly wider than the hyphen (-) but narrower than the em dash (—). The typical computer keyboard lacks a dedicated key for the en dash, though most word processors provide a means for its insertion.


Figure panel

Figures can contain several “embedded” images, each of which contains its own identifier - a letter. Those “embedded” images are called figure panels.

Example:
Figure panels

Large tables

Applicable to Supplementary materials only!

Tables which span across 3 or more pages are considered large tables. Tables which fit into 2 pages should be published as PDF for convenient printing, whilst large tables should be published as Excel (.xlsx) or Word (.docx) documents. See more information in Large tables check


Shortened format for page number ranges
Ending page numbers should be shortened to the greatest changed digit.
Examples of properly formatted page ranges:
5–9 (cannot be shortened)
1–17 (cannot be shortened)
10–8 (shortened from 10–18)
12–22 (cannot be shortened)
132–9 (shortened from 132–139)
303–27 (shortened from 303–327)
342–423 (cannot be shortened)

Justified text

Text is aligned along the left margin, with letter-spacing and word-spacing adjusted so that the text falls flush with both margins.


Flush left text

Text is aligned along the left margin.

Notes

How to check whether term, keyword, etc is in correct case?
  1. Search article text for the term in question. Most likely you will find a few instances, which will give you understanding regarding correct capitalization. If this is not the case, check next points.

  2. Search PubMed site for the term in question.

  3. Search Google for the term in question.


Optional sections for Editorials

There are optional sections for Editorials that can appear after Keywords section and before Copyright section in this order: Abbreviations, Acknowledgments, Conflicts of Interest and Funding. |

Accepted variations for China
  • China

  • People’s Republic of China

  • PRC (or P.R.C.)

  • PR (or P.R.) China

Accepted variations for Taiwan
  • Taiwan

  • Republic of China

  • ROC (or R.O.C.)

  • Taiwan, Republic of China

  • Taiwan, ROC (or R.O.C.)

Accepted variations for Hong Kong
  • Hong Kong

  • Hong Kong SAR

Note

Taiwan and Hong Kong can optionally include China (or any of its allowed variations) as the ultimate country as long as consistency is maintained throughout the affiliations.


US State abbreviations

State

Abbr.

ALABAMA

AL

ALASKA

AK

ARIZONA

AZ

ARKANSAS

AR

CALIFORNIA

CA

COLORADO

CO

CONNECTICUT

CT

DELAWARE

DE

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

DC

FLORIDA

FL

GEORGIA

GA

HAWAII

HI

IDAHO

ID

ILLINOIS

IL

INDIANA

IN

IOWA

IA

KANSAS

KS

KENTUCKY

KY

LOUISIANA

LA

MAINE

ME

MARYLAND

MD

MASSACHUSETTS

MA

MICHIGAN

MI

MINNESOTA

MN

MISSISSIPPI

MS

MISSOURI

MO

MONTANA

MT

NEBRASKA

NE

NEVADA

NV

NEW HAMPSHIRE

NH

NEW JERSEY

NJ

NEW MEXICO

NM

NEW YORK

NY

NORTH CAROLINA

NC

NORTH DAKOTA

ND

OHIO

OH

OKLAHOMA

OK

OREGON

OR

PENNSYLVANIA

PA

RHODE ISLAND

RI

SOUTH CAROLINA

SC

SOUTH DAKOTA

SD

TENNESSEE

TN

TEXAS

TX

UTAH

UT

VERMONT

VT

VIRGINIA

VA

WASHINGTON

WA

WEST VIRGINIA

WV

WISCONSIN

WI

WYOMING

WY


Author Query Templates

Note

Please provide a PDF to the authors whenever you are contacting them about any potential changes to their paper. Depending on the situation and the amount of issues, mark the PDF to specifically show them where the issues are, and you can also add suggested edits when applicable. Abstain from sending the authors a Word doc to make changes unless it’s absolutely necessary. Let the authors know that they need to use “Track Changes” if a Word doc is being edited.

Email Title

Response Required - Aging MS XXXXX | PII XXXXXX - XX

Body

Dear Dr. XXX,

I have been working with your article, “XXX”, in preparation for its publication in Aging, and I have a few questions for you:

XXX

Please respond within 48 hours to accommodate our stringent production deadlines and ensure timely publication of your article.

Kind thanks,
XXX
PubMed Team

Issues

Alphabetical Figure Legend Panel Callouts

Each figure legend should be formatted so that the first instance of each panel letter is called out in alphabetical order (Ex. A, B, A, C, B, D).

Could you please use the attached PDF to mark the necessary changes to bring your paper into accordance with this standard? Keep in mind that changes made to the panel letters in the figure or the legend may affect in-text callouts throughout the rest of your paper as well.