Submissions

Author Guidelines

Instructions To Authors Manuscripts (in English and single spaced), together with a cover letter from the author responsible for all correspondence, should be submitted via the online submission process, as a file saved in Microsoft Word.doc or docx. Spelling, punctuation, sentence structure, spacing, length, and consistency of usage in form and descriptions should be checked before submission. Please also check References for accuracy. Ensure that all figures and tables are mentioned in the text, and that all references are cited in the text.

Type of Manuscripts: The Journal of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences (JPPS) publishes research articles, research reports, technical notes, scientific commentaries, news, views and review articles in the physical, chemical, biological, biotechnical, clinical, and socioeconomic-pharmacoeconomic, regulatory aspects of the pharmaceutical sciences.

Formulation development studies are only acceptable if they provide a clear advancement in the field. Applying known formulation techniques to another drug does not suffice.

A study of natural products will not be accepted if it only reports the pharmacological data of a certain plant or plant extracts. Identification and separation of potential active ingredients coupled with carefully planned pharmacological studies may be acceptable. In addition, attention to the time- and storage-dependent stabilities will be scrutinized.

Medicinal chemistry papers will be considered if new classes of drugs are studied with reasonle tarionales, or if there is a strong rationale for developing a new derivative of an old drug. Clear identification and separation of the compounds are needed. Mere synthesis of another derivative will not suffice.

Routine bioequivalence studies, i.e., a comparison of the bioavailability of two or more products, will not be accepted for publication.

Analytical method development for formulations will not be acceptable unless it contains experiments with sufficient scientific rigor and breakthrough data.

For Western blot experiments, i) all individual traces must be provided as a supplementary file. In the main text representative traces will suffice. ii) The image should cover sufficient area around the band of interest; ideally one molecular weight marker above and one below the band. iii) The image should show the background information. iv) Bands recorded simultaneously should be shown in the same figure. v) Breaks must be placed between more than two gels recorded in different times if they are shown on the same figure. 

For population PK and/or PD studies, provide a supplemental documents file that includes the appropriate goodness-of-fit plots.

Submission of the author's CV along with unsolicitaded Review article including systematic reviews, will be very useful as will expedite the process.

* * * English Proof Reading and Writing Manuscript will be accepted only when the writing style and the use English language are deemed appropriate. Authors may choose to contact editing services such as those listed below with full realization that the Journal accept no responsibility or liability regarding the service rendered and its associated business transaction.

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The submission will be a single Word.doc including the title page, the main body of the manuscript, tables and figures at appropriate locations. When possile, insert illustrations at their appropriate spot within the paper. The file name should include your last (family) name and a keyword from the title of your manuscript. 

Format: For each section, the sub-title appears as BOLD CAPITAL, and subsequent titles as Bold Sentence and then, if required, Bold Italic Sentence. Text should be set in Times New Roman font, 11 point. Leave only one (1) space after periods. Start new paragraphs with an indent except for the first paragraph after a title. Do not use spaces to create indents. Use line returns only at the end of paragraphs and do put blank lines between paragraphs. Use the Symbol font for symbols and special characters. Do not use equation editors or footnoting utilities in your files. Equations should be numbered consecutively with Arabic numerals in parentheses on the right hand side of the page. Number pages (bottom, centre). Use proper Superscripts and Subscripts, not raised or lowered text.

Title Page: The title page should include the title of the article, author's name with full first name (no degrees), and author’s affiliation. The affiliation should comprise the department, institution (usually university or company), city, and state (or nation) and should be typed as a footnote to the author's name. For office purposes, the title page should include the name and complete mailing address including country, and email address of the one author designated to review proofs. The title page should start below the top margin, be single-spaced, and no space left before the Abstract.

Abstract: A structured abstract of fewer than 300 words is required of research articles and reports and should be arranged, in one paragraph, under the following headings: PURPOSE, METHODS, RESULTS, CONCLUSIONS. Review articles also require an abstract, which need not be organized under these headings. The purpose of a structured abstract is to assist authors in organizing their thoughts - not only to highlight their work, but also to aid readers to grasp quickly the essence of the paper.

Novelty of the Work: Provide a brief description of not more than four short sentences regarding the novelty of the paper in the cover letter.

The Main Body of the Manuscript: This section must contain Introduction, Methods, Results and Discussion. Do not combine Results and Discussion unless instructed by the Editor.

Under INTRODUCTION clearly state the novelty of the work.

Ethics in Animal and Clinical Investigations: Investigations using experimental animals must adhere to the ''Guide to the Care and Use of Experimental Animal Care" (Canadian Council on Animal Care guidelines, 1984). All papers containing animal data must Include a statement from your university's Animal Ethics Committee approving your protocol. Investigations with human subjects must follow the Declaration of Helsinki guidelines (1964) and be approved by the institutional human experimentation committee, or equivalent, and have signed in-formed consent. Ethics Approval for Animal and Human Studies: Statement that approval has been received must be included under the METHODS Section.

Statistical Approach: The number of repeat measurements and the variance of the means must be clearly depicted in the texts and in the illustrations. Reasonable significant figures (usually three) must be used as elaborated in Levy G. Significant figures or significant nonsense? Clin Pharmacol Ther, 59:363, 1996 or Wikipedia.

The significant figures (SF) of a number is all certain digits plus the first uncertain digit. For example, if an assay has a sensitivity of 1 mg/L, a concentration of 32.32 mg/L has one extra uncertain and unnecessary figure. Hence, it should be reported as 32.3 which contains three SFs. See below for calculation of SFs: - 31 has 2 SF - 301 has 3 SFs - 0.022 has 2 SFs (leading zeros don’t count - 4.300 has 4 SFs (trailing zeros after decimal point count) - 310 has 3 SFs (rounded off since a trailing zero with no decimal point is ambiguous).

For comparison among more than one mean, tests such as ANOVA must be use followed by an appropriate post hoc, e.g., Duncan’s Multiple Range or Tukey’s. The Student’s t-test is not appropriate for such assessments neither as the main nor as the post hoc tool. Label means, numerical or graphical, with characters as shown below. In the legends insert ‘Different characters indicate significant differences”.

In the above example, different character indicate significant difference, and the same character means no significant difference. i.e., bars labeled ‘a’ are not different from each other but different from ‘b’, ‘c’ and ‘d’ bars. A bar may have two different characters, e.g., the last bar is not significantly different from other ‘b’ or ‘c’ bars.

Figures: Figures should be numbered in one consecutive series of Arabic numerals in the order in which they are cited in the text, and designed to fit the column or page size of the Journal. All parts of a figure must be “grouped” with no segmented text box. Left justify the title below the figure (bold font). Keys to symbols should be a part of the figure, and not a part of the caption. Use the same typeface for all figures. Labels should be in title case. Figure legends should be informative and self-explanatory.

Tables: Tables should be numbered consecutively (with Arabic numerals), referred to by number in the text and designed to fit the column or page size of the Journal. Prepare numerical illustrations (e.g., tables) using the "table" function (rows and columns). Do not make table using text functions such as tabs, spaces or lines. Hide lines except under the column headings. Left justify the title above the table (bold font). Captions should be typed separately. Table legends should be informative and self-explanatory.

Footnotes: Footnotes should be avoided. When their use is necessary, footnotes should be numbered consecutively using Arabic numerals and should be typed at the bottom of the page to which they refer. Place a line above the footnote, so that it is set off from the text.

Abbreviations: Try to use abbreviations sparingly. When used extensively, provide a list of all non-standard abbreviations on a separate page before the reference section. Use the metric system for all measurements without periods (cm, ml, s). Define all symbols used in equations and formulas. When symbols are used extensively, include a list of all symbols in the notation section. Do not abbreviate the word "Figure" or "Table" in titles or text.

References: References should be numbered consecutively in the order in which they are cited in the text. Cite in the text by the appropriate Arabic numeral enclosed in parentheses, e.g., (1) or (2-5), not super or sub scripted. References to unpublished personal communications should be avoided. Use ( ) for reference citation in the text. Place punctuation AFTER the reference. For each reference, use a single continuous paragraph with no extra space or line break. Do not use "add-ins" such as EndNotes. Abbreviations for journal names should conform to those in the Bibliographic Guide for Editors and Authors (American Chemical Society, Washington, D.C.).

*** All references musl also contain DOI code when available.

Although CSPS accepts various reference formats, the Vancouver style is preferred. Alternatively,the references should conform to the following style and punctuation:

-- Journal Article: Davies NM, Jamali F. COX-2 selective inhibitors cardiac toxicity: Getting to the heart of the matter. J Pharm Pharm Sci, 2004; 7:332-336.

-- Book: Mutschler, E.; Derendorf, H., Drug Actions, Basic Principles and Therapeutic Aspects. CRC, Ann Arbor, MI, USA, 1995.

-- Contribution to a Book: Jamali, F., Stereochemically Pure Drugs: An Overview, in Wainer IW: Drayer D (eds), Drug Stereochemistry: Analytical Methods and Pharmacology. 2nd ed., Marcel Dekker, INC, New York, NY, pp 375-384, 1993.

Acknowledgments: All acknowledgments (including those for grant and financial support) should be typed in one paragraph directly preceding the reference section. Authors of manuscripts submitted to JPPS are requested to state the source of all funding that enabled the research described to be undertaken.

Conflict of interest: Declare any actual or perceived conflicts of interest on the part of any author

Author contributions: Describe each author's contributions to the manuscript.

Manuscript Submission: Manuscripts will be received by Online Submission. Manuscripts are reviewed anonymously by independent referees. To facilitate the review process, the authors should submit supplementary material such as a cited accepted (but not published) paper, which may be required for assessment of the submitted manuscript. Careful preparation of manuscripts and subsequent review of page proofs are essential, as the authors are responsible for all statements and content.

Reviewing Process: Manuscripts will be subjected to an initial editorial review. The aim of this task of editors wil be to decide whether the manuscript is suitable for consideration for further process. At this stage, the suitability of the manuscript for the Journal’s readership, the importance, novelty and scientific rigor of the manuscript are considered.  If the manuscript is to be declined, the authors will receive a quick email indicating the editorial decision. Submissions that pass this stage will be assigned by the editor to a specific associate editor who through the Journal’s database, or other means, will choose external reviewers.  

The selection of the reviewers will be based on factors such as expertise, professional reputation, authors’ recommendations and editors' own knowledge of a reviewer. The authors can exclude any associate editor or reviewer upon request. Reviewers are asked to declare any conflict of interest regarding the authors and/or the contents of the paper. This is a blinded process so that the reviewers’ identities are anonymous unless she/he indicates otherwise. However, the reviewer will have access to the authors identity.

Upon receiving reviewers’ reports, the associate editor will decide to accept, ask for revisions, reject, or ask for resubmission for another review. The reviewers’ comments will be shared with the authors regardless of the decision. Attempts will be made to complete the process in four weeks. In addition, for manuscript with substantial language issues, may be recommended to use the service of any professional language editor. This may add to the length of time a manuscript is under review.

The final decision is made by the associate editor who will inform the authors of the outcome of the review. During the entire process, the authors will have access to the manuscript’s review page that will clearly indicate the status of the submission. Any request for appeal or reconsideration should be directed to the editor-in-chief who will decide regarding grounds for such a requests, and/or process involved.

Upon acceptance, the manuscript will be formatted and galley will be sent to the author for proof-reading. The proof-read formatted manuscript will be posted as soon as it goes through a final inspection. Manuscripts will be assigned to an issue which, upon closure, will be reported to PubMed for listing.

Manscripts will be subjected to active plagiarism screening during the reviewing process.

Copyright and Reference Citation: Submitted manuscripts must not be published previously or be currently under consideration for publication elsewhere. Acceptance of a manuscript for publication in the Journal will automatically place the manuscript under the terms and conditions of Creative Commons license (Attribution-ShareAlike). Authors must cite the source of any quotation or statement inserted in the manuscript.

Authors must obtain permission from publisher for any illustration and table copied or adapted from a published material. Such permissions must arrive in the Journal office via direct e-mail or fax from the publisher or original letter before the manuscript can be published.

Authors must cite the source of any quotation or statement inserted in the manuscript.