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About Herpesviridae

Aims and scope | Open access | Article-processing charges | Indexing services | Publication and peer review process | Editorial policies | Citing articles in Herpesviridae | Why publish your article in Herpesviridae?

This page includes information about the aims and scope of Herpesviridae, editorial policies, open access and article-processing charges, the peer review process and other information. For details of how to prepare and submit a manuscript through the online submission system, please see the instructions for authors.

Aims & scope

Herpesviridae is an open access journal created by scientists in the field, publishing high quality articles that contribute to the overall knowledge of the role of herpes viruses in health and disease.

The eight viruses belonging to the family of human Herpesviridae are: Herpes simplex 1 and 2, Cytomegalovirus, Epstein-Barr virus, Varicella-Zoster and Human herpes virus 6, 7 and 8. The ability to establish life-long latency after primary infection is a common denominator for these large species-specific DNA viruses, as is their ability to reactivate during life and cause morbidity and mortality. These viruses are endemic worldwide and many of them are carried by 70-100% of the world's population. Recognition of the significance of herpes viruses as potential pathogens has increased during the past three decades, due to the escalation in the number of patients undergoing immunosuppressive therapy following organ or bone marrow transplantation, as well as to the increasing incidence of AIDS. The ability of these viruses to control various cellular and immunological functions in order to ensure their survival has focused attention on the potential role of these viruses in the development of vascular and autoimmune syndromes as well as various cancers.

Herpesviridae also welcomes studies on animal herpes viruses as well as studies utilizing animal models to gain knowledge of the role of herpes viruses in health and disease.

Open access

All articles published by Herpesviridae are made freely and permanently accessible online immediately upon publication, without subscription charges or registration barriers. Further information about open access can be found here.

Authors of articles published in Herpesviridae are the copyright holders of their articles and have granted to any third party, in advance and in perpetuity, the right to use, reproduce or disseminate the article, according to the BioMed Central copyright and license agreement.

Article-processing charges

Open access publishing is not without costs. Herpesviridae therefore levies an article-processing charge of £1115/$1685/€1305 for each article accepted for publication. We routinely waive charges for authors from low-income countries. Generally, if the submitting author's institution is a Member the cost of the article-processing charge is covered by the membership, and no further charge is payable. In the case of authors whose institutions are Supporter Members, however, a discounted article-processing charge is payable by the author. For further details, see our article-processing charge page. A limited number of waivers for article-processing charges are also available at the editors' discretion, and authors wishing to apply for these waivers should contact the editors.

Indexing services

All articles published in Herpesviridae are included in:

  • CAS
  • Index Copernicus
  • PubMed
  • PubMed Central

The full text of all research articles is deposited in digital archives including e-Depot (The Netherlands).

BioMed Central is working closely with Thomson Reuters (ISI) to ensure that citation analysis of articles published in Herpesviridae will be available.

Publication and peer review process

Criteria for publication

Herpesviridae considers the following types of articles:

  • Research: reports of data from original research.
  • Short reports: brief reports of data from original research.
  • Reviews: comprehensive, authoritative, descriptions of any subject within the scope of Herpesviridae. Reviews can cover any topical themes such as basic science and clinical reviews, ethics, pro/con debates, equipment reviews and thematic series to highlight specific topics in the field. They are often written by experts in the field, invited by the Editorial Board.
  • Commentaries: short, focused and opinionated articles on any subject within the scope of Herpesviridae. These articles are usually related to a contemporary issue, such as recent research findings, and may be commissioned from opinion leaders in the field.
  • Case reports: reports of clinical cases that can be educational, describe a diagnostic or therapeutic dilemma, suggest an association, or present an important adverse reaction. All case report articles should indicate that informed consent to publish the information was granted from the patients or their guardians.
  • Meeting report: a short description of a conference that the author has attended, which focuses on the key developments presented and discussed at the meeting.
  • Letters to the Editor: these can take three forms: a substantial re-analysis of a previously published article, a substantial response to such a re-analysis from the authors of the original publication, or an article that may not cover 'standard research' but that may be relevant to readers.

Peer-review policies

Herpesviridae operates a ‘closed’ peer review system.

After being screened for suitability, manuscripts submitted to Herpesviridae are reviewed by two experts selected by the Editors, with the aim of reaching a decision as soon as possible. Reviewers are required to declare any competing interests and are asked to submit their reports within 10 days. Overall the Editors of Herpesviridae aim to reach a decision on a manuscript within four weeks.

After receipt of the recommendation from the reviewers, the Editors-in-Chief decide whether to accept (outright or subject to revisions) or reject manuscripts. The authors are then given three months with which to revise their manuscript.

Authors will be able to check the progress of their manuscript through the submission system at any time by logging into My Herpesviridae, a personalized section of the site.

Reprints

High-quality, bound reprints can be purchased for all articles published. Please see our reprints website for further information about ordering reprints.

Supplements

Herpesviridae will consider supplements based on proceedings (full articles or meeting abstracts), reviews or research. All articles submitted for publication in supplements are subject to peer review. Published supplements are fully searchable and freely accessible online and can also be produced in print. For further information, please contact us.

Editorial policies

All manuscripts submitted to Herpesviridae should adhere to BioMed Central's editorial policies.

Citing articles in Herpesviridae

Articles in Herpesviridae should be cited in the same way as articles in a traditional journal. Because articles are not printed, they do not have page numbers; instead, they are given a unique article number.

Article citations follow this format:

Authors: Title. Herpesviridae [year], [volume number]:[article number].

e.g. Roberts LD, Hassall DG, Winegar DA, Haselden JN, Nicholls AW, Griffin JL: Increased hepatic oxidative metabolism distinguishes the action of Peroxisome Proliferator-Activated Receptor delta from Peroxisome Proliferator-Activated Receptor gamma in the Ob/Ob mouse. Herpesviridae 2009, 1:115.

refers to article 115 from Volume 1 of the journal.

Why publish your article in Herpesviridae?

High visibility

Herpesviridae's open access policy allows maximum visibility of articles published in the journal as they are available to a wide, global audience. Articles that have been especially highly accessed are highlighted with a 'Highly accessed' graphic, which appears on the journal's contents pages and search results.

Speed of publication

Herpesviridae offers a fast publication schedule whilst maintaining rigorous peer review; all articles must be submitted online, and peer review is managed fully electronically (articles are distributed in PDF form, which is automatically generated from the submitted files). Articles are published with their final citation immediately upon acceptance in a provisional PDF form. The article will subsequently be published in both fully browsable web form, and as a formatted PDF; the article will then be available through Herpesviridae and BioMed Central.

Flexibility

Online publication in Herpesviridae gives authors the opportunity to publish large datasets, large numbers of color illustrations and moving pictures, to display data in a form that can be read directly by other software packages so as to allow readers to manipulate the data for themselves, and to create all relevant links (for example, to PubMed, to sequence and other databases, and to other papers).

Promotion and press coverage

Articles published in Herpesviridae are included in article alerts and regular email updates. Some may be included in abstract books mailed to academics and are highlighted on Herpesviridae's pages and on the BioMed Central homepage.

In addition, articles published in Herpesviridae may be promoted by press releases to the general or scientific press. These activities increase the exposure and number of accesses for articles published in Herpesviridae. A list of articles recently press-released by journals published by BioMed Central is available here.

Authors of articles published in Herpesviridae retain the copyright of their articles and are free to reproduce and disseminate their work (for further details, see the BioMed Central copyright and license agreement).

For further information about the advantages of publishing in a journal from BioMed Central, please click here.