Microbiology and Biotechnology Letters (MBL) is a journal devoted to the advancement and dissemination of scientific knowledge concerning microbiology, applied microbiology, biotechnology, bioprocess and related academic disciplines. Main topics covered by MBL: Food Microbiology (FM); Microbial Biotechnology (MB); Fermentation Microbiology (FM); Environmental Microbiology (EM); Molecular and Cellular Microbiology (MCM), Genome Reports, (the subcategories are available in detail online at http://www.mbl.or.kr/content/about/about_the_journal.html).
Originality, authorship, and copyright
The manuscripts submitted for publication must be previously unpublished research works written in Korean or English, which are not being considered for publication elsewhere. All the authors must have agreed to the submission and to the order of their names on the title page. They must also have agreed that the corresponding author may act on their behalf throughout the editorial review and publication process. The corresponding author is responsible for obtaining such agreement. Requests for changes in authorship (order of listing or addition or deletion of name) after submission should be accompanied by signed statements of agreement from all the parties involved. To maintain and protect the Society's ownership and rights, and to protect the original authors from misappropriations of their published work, author(s) are required to sign a Copyright Transfer Agreement, which will be sent to the corresponding author confirming receipt of the manuscript when a manuscript is accepted for publication. Unless this agreement is executed, KMB will not publish the manuscript.
Permissions
The author is responsible for acquiring the permission(s) to reproduce any copyrighted figures, tables, data, or text that are being used in the submitted paper. Authors should note that text quotation of more than 250 words from a published or copyrighted work will require grant of permission from the original publisher to reprint. The written permission letter(s) must be submitted together with the manuscript.
Ethics
All research involving human subjects must be performed in accordance with the ethical standards given in the Declaration of Helsinki and the research protocol must be approved by the author's institutional review board (IRB) prior to experiments. Experiments involving animals must be conducted in accordance with institution's or national research council's guidelines for the care and use of laboratory animals and must be approved by the author's institutional animal care and use committee (IACUC). Details of the ethical approval status of the research must be described in the Materials and Methods section of the manuscript, including the IRB and/or IACUC approval number. Eusure correct use of the terms sex (when reporting biological factors) and gender (identity, psychosocial or cultural factors), and unless inappropriate, report the sex and/or gender of study participants, the sex of animals or cells, and describe the methods used to determine sex and gender. If the study was done involving an exclusive population, for example in only cases (e.g., prostate cancer), authors should define how they determined race and ethnicity and justify their relevance. Authors should submit a document indicating approval of the research when submit the revised version of the manuscript.
Authorship
It is expected that the credit for authorship should be recognized based on the four criteria below: (1) substantial contributions to conception and design, acquisition of data, and analysis and interpretation of data; (2) drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content; (3) final approval of the version to be published; and (4) agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved. The corresponding author must provide author contribution statements in the manuscript. The corresponding author is also responsible for having ensured that all the listed authors have agreed to all of the contents, including the author list and author contribution statements, and have approved the manuscript submission to the journal, and for managing all communication between the journal and all co-authors, before and after publication.
Conflict of interest
Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology requires that all authors disclose any potential sources of conflict of interest. Any interest or relationship, financial or otherwise, that might be perceived as influencing an author's objectivity is considered a potential source of conflict of interest. These must be disclosed when directly relevant or indirectly related to the work that the authors describe in their manuscript. Potential sources of conflict of interest include but are not limited to patent or stock ownership, membership of a company board of directors, membership of an advisory board or committee for a company, and consultancy for or receipt of speaker's fees from a company. The existence of a conflict of interest does not preclude publication in this journal. If the authors have no conflict of interest to declare, they must also state this at submission. It is the responsibility of the corresponding author to review this policy with all authors and to collectively list in the manuscript (under the Acknowledgment section).
Sequence data
Manuscripts reporting new nucleotide and amino acid sequences should be accompanied by substantial additional experimentation to characterize the gene(s) and product(s) concerned, and/or substantial comparable analysis. A sequence alone is unlikely to be acceptable. Papers reporting new sequence data will not be published unless the sequence has an accession number from a recognized nucleotide database. GenBank/EMBL/DDBJ accession numbers should be included in the manuscript no later than the modification stage of the review process. The accession numbers should be included in a separate paragraph at the end of the Materials and Methods for Articles or at the end of the text for Notes (e.g., The GenBank/EMBL/DDBJ accession number of the sequence reported in this paper is A00000). Authors should follow "Sequence data format" (below) for preparation of nucleotide and amino acid sequence diagrams.
Page charges
Under the acceptance of publication, the page charge is US$30 (₩30,000) and US$50 (₩50,000) per each printed page, for active KMB members and non members in Korea, respectively. The whole charge for overseas authors is US$50 per manuscript. A bill for page charges will be sent with the galley proofs. The online version of the manuscript provides color figures free of charge while the print version will be produced in black-and-white. If figures are required to be printed in color, extra charges (₩200,000 per page) will be applied for the authors.
Editorial review and revision
All papers will be critically read by at least two or three peer-reviewers, selected for their competence in the subject area of the paper. Acceptance of the paper will depend upon its scientific merit and suitability for the journal. A paper may be accepted in its original form or subject to revision.
The reviewers' (and editor's) suggestions will be conveyed to the author, who will then have an opportunity to revise the paper. If a manuscript returned to an author for revision is held for longer than two months, or if revision is sufficiently extensive, then the date of receipt of the revised manuscript will be substituted for the initial date of receipt.
Proofs
Galley proofs (PDF format) for an accepted article will be sent by e-mail to the corresponding author for copyediting corrections. The core content of an article cannot be changed during galley proof reading. It is the author's responsibility to check the entire manuscript, including tables, figure legends, and cited reference numbers, not just items queried. The proofs should be corrected and mailed to the Editorial Office within 48 h of receipt in order to expedite publication. Only one set of corrections will be accepted. This means it is important to ensure all of your corrections are sent to us in one communication.
Reprints
Authors, including overseas authors, who wish to purchase reprints, are required to complete the Reprint Order Form, which will be sent with the galley proofs to corresponding authors. This form must be returned together with the corrected galley proofs. Reprints are supplied only in multiples of 30 for a fee of US$50 (₩50,000) per 30 copies, inclusive of shipping charge.
Membership in the KMB is not a prerequisite for submission and consideration of manuscripts. Authors are requested to submit their manuscripts electronically by using the MBL online manuscript submission system available http://www.mbl.or.kr. This site will guide authors stepwise through the submission process. The editorial office will acknowledge receipt of your manuscript within 24 hours of submission. Please contact the editorial office (mbl@mbl.or.kr) if you do not receive confirmation within this period of time. The "date of receipt" that appears in the published paper will be the date when the handling managing editor received the manuscript.
Revisions
Papers may be returned to authors for revision. Authors will be given eight weeks after receipt of the reviewers' comments to revise their paper. Revisions must be submitted via the online submission system, under the heading "Submit Manuscript Online." Click on the link "Submit a revised manuscript" then upload your revised files. Please do not submit the revision via email.
Resubmissions
Papers may be rejected but the authors are encouraged to resubmit the paper after additional experimental data are obtained. Resubmissions must be submitted via the online submission system under "Begin a new submission." The paper must be marked as a resubmission and list the handling editor and manuscript number of the original submission, in the cover letter. Please also provide a letter giving point-by-point responses to the referees of the previous version.
Prepare the text in Microsoft (MS) Word (6.0 or later version) or hwp or WordPerfect. Set the page size to have 2.5 cm margins on all sides. The font size should be no smaller than 12 points. Type every portion of the manuscript double spaced, including References and figure legends, and number all pages in sequence, including the abstract, figure legends and tables. The last two items should be placed after the Reference section. Manuscripts written in English should contain the title, author name(s), author affiliation(s) and the abstract in Korean following the Reference section. However, foreign authors are exempted. Korean papers should contain the title, author name(s), author affiliation(s) and the abstract and keywords in English and put Korean abstract after Results and Discussion section.
Manuscript pages should have line numbers. The text of your manuscript (including title page, abstract, main text, references, and figure legends) followed by tables and figures should be in a single word file for initial submission. Each figure should be labeled with a figure number. Standard fonts (Times New Roman, Times, or Courier), preferably Times New Roman should be used for the generation of text and Arial or Helvetica for the figures. Use the Symbol font and the "Insert Symbol" option from the menu bar for introducing symbols in MS Word. Authors can upload their articles as MS Word (6.0 or a later version) or hwp or WordPerfect. It is also possible to submit an article in a ready made Adobe Acrobat PDF format, but if the article is accepted, the original source files will be needed. Authors must then check the PDF conversion carefully to make sure that everything converted properly. This format is acceptable for reviewing purposes only. If your paper is accepted, you are then required to send the final version as source files including a separate Word file for text and graphic TIFF or EPS files. Manuscripts that do not follow the "File Formats" and "Organization and Styles of Manuscripts" (below) are not suitable for editorial review or publication, and will be returned to the author.
I. Articles
Articles are full-length research reports that contain detailed descriptions of experimental work, with clear interpretation and discussion of the theoretical and experimental results and data. Articles should be structured under the section headings Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, Discussion, Acknowledgment, Nomenclature/Appendix (if applicable), and References. Authors should present their material with utmost clarity and conciseness and in a logical manner. Constant repetition of experimental procedures, information, and facts among sections should be avoided. The average length of a published Article should be approximately six printed page long including tables and figures.
The organization shown below should be followed (in the order given):
Title page
· title of the paper
· author name(s)
· author affiliation(s)
· address(es) of the institution(s) at which the work was performed
· name, postal and E-mail addresses, and phone and fax numbers of the corresponding author to whom the revision or galley proofs of the paper is to be sent
· a brief running title (not to exceed 54 characters and spaces)
With regard to titles, avoid the main title: subtitle arrangement, declarative titles, complete sentence constructions, and unnecessary use of articles. Because each manuscript should present results of independent and cohesive study, numbered series titles are not allowed. The running title will be considered during compilation of the subject index and will be at the top of each printed page.
Place an asterisk after the name of the author to whom inquiries regarding the paper should be directed.
The affiliation address for each author should be indicated by superscript Arabic numbers (1, 2, 3, etc).
Abstract
Articles must include an Abstract of 250 words or fewer. The Abstract should not repeat information already present in the title. It should be suitable for direct inclusion in Current Contents, Chemical Abstracts, and Biological Abstracts, etc.
Key words
Immediately after the abstract, provide a maximum of 6 keywords. Please avoid general terms, multiple concepts (avoid, for example, "and" "of"), and abbreviations. Only abbreviations firmly established in the field may be eligible.
Introduction
The Introduction presents the purpose of the studies reported and their relationship to earlier work in the field. It should not be an extensive review of the literature. Use only those references required to provide the most salient background to allow the readers to understand and evaluate the purpose and results of the present study without referring to previous publications on the topic.
Materials and Methods
The Materials and Methods section should be brief but include sufficient technical information to allow the experiments to be repeated by a qualified reader. Only new methods should be described in detail. Cite previously published procedures in References.
Results
The Results section should include the rationale or design of the experiments as well as the results of the experiments. Results can be presented in figures, tables, and text. Reserve extensive discussion of the results for the Discussion section
Discussion
The Discussion section should focus on the interpretation of the results rather than a repetition of the Results section. The Results and Discussion sections may be combined into one section when substantial redundancy cannot be avoided in two separate sections or if a long discussion is not warranted.
Acknowledgments
Place Acknowledgments, including information on the source of any financial support received for the work being published, before the References.
References
Endnote Style
Effective January 2017, MBL announces a new reference style. This new style uses bibliography sorted by citation order, not by alphabetical order. Use of this style will make referencing easier for authors, and will facilitate readability to readers.
Please refer the instruction to Authors and make the references section according to the changed reference style when you submit your manuscript to MBL in the future.
The EndNote style of the new reference listing format is available from MBL website and the instruction to Authors. However, we encourage the authors to check the final reference list before submission. The MBL EndNote style does not provide automatic italicized generic name of microorganisms and genes.
Arrange the reference list in the order of their appearance in the main text, and then number the list consecutively.
Cite listed references in the text by their list number in square brackets (e.g., [1, 4, 10]), not by author name/year. The author(s) must check the accuracy of all reference numbers, as the MBL will not be responsible for incorrect in-text reference citations.
Abbreviate journal names according to the PubMed Entrez Journals database (available at https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez). The referencing styles shown in the examples below should be used for books (1), specific chapters in books (2), journal articles (3), and websites (4), respectively:
1. Brock, TD, Madigan MT. Madigan. 1988. Biology of Microorganisms, pp. 42-59. 5th Ed. Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey.
2. Gershon AA, Russa P La, Steinberg SP. Steinberg. 1999. Varicella-zoster virus, pp. 900-911.
In Murray PR, Baron EJ, Pfaller MA, Tenover FC, Yolken RH (eds.), Manual of
Clinical Microbiology, 7th Ed. American Society of Microbiology, Washington, D.C.
3. Lee YH, Park JS. 2004. Evaluation of operational conditions and power consumption
of bioattritor for enzymatic saccharification of uncooked starch. J. Microbiol. Biotechnol. 14: 351-357.
4. Kirkman TW. 1996. Statistics to Use. Available from http://www. physics.csbsju.edu/stats/. Accessed Nov. 20, 2011.
References to papers accepted for publication but not yet published should show the journal name and, if known, the probable year of publication, and state "in press."
The following types of references are not valid for listing in the References section:
· unpublished data
· personal communication
· manuscripts in preparation or submitted
· pamphlets
· abstracts
· patents
· newsletters
· material that has not been subjected to peer review.
References to such sources should be made parenthetically in the text (e.g., Lee YH et al. 1989. Abstr. Annu. Meet. Kor. Soc. Appl. Microbiol. Seoul, Korea, p. 159).
Figure legends
Figure legends should contain a brief description of the experiments so that the figure can be understood without reference to the body of the text. However, the legend should not repeat Materials and Methods or contain interpretive statements.
Tables
Tables should be typewritten separately from the main text and in an appropriate font size to preferably fit each table on a separate page. Each table must be numbered with Arabic numerals (e.g., Table 1, Table 2) and include a title. Place footnotes to tables below the table body and indicate them with superscript lowercase letters (a, b, c, etc), not symbols. Do not use vertical rulings in the tables. Each column in a table must have a heading, and abbreviations, when necessary, should be defined in the footnotes
Figures
Figures should be provided separately from the main text. Use Arabic numerals to number all figures (e.g., Figure 1, Figure 2) according to their sequence in the text. The figure number must appear well outside the boundaries of the image itself. Multipart figures should be numbered in uppercase and bold font letters (A, B, C, etc) without parenthesis, both on the figure itself and in the figure legends.
Note that figures may have to be reduced in size to fit the one-column (84 mm) or two-column (176 mm) space of the printed page, as determined by the journal designer. Original figures, especially line drawings, must therefore contain fonts and other detail that are large and clear enough to be legible even after a 50% reduction in size. Line drawings must be a minimum of 0.5 mm thickness for clear reproduction. The preferred symbols for graphs are ○, ●, □, ■, △, ▲, ▽, ▼. Where possible, the same symbol should be used for the same quantity in different figures. Simple bar diagrams re- porting only a few values are usually unnecessary; the data can normally be given in a few lines of text. It is editorial policy not to publish bar diagrams with "three-dimensional" bars unless there is a specific justification for their use. Tints should not be used as shading for bars.
All figures should be created with applications that are capable of preparing high resolution TIFF or EPS files acceptable for publication. All figures should be embedded at the end of text in a single Word or PDF file when you initially submit manuscript. If your paper is accepted, we will require submission of figures as separate TIFF or EFS files at publication quality resolution. Blurred images will not be accepted. Diagrams and photographs submitted in electronic format must be of the following minimum resolutions:
The author(s) will be required to pay for reproduction of color photographs. The cost is US$200 (₩200,000) for each illustration containing color. Any figures submitted in color will be reviewed and processed with the understanding that the figure will be published in color. The mode of the TIFF or EPS file must be CMYK, not RGB.
II. Notes
Notes are short reports for the presentation of brief observation that have insufficient material to fulfill the structure of a full-length article. They are intended for reporting preliminary studies or brief studies of a descriptive nature. Notes should be arranged in the same way as Articles, except that the Introduction, Results, and Discussion sections are in a combined section with no section headings. The abstract should not exceed 100 words. The main text should follow the logical flow of a structured article and should not exceed 1,200 words; the total number of figures and tables should not exceed four. Notes should be approximately 3-4 printed page long. The References section is identical to that of Articles. Notes are subjected to review.
III. Reviews
Authoritative and critical Reviews of the current state of knowledge regarding any aspect of microbiology and biotechnology are preferred. They must be based on original articles, and may address subjects within the scope of the MBL.
Reviews should be divided into sections with appropriate headings. The format of the References section is identical to that of Articles. While there is no limitation on the length of a Review, it is recommended that a standard Review comprises no more than the equivalent of 12 printed journal pages, including display items and references. References should number no more than 80. If, for a particular reason, an author wishes to exceed or diverge from these guidelines significantly, they should contact the Production Editor (mbl@mbl.or.kr) before submitting a manuscript. Unsolicited reviews will be considered but are subject to the approval of the Editor-in-Chief and will be accepted only under special circumstances.
Reviews will be subjected to an independent peer review, and the Editor-in-Chief may request changes or decide not to proceed with publication.
Nomenclatures and abbreviations for chemical and biochemical agents, microorganisms, enzymes, proteins, and genes should follow the Instruction to Authors for journals published by the American Society for Microbiology (available online at http://journals.asm.org/).
For nomenclature of restriction enzymes, DNA methytransferases, homing endonucleases, and their genes, refer to the article by Roberts et al. (Nucleic Acid Res. 31:1805-1812, 2003)
The MBL follows the same nomenclature for viruses as the Journal of Virology, and more detailed information can be found in the instruction to author of that journal (available online at http://jvi.asm.org/).
All abbreviations should be defined at their first use in the text only; do not repeat the definition of abbreviations thereafter
Note that the MBL uses the following specific design styles(Nomenclature, abbreviations, units and symbols):
Table 1. Abbreviations
Name | memo | Name | memo |
DNA | Deoxyribonucleic acid | NADP+ | Nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate, oxidized |
cDNA | Complementary DNA | Poly(A) and poly(dT), etc. | Polyadenylic acid and polydeoxythymidylic acid, etc. |
RNA | Ribonucleic acid | Oligo(dT), etc. | Oligodeoxythymidylic acid, etc. |
cRNA | Complementary RNA | UV | Ultraviolet |
RNase | Ribonuclease | PFU | Plaque-forming units |
DNase | Deoxyribonuclease | CFU | Colony-forming units |
rRNA | Ribosomal RNA | MIC | Minimal inhibitory concentration |
mRNA | Messenger RNA | Tris | Tris[hydroxymethyl] aminomethane |
tRNA | Transfer RNA | DEAE | Diethylaminoethyl |
AMP, ADP, ATP, dAMP, ddATP, and GTP, etc. | For the respective 5' phosphates of adenosine and other nucleosides | EDTA | Ethylenediamine tetraacetic acid |
ATPase and dGTPase, etc. | Adenosine triphosphatase and deoxyguanosine triphosphatase, etc. | EGTA | Ethylene glycol-bis[β-aminoethyl ether]-N,N,N',N'-tetraacetic acid |
NAD | Nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide | HEPES | N-2-hydroxyethyl piperazine-N'-2-ethanesulfonic acid |
NAD+ | Nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide, oxidized | PCR | Polymerase chain reaction |
NADH | Nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide | AIDS | Acquired immune deficiency syndrome |
NADPH | Nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate |
Table 2. Multiplying SI Prefixes
Factor | Prefix | Symbol |
101 | deca | da |
102 | hecto | h |
103 | kilo | k |
106 | mega | M |
109 | giga | G |
1012 | Tera | T |
1015 | peta | P |
1018 | exa | E |
1021 | zetta | Z |
1024 | yotta | Y |
10-1 | deci | d |
10-2 | centi | c |
10-3 | milli | m |
10-6 | micro | μ |
10-9 | nano | n |
10-12 | pico | p |
10-15 | femto | f |
10-18 | atto | a |
10-21 | zepto | z |
10-24 | yocto | y |
Table 3. SI-Derived Units
Name | Symbol | Quantity | In terms of other units |
In terms of SI based units |
becquerel | Bq | activity (of a radionuclide) | - | s-1 |
coulomb | C | quantity of electricity, electric charge | - | s·A |
farad | F | capacitance | C/V | m-2·kg-1·s4·A2 |
gray | Gy | absorbed dose, kerma, specific energy imparted | J/kg | m2·s-2 |
henry | H | inductance | Wb/A | m2·kg·s-2·A-2 |
hertz | Hz | frequency | - | S-1 |
joule | J | energy, work, quantity of heat | N·m | m2·kg·s-2 |
lumen | lm | luminous flux | cd·sr | m2·m-2·cd=cd |
lux | lx | illuminance | lm/m2 | m2·m-4·cd=m-2·cd |
newton | N | force | - | m·kg·S-2 |
ohm | Ω | electric resistance | V/A | m2·kg·S-3·A-2 |
pascal | Pa | pressure, stress | N/m2 | m-1·kg·S-2 |
siemens | S | conductance | A/V | m-2·kg-1·s3·A2 |
sievert | Sv | dose equivalent | J/kg | m2·s-2 |
tesla | T | magnetic flux density | Wb/m2 | kg·s-2·A-1 |
volt | V | electric potential, potential difference, electromotive force | W/A | m2·kg·s-3·A-1 |
watt | W | power, radiant flux | J/s | m2·kg·s-3 |
weber | Wb | magnetic flux | V·s | m2·kg·s-2·A-1 |
Diagrams of nucleotide and amino acid sequences should be prepared in the most effective layout. The layout should be designed to fit the journal page economically, i.e. to fill either the full width of the page (176 mm) or a single column (84 mm). The height of the characters should be about 1.5-2 mm (or 6-8 point). For sequence data at full-page width with this size of type, a layout with 80-100 nucleotides per line is appropriate (or 60-70 if there are spaces between the codons). A single-column layout would ideally fit 50-60 nucleotides per line. If possible, lines of nucleic acid sequence should be subdivided into blocks of 10 or 20 nucleotides by spaces within the sequences or by marks above it. There should not be too much space between the lines of sequence. Use of the single-letter amino acid code is preferred.
MICROARRAY DATA
Data from microarray gene expression studies must comply with the MIAME guidelines
(see http://www.mged.org/Workgroups/MIAME/miame.html).
MANUSCRIPT CHECKLIST
It is hoped that this list will be useful during the final checking of your manuscript prior to submitting it to the journal for review. Ensure that the following items are present:
Hyun Ju Kim, Min Sung Kwon, Hyelyeon Hwang, Ha-Sun Choi, WooJe Lee, Sang-Pil Choi, Haeun Jo, and Sung Wook Hong
Microbiol. Biotechnol. Lett. 2023;51: 353-373 https://doi.org/10.48022/mbl.2310.10011Anish Kumar Sharma and Jyotsana Pandit
Microbiol. Biotechnol. Lett. 2023;51: 374-389 https://doi.org/10.48022/mbl.2308.08011Tel :
+82-2-3454-6010
Fax :
+82-2552-4732
E-mail :
mbl@mbl.or.kr