Abstract

The abstract provides the outline of the hypothesis and the experimental outcomes of the article. No specific results need to be quoted. It must be a single paragraph, no longer than 250 words. If after copyediting the abstract is still too long, notify the author and request a shorter abstract. Note that Medline cuts off all abstracts longer than 250 words.

Author names are written in the same form as they appear in the author line. Use spelled-out names or initials, per author line. The first author's name is inverted, with the surname first, followed by a comma.

The bibliographic data (metadata) are run into the text of the abstract, separated by an em-dash.

Lenihan, Daniel J., Abdulfatah Osman, Vissa Sriram, Julius Aitsebaomo, and Cam Patterson. Evidence for association of coronary sinus levels of hepatocyte growth factor and collateralization in human coronary disease. Am J Physiol Heart Circ Physiol 284: H1507–H1512, 2003. First published January 9, 2003; 10.1152/ajpheart.00429.2002.—The therapeutic use of angiogenic factors to protect ischemic myocardium is limited by . . .

Am J Heart Circ Physiol 284: H1507–H1412, 2003

Abbreviations in the text of the abstract are permitted. Spell out the term at first mention and follow with abbreviation in parentheses. For long but understandable terms, such as some drug names, undefined abbreviations may be used even if the term appears only once in the abstract, to cut down on word count. If needed, you may abbreviate in the abstract terms that are not abbreviated in text.

Exceptions

There is no em-dash after the citation in Journal of Neurophysiology abstracts.

NIPS articles do not have abstracts as such. The author instead provides a brief summary, which is set in italics.

For Advances articles, the citation goes at the end of the abstract, rather than at the beginning. Only the journal name, volume, page range, year, date of first publication, and DOI number are used. The citation should be in all caps, italic. The copy editor should denote the citation with the «jnl» code (see Using the Toolkit, below).

Abstracts in Physiological Reviews run the width of the page, rather than a single column; the word limit for abstracts is therefore not as strictly enforced.

References in the Abstract

References may not be cited by number in the abstract. If a reference is cited, you must include the entire author list with initials, the journal name in italics, the volume, the page numbers, and the year (the article title is omitted for the sake of brevity.) Query author if the information is not complete.

Figures or tables may not be mentioned. Do not include figure or table callouts.

Using the Toolkit

Use the «abs2» at the beginning of an abstract, unless the article is an invited review.

Insert the «t» code to break between the authors and the article title in the bibliographical data at the beginning of the abstract. Although it is not strictly necessary to start a new paragraph at the «t» code, the ARRANGE option in ABRA will insert a paragraph break if you have not.

Use the «jnl» code at the beginning of the bibliographical data in an Advances abstract. Although the citation should be set in italics in proof, there is no need to do this at manuscript stage; the «jnl» code will signal the printer to italicize the text.

Abstracts for invited reviews are set as a single column centered on the page, followed by the text in two columns. Copy editors must use the «abs» code to indicate to the printer that the abstract is to be set this way. Although this does not make the copyediting process substantially different, it may have an effect when judging the length of the abstract.