INSTRUCTIONS  FOR  AUTHORS |  PDF  | Protistology is one of the five “organism-oriented” journals for researchers of protistan material. It is an open access journal which is published both on-line and as hard-copy version. Accepted papers appear on-line in PDF format before the final version is available in print. There is no page charge for authors. Protistology publishes manuscripts on the whole spectrum of lower Eukaryote cells including protozoans, lower algae and lower fungi. The Journal publishes original papers (experimental and theoretical contributions), full-size reviews, short topical reviews (which are supposed to be somewhat “provocative” for setting up new hypotheses), rapid short communications, book reviews, symposia materials, historical materials, obituary notices on famous scientists, letters to the Editor, comments on and replies to published papers. Manuscripts should be submitted in good English. Authors are fully responsible for the linguistic accuracy of their papers. Poorly written manuscripts will be returned to authors without consideration. Manuscripts that conform to the Instructions for authors will be fully peer-reviewed by members of Editorial Board and invited reviewers. Authors may suggest referees for their manuscripts. COPYRIGHT Submission of a manuscript implies that the submitted work has not been published before (except for publication as part of a thesis or in the form of an abstract) and that it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere. When the manuscript is accepted for publication, the authors hand over the transferable copyright of the accepted manuscript to the publisher. Thus, the manuscript or parts of it will not be eligible for publication elsewhere in any language without the prior written permission from the copyright holder – the Protozoological Society Affiliated with RAS. Copyrights include, without timely limitation, the mechanical, electronic and visual reproduction and distribution, electronic storage, and all other forms of electronic publication or any other types of publication. Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this journal do not necessarily reflect those of the Editorial Board. Editors cannot be held responsible for errors or any consequences arising from the use of information contained in Protistology. ORGANIZATION  OF  MANUSCRIPTS The size of manuscripts is not limited. The text must be typed one and a half space throughout, including references, tables, and figure legends (Arial, 12 pt). Number the pages of your manuscript consecutively, title page counting as p. 1. The name of the first author must appear in the righthand corner of each page. Text, including italics and bold characters, should be saved as Microsoft Word document only. In-text references should be cited by name and year of publication, e.g.: (Hibberd and Leedale, 1972; Andersen et al., 2012). References in brackets should be listed in chronological order, e.g.: (Stein, 1878; Kent, 1880; Fisch, 1885; Griessman, 1914; Cavalier-Smith and Chao, 2003). THE LAYOUT OF YOUR MANUSCRIPT Title page arrangement: Full title of article, first name(s) in full and surname(s) of author(s) (without academic titles), full addresses, address for correspondence and e-mail. Summary: The Summary not exceeding 250 words should appear on page 2. It should be a single paragraph which presents the purpose of the investigation, the most important methods, the main findings, and the principal conclusions. Up to seven key words referring to the subject of the publication and to its methods should be given in alphabetical order, following the Summary. The editors may change the key words in certain cases. Text: Subdivide articles as follows: Introduction, Material and methods, Results, Discussion, Acknowledgements, References. This structure can be different in reviews and some special reports. Avoid footnotes. Genera and species names should be written in italics. Give sources and strain designations for authenticated strains of protista in Material and methods. References: Responsibility for the accuracy of bibliographic citations lies entirely with the author(s). Please ensure that every reference cited in the text is also present in the reference list (and vice versa). References must not include personal communications and papers not yet accepted for publication. Citations in the text must be given in chronological order; for example: “Amoebae of the genus Thecamoeba Fromentel, 1874 are widely distributed in the environment and can be isolated from marine and freshwater habitats, soil and leaf litter (Page, 1977; Smirnov, 1999a, 1999b; Dyková et al., 2008; Kudryavtsev and Hausmann, 2009; Mesentsev and Smirnov, 2019, 2021; Mesentsev et al., 2020, 2022, 2023; Henderson et al., 2024)”. If all the cited publications in brackets are of the same year, then the citations should be given in alphabetic order of the first author’s family names; for example: “... (Ignatenko and Yatsenko-Stepanova, 2023; Kapustin et al., 2023; Kotkova et al., 2023)". The list of all references should be in alphabetical order of the family names of the first authors. When the number of co-authors is five or less, all authors’ names should be indicated in the reference. If the number of co-authors exceeds five, only first four authors’ names should be indicated, followed by “et al.” (see the example below). When several papers published in the same year by the same author(s) are cited, they should be distinguished by adding the letters “a”, “b”, “c”, etc. after the year. The names of journals should be abbreviated as in the Serial Sources for the Biosis Data Base. Use of DOI is highly encouraged. For the Web references, as a minimum, the full URL should be given and the date when the reference was last accessed. Examples for bibliographic arrangement of references: Journals: Adl S.M., Simpson A.G., Lane C. E., Lukeš J. et al. 2012. The revised classification of eukaryotes. J. Eukaryot. Microbiol. 59 (5): 429–493. doi:10.1111/j.1550-7408.2012.00644.x Keeling P.J., Burki F., Wilcox H.M., Worden A.Z. et al. 2014. The Marine Microbial Eukaryote Transcriptome Sequencing Project (MMETSP): illuminating the functional diversity of eukaryotic life in the oceans through transcriptome sequencing. PLoS Biology. 12 (6): e1001889. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.1001889 Migunova A. and Pinevich A. 2021. Tripartite symbiosis: shelter, hiding inhabitant, and ambush predator. Protistology. 15 (3): 142–152. doi:10.21685/1680-0826-2021-15-3-4 Telesh I.V., Schubert H. and Skarlato S.O. 2011. Revisiting Remane’s concept: evidence for plankton diversity and a protistan species maximum in the horohalinicum of the Baltic Sea. Mar. Ecol. Prog. Ser. 421: 1–11. https://doi.org/10.3354/meps08928 Sokolova Yu.Ya., Snigirevskaya E.S. and Komissarchik Ya.Yu. 2007. Golgi apparatus in parasitic protists. Tsitologiya. 49: 163–181 (in Russian with English summary). Books and book chapters: Raikov I.B. 1982. The protozoan nucleus. Morphology and evolution. Cell Biology Monographs 9. Springer-Verlag, Berlin. Goodkov A.V., Smurov A.O. and Podlipaeva Y.I. 2010. Free-living protists as a model for studying heat shock proteins in the cell. In: Handbook of molecular chaperones: roles, structure, and mechanisms (Eds: Durante P. and Colucci L.). Nova Science Publishers, New York, pp. 293–312. Abstracts: Nassonova E., Gorbunov A., Naumov A., Issi I. and Smirnov A. 2011. Molecular phylogeny of Bertramia asperospora, a protozoan rotifer parasite with obscure taxonomic position: Shuffling cards in favor of the ichthyosporeans. Abstr. VI Europ. Congr. Protistol. Berlin. P. 92–93. Illustrations: Figures (photographs) can be placed separately throughout the text or can be grouped in plates. The position of figures should be indicated in the text. A figure should fit the column width (8.0 cm), page width (16.5 cm) or the maximum page size (16.5 x 23.3 cm). All figures (photographs) should be prepared in the final size of reproduction. In photo plates, separate sections should be spaced 3 mm apart. All images should be submitted in Tag Image File Format (TIFF) only with at least 300 dpi for halftones, colour and bit-mapped. Do not use Microsoft Word for figure formatting. Figures should be cited in numerical order in the text. Arabic numerals should be used for figures and capital letters for multiple parts of a single figure. All letter abbreviations and graphic symbols should be indicated. Details (organelles, structural elements, etc.) are marked by small letters (for example, n – nucleus, mt – microtubules, etc.). Photographs and line drawings (the latter – if necessary) should have scale bars with their value in “mm”, “µm”, or “nm”. Legends, brief and precise, must not repeat, expand or specify the information in the text. Legends to separate figures should contain the title of the figure, explanation of symbols used in the figure, and indication of magnifications. Letter symbols should be given alphabetically and follow the explanation of graphic symbols. For example: Fig. 1. Korotnevella discophora: floating form. Abbreviations: n – nucleus, p – pseudopodia. Scale bar: 10 µm. Fig. 5. Microsporidia from the gut of Gryllus bimaculatus. A – epithelium of the gut with invaded enterocytes; B – parasitophorous vacuole with dividing meront; C – early stages of sporogenesis; D – mature spore. Abbreviations: b – basal plate of epithelium, e – exospore, fv – food vacuole, pv – parasitophorous vacuole; arrow – fragment of everted polar filament. Scale bar: 0.4 µm. One and the same letter symbol should mark one and the same structure throughout the figures. If letter symbols are repeated, the explanation is given only the first time the symbol is used. In the following figure legends it should be written: “for explanation of other symbols see Fig. 2”. Reference to a separate figure in the text contains its number only, references to plates may also contain an indication of the position, e.g. Fig. 2, A; or Figs 2, B; 3, A, C. Tables: Each table has to appear on a separate page. Tables should be numbered consecutively and have a brief specific title. Each table should be self-explanatory and supplementary to the text. Tables should be prepared with appropriate tools for tables offered by Microsoft Word or Excel; do not format tables by introducing spaces and/or by rightjustifying. THE  ENGLISH  LANGUAGE  CHECK To enhance the overall quality of articles published in Protistology, we recommend all authors to contact the Effective Language Tutoring Services for the professional English language check prior to submission of their manuscripts to the Journal. SUBMISSION  OF  MANUSCRIPTS The original manuscript should be sent as an e-mail attachment to the Editorial Office: Andrew V. Goodkov. Institute of Cytology, Russian Academy of Sciences. Tikhoretsky Avenue 4, St. Petersburg 194064, Russia; e-mail: pelgood1@gmail.com