Multiple Sclerosis Journal – Experimental, Translational and Clinical

 Manuscript Submission Guidelines: Multiple Sclerosis Journal – Experimental, Translational and Clinical

1. Open Access
2. Article processing charge (APC)
3. Article Types
4. Editorial policies
   4.1 Peer Review Policy
   4.2 Authorship
   4.3 Acknowledgements
   4.4 Funding
   4.5 Declaration of conflicting interests
   4.6 Research ethics and patient consent
   4.7 Clinical Trials
   4.8 Reporting guidelines
5. Publishing policies
   5.1 Publication ethics
   5.2 Contributor's publishing agreement
6. Preparing your manuscript
   6.1 Word processing formats
   6.2 Nomenclature & Units of measurement
   6.3 Artwork, figures and other graphics
   6.4 Supplemental material
   6.5 Reference style
   6.6 English language editing services
7. Submitting your manuscript
   7.1 ORCID
   7.2 Information required for completing your submission
   7.3 Corresponding author contact details
   7.4 Permissions
8. On acceptance and publication
   8.1 Sage Production
   8.2 Continuous publication
   8.3 Promoting your article
9. Further information

This Journal is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics.

This Journal recommends that authors follow the Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals formulated by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE).

Please read the guidelines below then visit the journal’s submission site http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/msj-etc to upload your manuscript. Please note that manuscripts not conforming to these guidelines may be returned.

Only manuscripts of sufficient quality that meet the aims and scope of Multiple Sclerosis Journal – Experimental, Translational and Clinical will be reviewed.

As part of the submission process you will be required to warrant that you are submitting your original work, that you have the rights in the work, and that you have obtained and can supply all necessary permissions for the reproduction of any copyright works not owned by you, that you are submitting the work for first publication in the Journal and that it is not being considered for publication elsewhere and has not already been published elsewhere. Please see our guidelines on prior publication and note that Multiple Sclerosis Journal – Experimental, Translational and Clinical may accept submissions of papers that have been posted on pre-print servers; please alert the Editorial Office when submitting (contact details are at the end of these guidelines) and include the DOI for the preprint in the designated field in the manuscript submission system. Authors should not post an updated version of their paper on the preprint server while it is being peer reviewed for possible publication in the journal. If the article is accepted for publication, the author may re-use their work according to the journal's author archiving policy.

1. Open Access

Multiple Sclerosis Journal – Experimental, Translational and Clinical is an open access, peer-reviewed journal. Each article accepted by peer review is made freely available online immediately upon publication, is published under a Creative Commons license and will be hosted online in perpetuity. Publication costs of the journal are covered by the collection of article processing charges which are paid by the funder, institution or author of each manuscript upon acceptance. There is no charge for submitting a paper to the journal.

For general information on open access at Sage please visit the Open Access page or view our Open Access FAQs.

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2. Article processing charge (APC)

If, after peer review, your manuscript is accepted for publication, a one-time article processing charge (APC) is payable. This APC covers the cost of publication and ensures that your article will be freely available online in perpetuity under a Creative Commons licence.

Members of the American Committee for Treatment and Research in Multiple Sclerosis, the European Committee for Treatment and Research in Multiple Sclerosis, the Latin American Committee for Treatment and Research in Multiple Sclerosis, the Pan-Asian Committee for Treatment and Research in Multiple Sclerosis or Rehabilitation in Multiple Sclerosis will receive a 75% discount on the APC.

The APC for this journal is $2,650* USD (+VAT where applicable). The APC is payable upon acceptance after peer review and subject to VAT where applicable.

*The article processing charge (APC) is payable upon acceptance after peer review and is subject to value added tax (VAT) where applicable. If the paying author/institution is based in the European Union, to comply with European law, VAT must be added to the APC. Providing a VAT registration number will allow an institution to avoid paying this tax, except for UK institutions. Payments can be made in GBP or USD.

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3. Article types

Please read the following carefully and ensure that your submission meets the requirements to avoid automatic return or delay in the consideration of your paper.

Authors may provide the essential requirements of MRI imaging as supplementary data in order to help replication of studies. If submitting a manuscript using MRI data please use this msj_mri_journal.doc to supply the necessary data in a suitable format.

Original research papers
Original research papers should be no more than 3,000 words and contain the following sections: Title page, Abstract, Introduction, Materials (or patients or animals) and Methods, Results, Discussion, Acknowledgements, References, Tables, Figure legends, Figures (see ‘Sections of the manuscript’ for further details).

Systematic reviews & meta-analyses

Systematic reviews and meta-analyses should be no more than 3,500-4,000 words. They should follow these guidelines:

•Systematic, critical assessments of the literature and data sources
•Focus on topics of high clinical or scientific interest
•Preferably do not review a topic for which a systematic review has been published within the last 5 years
•Should follow PRISMA Reporting Guidelines or MOOSE Reporting Guidelines
•Pre-submission inquiries are encouraged

Case Reports, Short Reports 
The Editors will consider for rapid publication Case Reports and Short Reports that illustrate important points. These must not exceed 1000 words in length, must have a title page, a short summary of no more than 100 words, up to 10 references, one figure and one table or two figures or two tables.

Letters to the Editor
Brief letters raising pertinent issues relating to recently published papers in MSJ- ETC are welcome. They will be reviewed and may be sent to the first author of the article being discussed for a possible response. They should be in letter format, no more than 500 words, 5 references, with a title page but without an abstract, and without figures or tables unless essential to illustrate the content.

Stand-alone letters on topics of interest are also welcome. They will be reviewed and should also be in letter format, no more than 500 words, 5 references, with a title page but without an abstract, and without figures or tables unless essential to illustrate the content. 

Personal Viewpoints
Viewpoints which bring new ideas and stimulate discussion and debate are welcomed by the Editors, in particular those that will be of general interest, and which question or comment on new and significant MS-related studies. These will be reviewed and should be no more than 1,500 words, up to 10 references, one figure and one table (if necessary).

Reviews 
MSJ-ETC will consider Traditional or Systematic Reviews.

Editorials 
Editorials may be solicited by the Editors to address particular topics relating to one or more papers in a given issue.

Future Perspectives
Future Perspectives can provide a forum to help capture the work of groups established to improve or update areas of fundamental importance to MS such as clinical and imaging outcomes. Articles will be reviewed and ideally should be no more than 1,500 words, up to 10 references, one figure and one table (if required).

Book and Meeting Reviews
These reviews are solicited by the Editors.

Note: While Editorials and, Reviews (including book and meeting reviews) will usually be solicited by the Editors, suggestions for topics or brief outlines of proposals are very welcome and can be sent to MSJ-ETC at msj-etcjournal@sagepub.co.uk.

Data previously published in un-reviewed format
The Editors will also consider for publication manuscripts containing data already in press elsewhere or published previously in un-reviewed format, such as abstracts or camera-ready papers for proceedings of scientific meetings. The new manuscript should differ from the one previously published and should not contain any identical tables or figures. It will be the responsibility of the senior author to bring to the Editor’s attention details of previous publications and if necessary, attach relevant documents for the use of referees. The existence of such related paper(s) (published or in press) should be mentioned as a footnote to the manuscript or documented with appropriate references. The Editorial decision will take account of the originality of the work submitted for publication and the extent to which readers of MSJ-ETC may be expected to have access to the book or journal in which the associated papers have appeared.

Related papers
Related papers either published or in press may be submitted with the manuscript as attachments to the cover letter for the attention of the Editors.

Summary table of article types:

* Excludes abstract, references, tables and legends
** For reference style please see section 9.3

Submitting a new manuscript through the online system:
When making a submission, the following separate, unpaginated documents should be uploaded. The lines should not be numbered as this occurs within the online pdf. Please do not submit one combined document. The separate files will be combined into a pdf in the online system.

1. Title page (title, names of authors, affiliations, keywords, corresponding author)
2. Main document (includes structured abstract, main text, acknowledgements, references)
3. Tables (each as a separate Word document)
4. Figure legends (Word document)
5. Figures (as separate tiff, jpg or eps files)
6. Any supplementary files

Submitting a Revision:
After review the editors may invite submission of a revised manuscript. When submitting a revision, delete the original files (as these are saved with your original submission), and upload your revised manuscript only, following the usual submission guidelines. Changes to the manuscript must be marked using highlighting or track changes, and the authors’ response to the reviewers’ comments should be placed in appropriate box during the submission process. The text should be double-spaced throughout and with a minimum of 3cm for left and right hand margins and 5cm at head and foot. Text should be standard 10 or 12 point. Word and reference counts as outlined in Table 1 re initial submissions, should still be adhered to as far as possible.

Title page
The title should be concise with no abbreviations. Please provide the surname, initials, department, institution, city and country of each author, and the name, email address, full mailing address, telephone number and fax number of the corresponding author. List six to eight keywords (chosen from Index Medicus, Medical Subject Headings if possible).

Abstract
The second page of the manuscript must contain only the abstract or summary, which should be of no more then 200 words and must be clearly written and comprehensive to readers before they have to read the paper. The abstract should be structured according to the following sub headings: Background, Objective, Methods, Results and Conclusion. Structuring may not suit Case Reports, Short Reports and Reviews, in which case a summary paragraph may be included instead. In all cases, abbreviations should be avoided and reference citations are not permitted. 

Any Original Research Papers submitted without a structured abstract will be returned to the author immediately without peer review, thus delaying the evaluation process of the manuscript.

Introduction
The introduction should assume that the reader is knowledgeable in the field and be as brief as possible.

Materials and Methods
Methods that have been published in detail elsewhere should not be described in detail. Avoid unnecessary detailed descriptions of widely used techniques. SI Units should be used throughout the text. Reports of experiments involving patients and healthy volunteers must describe the steps taken to obtain consent and to maintain confidentiality. Experiments involving animals must conform to accepted ethical standards.

Tables
Tables should be submitted in Word with each Table in a separate Word document. Tables should be numbered consecutively with Arabic numerals, and cited as such in the manuscript. The preferred placing of tables in the main text should be indicated. Tables should include a brief descriptive title and be self-explanatory. Footnotes to tables indicated by lower-case superscript letters are acceptable, but they should not include extensive experimental details.

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4. Editorial policies

4.1 Peer review policy

Sage does not permit the use of author-suggested (recommended) reviewers at any stage of the submission process, be that through the web-based submission system or other communication. Reviewers should be experts in their fields and should be able to provide an objective assessment of the manuscript. Our policy is that reviewers should not be assigned to a paper if:

•  The reviewer is based at the same institution as any of the co-authors

•  The reviewer is based at the funding body of the paper

•  The author has recommended the reviewer

•  The reviewer has provided a personal (e.g. Gmail/Yahoo/Hotmail) email account and an institutional email account cannot be found after performing a basic Google search (name, department and institution). 

4.2 Authorship

Papers should only be submitted for consideration once consent is given by all contributing authors. Those submitting papers should carefully check that all those whose work contributed to the paper are acknowledged as contributing authors.

The list of authors should include all those who can legitimately claim authorship. This is all those who:

1. 1. Made a substantial contribution to the concept or design of the work; or acquisition, analysis or interpretation of data,
   2. Drafted the article or revised it critically for important intellectual content,
   3. Approved the version to be published,
   4. Each author should have participated sufficiently in the work to take public responsibility for appropriate portions of the content.

Authors should meet the conditions of all of the points above. When a large, multicentre group has conducted the work, the group should identify the individuals who accept direct responsibility for the manuscript. These individuals should fully meet the criteria for authorship.

Acquisition of funding, collection of data, or general supervision of the research group alone does not constitute authorship, although all contributors who do not meet the criteria for authorship should be listed in the Acknowledgments section. Please refer to the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) authorship guidelines for more information on authorship.

Please note that AI chatbots, for example ChatGPT, should not be listed as authors. For more information see the policy on Use of ChatGPT and generative AI tools.

4.3 Acknowledgements

All contributors who do not meet the criteria for authorship should be listed in an Acknowledgements section. Examples of those who might be acknowledged include a person who provided purely technical help, or a department chair who provided only general support.

Any acknowledgements should appear first at the end of your article prior to your Declaration of Conflicting Interests (if applicable), any notes and your References.

4.3.1 Third party submissions

Where an individual who is not listed as an author submits a manuscript on behalf of the author(s), a statement must be included in the Acknowledgements section of the manuscript and in the accompanying cover letter. The statements must:

• Disclose this type of editorial assistance – including the individual’s name, company and level of input
• Identify any entities that paid for this assistance
• Confirm that the listed authors have authorized the submission of their manuscript via third party and approved any statements or declarations, e.g. conflicting interests, funding, etc.

Where appropriate, Sage reserves the right to deny consideration to manuscripts submitted by a third party rather than by the authors themselves.

4.3.2 Writing assistance

Individuals who provided writing assistance, e.g. from a specialist communications company, do not qualify as authors and so should be included in the Acknowledgements section. Authors must disclose any writing assistance – including the individual’s name, company and level of input – and identify the entity that paid for this assistance.

It is not necessary to disclose use of language polishing services.

4.4 Funding

Multiple Sclerosis Journal – Experimental, Translational and Clinical requires all authors to acknowledge their funding in a consistent fashion under a separate heading.  Please visit the Funding Acknowledgements page on the Sage Journal Author Gateway to confirm the format of the acknowledgment text in the event of funding, or state that: ‘This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors’. 

4.5 Declaration of conflicting interests

It is the policy of Multiple Sclerosis Journal – Experimental, Translational and Clinical to require a declaration of conflicting interests from all authors enabling a statement to be carried within the paginated pages of all published articles.

Please ensure that a ‘Declaration of Conflicting Interests’ statement is included at the end of your manuscript, after any acknowledgements and prior to the references. If no conflict exists, please state that ‘The Author(s) declare(s) that there is no conflict of interest’.

For guidance on conflict of interest statements, please see the ICMJE recommendations.

4.6 Research ethics and patient consent

Medical research involving human subjects must be conducted according to the World Medical Association Declaration of Helsinki.

Submitted manuscripts should conform to the ICMJE Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals, and all papers reporting animal and/or human studies must state in the methods section that the relevant Ethics Committee or Institutional Review Board provided (or waived) approval. Please ensure that you have provided the full name and institution of the review committee, in addition to the approval number.

For research articles, authors are also required to state in the methods section whether participants provided informed consent and whether the consent was written or verbal.

Information on informed consent to report individual cases or case series should be included in the manuscript text. A statement is required regarding whether written informed consent for patient information and images to be published was provided by the patient(s) or a legally authorized representative. Please do not submit the patient’s actual written informed consent with your article, as this in itself breaches the patient’s confidentiality. The Journal requests that you confirm to us, in writing, that you have obtained written informed consent but the written consent itself should be held by the authors/investigators themselves, for example in a patient’s hospital record. The confirmatory letter may be uploaded with your submission as a separate file.

Please also refer to the ICMJE Recommendations for the Protection of Research Participants.

4.7 Clinical trials

Multiple Sclerosis Journal – Experimental, Translational and Clinical conforms to the ICMJE requirement that clinical trials are registered in a WHO-approved public trials registry at or before the time of first patient enrolment as a condition of consideration for publication. The trial registry name and URL, and registration number must be included at the end of the abstract.

4.8 Reporting guidelines

The relevant EQUATOR Network reporting guidelines should be followed depending on the type of study. For example, all randomized controlled trials submitted for publication should include a completed CONSORT flow chart as a cited figure and the completed CONSORT checklist should be uploaded with your submission as a supplementary file. Systematic reviews and meta-analyses should include the completed PRISMA flow chart as a cited figure and the completed PRISMA checklist should be uploaded with your submission as a supplementary file. The EQUATOR wizard can help you identify the appropriate guideline.

Other resources can be found at NLM’s Research Reporting Guidelines and Initiatives.

4.8.1 Statistical Analysis

Where statistical analyses have been carried out please ensure that the methodology has been accurately described. In comparative studies power calculations are usually required. In research papers requiring complex statistics the advice of an expert statistician should be sought at the design/implementation stage of the study.

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5. Publishing policies

5.1 Publication ethics

Sage is committed to upholding the integrity of the academic record. We encourage authors to refer to the Committee on Publication Ethics’ International Standards for Authors and view the Publication Ethics page on the Sage Author Gateway.

5.1.1 Plagiarism

Multiple Sclerosis Journal – Experimental, Translational and Clinical and Sage take issues of copyright infringement, plagiarism or other breaches of best practice in publication very seriously. We seek to protect the rights of our authors and we always investigate claims of plagiarism or misuse of published articles. Equally, we seek to protect the reputation of the journal against malpractice. Submitted articles may be checked with duplication-checking software. Where an article, for example, is found to have plagiarized other work or included third-party copyright material without permission or with insufficient acknowledgement, or where the authorship of the article is contested, we reserve the right to take action including, but not limited to: publishing an erratum or corrigendum (correction); retracting the article; taking up the matter with the head of department or dean of the author's institution and/or relevant academic bodies or societies; or taking appropriate legal action.

5.1.2 Prior publication

If material has been previously published, it is not generally acceptable for publication in a Sage journal. However, there are certain circumstances where previously published material can be considered for publication. Please refer to the guidance on the Sage Author Gateway or if in doubt, contact the Editor at the address given below.

5.2 Contributor's publishing agreement

Before publication Sage requires the author as the rights holder to sign a Journal Contributor’s Publishing Agreement. Multiple Sclerosis Journal – Experimental, Translational and Clinical publishes manuscripts under Creative Commons licenses. The standard license for the journal is Creative Commons by Attribution Non-Commercial (CC BY-NC), which allows others to re-use the work without permission as long as the work is properly referenced and the use is non-commercial. For more information, you are advised to visit Sage's OA licenses page.

Alternative license arrangements are available, for example, to meet particular funder mandates, made at the author’s request.

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6. Preparing your manuscript

6.1 Word processing formats

The preferred format for your manuscript is Word. LaTeX files are also accepted. Word and (La)Tex templates are available on the Manuscript Submission Guidelines page of our Author Gateway.

6.2 Nomenclature & Units of measurement

Use the generic or chemical name of any drug, in lower case; the specific trade name (capitalized) may be given in parentheses after the first text reference.
Units of measurement should be expressed in SI and metric units; older conventional units may be added in parentheses.

6.3 Artwork, figures and other graphics

For guidance on the preparation of illustrations, pictures and graphs in electronic format, please visit Sage’s Manuscript Submission Guidelines.  

Figures supplied in colour will appear in colour online.

6.4 Supplemental material

This journal is able to host additional materials online (e.g. datasets, podcasts, videos, images etc) alongside the full-text of the article. For more information please refer to our guidelines on submitting supplemental files.

At submission authors are able to provide video abstracts or supplementary material in the format of a video. For further information regarding video abstracts please see the Sage Video Abstract guidelines.

The video needs submitted along with the submitted manuscript with final decisions made by the Editor in Chief. All videos must be accompanied by written permission of any individuals featuring in all media forms for print and online publication.

Please note that an audio-visual release from must be completed for each individual contributor to the video. This form should be signed and submitted as 'audio-visual release form'. The form is located here.

Video properties:

• At least 640x480 resolution and at least 20 fps.
• The video compression should be of high quality. The Journal expects compression technology to evolve and so does not wish to be prescriptive over compression types. Today H.264 codec in an MP4 or AVI contained is a good choice. MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 are portable but have lower quality and larger files than the more modern codecs. We expect videos to be able to play on Windows 8 and back, Linux and Mac so proprietry formats, such as WMV and FLV, are discouraged.
• Note the Editors reserve the right to request authors to change the compression codec before publication.
• Videos should be below the 50MB mark and any video over this amount should provide a short preview to be hosted alongside the full file. Exceptions may be made at the discretion of the Editors.
• Format needs to follow the guidelines found here: https://www.sagepub.com/supplementary-files-on-sage-journals-sj-guidelines-for-authors.

6.5 Reference style

Multiple Sclerosis Journal – Experimental, Translational and Clinical adheres to the Sage Vancouver reference style. Please review the guidelines on Sage Vancouver to ensure your manuscript conforms to this reference style.

If you use EndNote to manage references, you can download the Sage Vancouver output file here.

6.6 English language editing services

Authors seeking assistance with English language editing, translation, or figure and manuscript formatting to fit the journal’s specifications should consider using Sage Language Services. Visit Sage Language Services on our Journal Author Gateway for further information.

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7. Submitting your manuscript

Multiple Sclerosis Journal – Experimental, Translational and Clinical is hosted on Sage Track, a web based online submission and peer review system powered by ScholarOne™ Manuscripts. Visit http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/msj-etc to login and submit your article online.

IMPORTANT: Please check whether you already have an account in the system before trying to create a new one. If you have reviewed or authored for the journal in the past year it is likely that you will have had an account created.  For further guidance on submitting your manuscript online please visit ScholarOne Online Help.

7.1 ORCID

As part of our commitment to ensuring an ethical, transparent and fair peer review process Sage is a supporting member of ORCID, the Open Researcher and Contributor ID. ORCID provides a persistent digital identifier that distinguishes researchers from every other researcher and, through integration in key research workflows such as manuscript and grant submission, supports automated linkages between researchers and their professional activities ensuring that their work is recognised.

The collection of ORCID iDs from corresponding authors is now part of the submission process of this journal. If you already have an ORCID iD you will be asked to associate that to your submission during the online submission process. We also strongly encourage all co-authors to link their ORCID ID to their accounts in our online peer review platforms. It takes seconds to do: click the link when prompted, sign into your ORCID account and our systems are automatically updated. Your ORCID iD will become part of your accepted publication’s metadata, making your work attributable to you and only you. Your ORCID iD is published with your article so that fellow researchers reading your work can link to your ORCID profile and from there link to your other publications.

If you do not already have an ORCID iD please follow this link to create one or visit our ORCID homepage to learn more.
 

7.2 Informtion required for completing your submission

You will be asked to provide contact details and academic affiliations for all co-authors via the submission system and identify who is to be the corresponding author. These details must match what appears on your manuscript. The affiliation listed in the manuscript should be the institution where the research was conducted. If an author has moved to a new institution since completing the research, the new affiliation can be included in a manuscript note at the end of the paper. At this stage please ensure you have included all the required statements and declarations and uploaded any additional supplementary files (including reporting guidelines where relevant).

7.3 Corresponding author contact details

Provide full contact details for the corresponding author including email, mailing address and telephone numbers. Academic affiliations are required for all co-authors. These details should be presented separately to the main text of the article to facilitate anonymous peer review.

7.4 Permissions

Please also ensure that you have obtained any necessary permission from copyright holders for reproducing any illustrations, tables, figures or lengthy quotations previously published elsewhere. For further information including guidance on fair dealing for criticism and review, please see the Copyright and Permissions page on the Sage Author Gateway

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8. On acceptance and publication

If your paper is accepted for publication after peer review, you will first be asked to complete the contributor’s publishing agreement. Once your manuscript files have been check for Sage Production, the corresponding author will be asked to pay the article processing charge (APC) via a payment link. Once the APC has been processed, your article will be prepared for publication and can appear online within an average of approximately 30 days. Please note that no production work will occur on your paper until the APC has been received.

8.1 Sage Production

Your Sage Production Editor will keep you informed as to your article’s progress throughout the production process. Proofs will be made available to the corresponding author via our editing portal Sage Edit or by email, and corrections should be made directly or notified to us promptly. Authors are reminded to check their proofs carefully to confirm that all author information, including names, affiliations, sequence and contact details are correct, and that Funding and Conflict of Interest statements, if any, are accurate.

8.2 Online publication

One of the many benefits of publishing your research in an open access journal is the speed to publication. With no page count constraints, your article will be published online in a fully citable form with a DOI number as soon as it has completed the production process. At this time it will be completely free to view and download for all.

8.3 Promoting your article

Publication is not the end of the process! You can help disseminate your paper and ensure it is as widely read and cited as possible. The Sage Author Gateway has numerous resources to help you promote your work. Visit the Promote Your Article page on the Gateway for tips and advice. 

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9. Further information

Any correspondence, queries or additional requests for information on the manuscript submission process should be sent to the Multiple Sclerosis Journal – Experimental, Translational and Clinical editorial office as follows: mso.pra@sagepub.com.

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