CNS 2018 Seattle: Abstract Submission

Submissions can include experimental, model-based, as well as more abstract theoretical approaches to understanding neurobiological computation. We especially encourage research that mixes experimental and theoretical studies. We also accept papers that describe new technical approaches to theoretical and experimental issues in computational neuroscience or relevant software packages.

Submission instructions, submission website, and a full description of the review process are below. Authors wishing to give oral presentation or travel award applicants are required to submit a formatted 1-3-page summary (for the OCNS reviewers only) describing the nature, scope and main results of the work in more detail. The summaries will be reviewed to make decisions for oral and featured oral presentations and to select travel award recipients. All submissions will be acknowledged by e-mail.

Note: The corresponding author has to register for the main meeting before abstract submission is possible. Please make sure to use the same email address during registration and abstract submission to insure seamless processing. If your abstract is rejected you can request a full refund. OCNS members may sponsor up to two abstracts as corresponding authors; non-members may sponsor only one abstract. See our FAQ for more details.

Submit an abstract

Abstract Submission

Authors should prepare a text-only abstract of 3500 characters max (please notice this is significantly different from previous years), and enter it on the ConfMaster submission site. Optionally you can also upload one figure and enter a short caption, which do not count against the character limit. If requesting an oral presentation or applying for a travel award, please prepare a more detailed  1-3 page summary in PDF format.

1. Go to the abstract submission site and log in. Note that this is a different login, specific to the ConfMaster website. Use an existing account, or create a new one by selecting "Register as new author".
2. Next click on “Submit an abstract” in the Submissions menu. You will only be able to submit an abstract if you have registered for the conference with the same email address that is linked to the ConfMaster account
3. Enter the title of the paper
4. Enter author information
5. Enter your abstract in the abstract text box. You can use the provided formatting tools. Alternatively, you can prepare your abstract in a word processor and past it into the abstract box. The abstract is limited to 3500 characters (please notice this is significantly different from previous years). One figure can also be included. Please upload the figure file as PNG and enter a brief caption in the provided text field.
6. Use the pull down menu to select presentation preference type (“poster preferred”, “oral preferred”). Note that “oral preferred” abstracts and summaries will be considered for both the longer "featured oral" format and the standard oral format
7. Select a field of study keyword (keyword1), a system keyword (keyword2), and up to 2 additional keywords that best describe your paper. These will be used to assign reviewers and to organize the program by topic
8. Select whether you are applying for a travel award
9. If you chose “oral preferred” or are applying for a travel award, upload your 1-3 extended abstract in PDF format describing the work in more detail. These summaries will be used together with the regular abstracts to select papers for the oral program. Summaries have no template and can include figures within the 3 page limit
10. When done, click the SUBMIT button (very important!)

Questions on the instructions can be addressed to [email protected].

The Review Process

Submissions will be judged and accepted for the meeting based on clarity, substance and appropriateness for the meeting. It is particularly important that the biological relevance of the research be made clear. OCNS strongly believes in the open exchange of ideas and rejections are usually based on absence of biological relevance (e.g., pure machine learning) or the absence of any computational aspect (e.g., purely clinical neurology studies). Authors will be notified of acceptance of their abstract before the end of March.

Submissions to be considered for oral presentation will be reviewed by at least two independent referees and results of the review process will be used to construct the oral program and to select travel awards. In addition to perceived quality and significance, the novelty of the research and the diversity and coherence of the overall program will be considerations for the selection of oral and featured oral presentations. We particularly encourage women and underrepresented minorities to apply for an oral presentations. To ensure diversity, those who have given talks in the recent past will not be selected and multiple oral presentations from the same lab will be discouraged. Most oral presentations will be 20 minutes in length, but a few papers will be selected for longer "featured oral" presentations.

All accepted papers not selected for oral talks may be presented during the poster sessions. Authors will be notified of the presentation format of their papers by 1 May 2018

Open Access, Citable Abstract Publication

The formatted abstracts will again be published as a Supplement to the online journal BMC Neuroscience. The supplement is citable, indexed by PubMed, and open access. Previous year's abstracts are available under the Publications menu.

Troubleshooting

You created an account on ConfMaster, but you can not submit abstracts with the error message "Your abstract submission limit has been reached …”

Be sure that you registered first for the OCNS conference. Assuming it is the case, be sure that the email address used in your OCNS and ConfMaster profile are the same. If you still have problems, please contact us at [email protected]