1. ZOOLOGICAL RESEARCH deals with all aspects of zoology. Papers on molecular biology and evolution, developmental biology,experimental embryology, biochemistry, physiology, neurobiology, immunology, pathology, genetics, ecology and ethology of animals are especially highlighted. The journal publishes bimonthly peer-reviewed original articles, review articles, research reports,and notes. Papers in English are warmly welcomed.

2. The journal is distributed both home and abroad, and papers are published in either Chinese or English. The journal can be viewed through address: http://www.zoores.ac.cn/ or http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/.

3. The submission of a paper for publication indicates that it must not have been published, accepted for publication, or be under consideration for publication wholly or partially elsewhere in any language, i.e. the copyright is transferred from the author to the publisher upon acceptance. Authors may use their article elsewhere after publication provided that prior permission is obtained from the publisher. The authors are responsible for obtaining permission to reproduce copyright material from other sources.

4. Manuscripts and all editorial correspondence compiled with Word document should be e-mailed to zoores@mail.kiz.ac.cn or submitted to http://www.zoores.ac.cn/, or by a regular mail to the Editorial Office of Zoological Research, Kunming Institute of Zoology, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, 32 Jiaochang Donglu, Kunming, Yunnan 650223, P. R. China. Tel: +86 871 5199026,Fax: +86 871 5191823.

5. Title of the paper and the author’s names as well as the full address of the corresponding author (detailed address and email address) should appear on the title page. Funding sources should follow as a footnote.

6. Each paper should be preceded by an abstract of no more than 300 words, which summarizes materials and methods, main results,and conclusions.

7. About five key words for indexing should be provided immediately below the abstract.

8. Headings and subheadings should be listed as “1” (Materials and Methods), “1.1”, “1.1.1”, “1.2”, “2” (Results), “2.1”,“3”(Discussion), etc.

9. Introduction should summarize the rationale and give a concise background. Use references to provide the most salient background rather than an exhaustive review.

10. Materials and methods provide technical information to allow the fieldwork or experiments to be repeated. Describe new methods or modifications and identify unusual instruments and procedures in detail.

11. Results emphasize or summarize only important observations. Simple data may be set forth in the text without the need of tables and figures.

12. Discussion should deal with the interpretation of your results. Focus the discussion on your results. Emphasize any new and important aspects and relate your results to other studies. End with a brief conclusion.

13. Acknowledgment(s) may briefly include ① contributors that do not warrant authorship; ① technical help; and ① material support.

14. Tables and figures must be numbered consecutively by Arabic numerals. The captions to illustrations can be bonded with the tables, and the figure legends should be separated from the illustration. Only good drawings and original photographs (ideally as JPEGs or TIFF) suitable for reproduction can be accepted. Actual enlarging multiples or the length unit （bar, in μm or nm） should be marked in photos produced by microscopy. Three-line tables (no vertical line appeared) are requested.

15. References to the literature are indicated in the text in the form of “(author’s name and year of publication)’, e.g. “(Luan et al,2002)”. Listed references should be complete in all details. The full list should be collected and typed at the end of the paper and arranged alphabetically by authors and chronologically for each author as shown below (if originally published in Chinese, followed by the Chinese correspondents).

15.1 For Journal [J]Luan YX, Xie RD, Yin WY. 2002. Preliminary study on phylogeny of Diplura [J]. Zool Res, 23(2): 149-154.

15.2 For Monographer [M] or Collective works [C]Gwinner A. 1990. Bird Migration: Physiology and Ecophysiology [M]. Berlin: Springer.

15.3 For a piece in monographer or collective works Fa JE. 1991. Provisioning of Barbary macaques on the rock of Gibraltar[M] //Box HO. Primate Responses to Environmental Change. London: Chapman and Hall. 137-154.

16. The corresponding author is invited to return the revision within three months after receiving the reviewers’ comments and send the proof back as soon as possible (within three days).

17. All issues concerned the manuscript should abide by ethnics rules and Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals produced by International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE).Zool Scripta, 39: 1-8.

Pasquet E, Bourdon E, Kalyakin MV, Cibois A. 2006. The fulvettas (Alcippe,Timaliidae, Aves): a polyphyletic group [J]. Zool Scripta, 35: 559-566.

Posada D, Crandall KA. 1998. Modeltest: testing the model of DNA substitution [J]. Bioinformatics, 14: 817-818.

Ramsay LW. 1878. A synopsis of the genus Pomatorhinus [J]. IBIS,20(2):129-145.

Reddy S, Moyle RG. 2011. Systematics of the scimitar babblers(Pomatorhinus: Timaliidae): phylogeny, biogeography, and specieslimits of four species complexes [J]. Biol J Linn Soc, 102: 846-869.

Sibley CG, Monroe BL. 1990. Distribution and Taxonomy of Birds of the World [M]. New Haven: Yale University.

Song G, Qu YH, Yin ZH, Li SH, Liu NF, Lei FM. 2009. Phylogeography of the Alcippe morrisonia (Aves: Timaliidae): long population history beyond late pleistocene glaciations [J]. BMC Evol Biol, 9: 143: 1-11.

Swofford DL. 1999. PAUP*: Phylogenetic Analysis Using Parsimony (*and other methods), Version 4.0 [M]. Sunderland, MA: Sinauer Associates.

Tamura K, Dudley J, Nei M, Kumar S. 2007. MEGA 4: Molecular evolutionary genetics analysis (MEGA) software version 4.0 [J]. Mol Biol Evol, 24(8): 1596-1599.

Thompson JD, Gibson TJ, Plewniak F, Jeanmougin F, Higgins DG. 1997.The clustal x windows interface: flexible strategies for multiple sequence alignment aided by quality analysis tools [J]. Nucleic Acids Res, 25(24): 4876-4882.

Yang L, Yang XJ. 2004. The avifauna of Yunnan China. Vol. II:Passeriformes [M]. Kunming: Yunnan Science and Technology Press.[楊嵐, 楊曉君. 2004. 云南鳥類志下卷: 雀形目. 昆明: 云南科技出版社.]

Zhang SX, Yang L, Yang XJ, Yang JX. 2007. Molecular phylogeny of the yuhinas (Sylviidae: Yuhina): a paraphyletic group of babblers including Zosterops and Philippine Stachyris [J]. J Ornithol, 148: 417-426.

Zink RM. 2004. The role of subspecies in obscuring avian biological diversity and misleading conservation policy [J]. Proc R Soc Lond B,271: 561-564.

Zou FS, Lim HC, Marks BD, Moyle RG, Sheldon FH. 2007. Molecular phylogenetic analysis of the Grey-cheeked Fulvetta (Alcippe morrisonia) of China and Indochina: A case of remarkable genetic divergence in a “species” [J]. Mol Phylogenet Evol, 44: 165-174.