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Call for Papers: Sex Differences in Autoimmune Disease

Biology of Sex Differences is calling for submissions to our Collection on Sex Differences in Autoimmune Disease. Most autoimmune diseases occur predominantly in women. This Collection provides recent data and perspectives on Sex and Gender Differences in Autoimmune Diseases from leaders in the field.

Call for Papers: Eschewing the Binary: Sex and Gender Science in Human and Non-human Animal Research

This Collection in Biology of Sex Differences is an occasion to highlight recent research and emerging perspectives on the interaction of sex and gender as well as to convene a conversation about how the social influences the biological, and in turn, how that interaction affects individuals. 

Call for Papers: Sex/Gender Differences in Social Determinants of Health at Specialized Centers of Research Excellence (SCORE) on Sex Differences

This collection in Biology of Sex Differences invites SCOR(E) Directors to submit articles from their Specialized Centers of Research (Excellence) addressing sex/gender differences in social determinants of health.

Featured Review: Differently different?: A commentary on the emerging social cognitive neuroscience of female autism

New Content ItemGina Rippon, Published: 13 June 2024

Decades of research have excluded or overlooked females on the autistic spectrum, resulting in the construction of inaccurate and misleading cognitive neuroscience models, and missed opportunities to explore the brain bases of this highly complex condition. A note of warning needs to be sounded about inferences drawn from past research, but if future research addresses this problem of male bias, then a deeper understanding of autism as a whole, as well as in previously overlooked females, will start to emerge.

Cover image: © Pan Macmillan 2025 (UK); © Seal Press 2025 (US)

Announcing the BoSD Early Career Award

Springer Nature is sponsoring the Biology of Sex Differences (BoSD) Early Career Award for the best paper published in BoSD each year.

Nominations are now being accepted for two awards:

  • 2024 Award for articles published in BoSD from January
  • 2021 through August 2023 2025 Award for articles published in BoSD from September 2023 through August 2024

Two awards will be given at OSSD 2025 

Winners will give talks at OSSD 2025 and receive a $1000 travel award.

  • Nominee will be first author or senior author on a paper published in BoSD - co-first authors may be nominated and split the award/talk AND
  • Graduate students at time of manuscript submission OR
  • Post-docs at time of manuscript submission OR
  • Investigators up to 6 years after training completion (post-doctoral/residency) at time of award (OSSD meeting) 

Deadline 1st September 2024 for nomination

Send a brief nomination letter, the manuscript & CV to Jill B. Becker, EIC jbbecker@med.umich.edu

This information may be included with submission for new manuscripts and manuscripts will be considered for the award after peer review.

Aims and scope

Biology of Sex Differences is unlike any other scientific journal: articles focus on sex differences in all aspects of an individual or organism. Everything from molecules to behavior and from studies of cellular function to clinical research studies are reported in this journal. Biology of Sex Differences aims to improve understanding of basic biological principles mediating sex differences and foster development of therapeutic and diagnostic tools that are sex-dependent. To the extent that gender influences biological outcomes, this journal also is interested in research addressing gender differences. Articles are expected to report results that directly compare sex/gender differences in the statistical analysis.

Biology of Sex Differences addresses a broad audience of readers. Articles are expected to report and discuss their findings using language that is accessible to non-specialists in the field, please minimize discipline-specific jargon. The Title and Abstract should be understandable to non-specialists. The novelty of the findings should be clear to all readers, non-experts as well as experts. To this end, the use of abbreviations should also be kept to a minimum. We now require a Plain English summary in addition to the Abstract.

Please refer to the “About” page for further details. Note also the changes to ‘Criteria’ that have been made including the requirement for 5 suggested reviewers included in the appropriate field during submission: https://bsd.biomedcentral.com/submission-guidelines

In your cover letter, please note two members of our Editorial Board to review your manuscript , dependent on the relevant expertise. In light of this, please ensure that there are no conflicts of interest.

Biology of Sex Differences is the official journal of the Organization for the Study of Sex Differences, and a publication of the Society for Women's Health Research.

Watch for new special collections announcements coming soon!


Articles

2024

Sex Differences in Autoimmune Disease

This Collection provides recent data and perspectives on Sex and Gender Differences in Autoimmune Diseases from leaders in the field.

Eschewing the Binary: Sex and Gender Science in Human and Non-human Animal Research

This Collection is an occasion to highlight recent research and emerging perspectives on the interaction of sex and gender as well as to convene a conversation about how the social influences the biological, and in turn, how that interaction affects individuals. 

Sex/Gender Differences in Social Determinants of Health at Specialized Centers of Research Excellence (SCORE) on Sex Differences

We invite invites SCOR(E) Directors to submit articles from their Specialized Centers of Research (Excellence) addressing sex/gender differences in social determinants of health as it pertains to their health topics of focus.

2023

Sex/Gender Differences in Cancer

We invite authors to submit articles to this Collection addressing the mechanisms underlying sex/gender differences in cancer incidence, treatment response, and survival. 

Sex Differences and Similarities in the Human Brain

We invite authors to submit empirical studies, meta-analyses, and theoretical articles to this Collection that aims to address on what and where sex-related variation can be found, but also how large or small, and how relevant or trivial these differences seem to be.

2022

Sex Differences in COVID-19
We welcome submissions of original articles and reviews on preclinical and clinical research in which findings of new sex differences in COVID-19 are reported. We are particularly interested in studies in which potential mechanisms are tested.

Sex Differences in Development
We are interested in primary research or review articles that address sex differences in development that are influenced by environmental, social, genetic, hormonal, or other biological factors. Outcome measures may include brain, behavior and/or physiological processes in children/adolescents or animal models of these processes.

2020

Sex differences in response to androgens: physiological and pathophysiological 
Guest Editor: Licy Yanes Cardozo

Hypertension, preeclampsia, renal and cardiovascular disease in pregnancy
Guest Editor: Vesna Garovic

2019

Sex Differences in Obesity, Insulin Resistance, Metabolic Syndrome, and the Microbiome
Guest Editor: Kate Denton


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Organization for the Study of Sex Differences (OSSD) President, Dr. Sofia Ahmed

New Content ItemDr. Sofia Ahmed MD MMSc FRCPC is a Professor in the Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry at the University of Alberta, Canada. Dr. Ahmed is a clinician-scientist with a focus on sex and gender differences in human kidney/cardiovascular outcomes and the University of Alberta Chair in Sex and Gender. Her program of research is supported by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada. She is the Chair of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research Institute of Gender and Health Advisory Board, Chair of the Canadian Medical Association Journal Governing Council and the President of the Organization for the Study of Sex Differences.

Dr. Ahmed completed her MD and internal medicine residency at the University of Toronto and a nephrology fellowship at Brigham and Women’s and Massachusetts General Hospitals in Boston, USA. She completed her Master’s in Medical Sciences at Harvard University. The recipient of the 2022 Hypertension Canada Senior Investigator Award, the 2021 Canadian Medical Association May Cohen Award for Women Mentors and a 2020 American Society of Nephrology Distinguished Mentor Award, Dr. Ahmed is strong proponent of the importance of mentorship and fostering excellence in the next generation of researchers.

Affiliated with

  • Society for Women's Health Research

Annual Journal Metrics

  • Citation Impact 2023
    Journal Impact Factor: 4.9
    5-year Journal Impact Factor: 6.0
    Source Normalized Impact per Paper (SNIP): 1.709
    SCImago Journal Rank (SJR): 2.030

    Speed 2023
    Submission to first editorial decision (median days): 9
    Submission to acceptance (median days): 137

    Usage 2023
    Downloads: 1,178,807
    Altmetric mentions: 1,611