GUIDE FOR AUTHORS

GUIDE FOR AUTHORS

INTRODUCTION

Types of paper

Contributions falling into the following categories will be considered for publication: Original research papers, reviews, editorial.

Please ensure that you select the appropriate article type from the list of options when making your submission. Authors contributing to special issues should ensure that they select the special issue article type from this list.

BEFORE YOU BEGIN

Ethics in Publishing

For information on Ethics in Publishing and Ethical guidelines for journal publication see http://www.elsevier.com/publishingethics and http://www.elsevier.com/ethicalguidelines.

Conf l ict of interest

All authors are requested to disclose any actual or potential conf l ict of interest including any fi nancial, personal or other relationships with other people or organizations within three years of beginning the submitted work that could inappropriately inf l uence, or be perceived to inf l uence, their work. See also http://www.elsevier.com/conf l ictsof i nterest.

Submission declaration

Submission of an article implies that the work described has not been published previously (except in the form of an abstract or as part of a published lecture or academic thesis), that it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, that its publication is approved by all authors and tacitly or explicitly by the responsible authorities where the work was carried out, and that, if accepted, it will not be published elsewhere including electronically in the same form, in English or in any other language, without the written consent of the copyright-holder.

Changes to authorship

This policy concerns the addition, deletion, or rearrangement of author names in the authorship of accepted manuscripts: Before the accepted manuscript is published in an online issue: Requests to add or remove an author, or to rearrange the author names, must be sent to the Journal Manager from the corresponding author of the accepted manuscript and must include: (a) the reason the name should be added or removed, or the author names rearranged and (b) written conf i rmation (e-mail, fax, letter) from all authors that they agree with the addition, removal or rearrangement. In the case of addition or removal of authors, this includes conf i rmation from the author being added or removed. Requests that are not sent by the corresponding author will be forwarded by the Journal Manager to the corresponding author, who must follow the procedure as described above. Note that: (1) Journal Managers will inform the Journal Editors of any such requests and (2) publication of the accepted manuscript in an online issue is suspended until authorship has been agreed.

After the accepted manuscript is published in an online issue: Any requests to add, delete, or rearrange author names in an article published in an online issue will follow the same policies as noted above and result in a corrigendum.

Copyright

Upon acceptance of an article, authors will be asked to complete a ‘Journal Publishing Agreement’. Acceptance of the agreement will ensure the widest possible dissemination of information. An e-mail will be sent to the corresponding author conf i rming receipt of the manuscript together with a‘Journal Publishing Agreement’ form or a link to the online version of this agreement.

Subscribers may reproduce tables of contents or prepare lists of articles including abstracts for internal circulation within their institutions. Permission of the Publisher is required for resale or distribution outside the institution and for all other derivative works, including compilations and translations (please consult http://www.elsevier.com/permissions). If excerpts from other copyrighted works are included, the author(s) must obtain written permission from the copyright owners and credit the source(s) in the article. Elsevier has preprinted forms for use by authors in these cases: please consult http://www.elsevier.com/permissions.

Role of the funding source

You are requested to identify who provided fi nancial support for the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the article and to brief l y describe the role of the sponsor(s), if any, in study design; in the collection, analysis and interpretation of data; in the writing of the report; and in the decision to submit the paper for publication. If the funding source(s) had no such involvement then this should be stated. Please see http://www. elsevier.com/funding.

Funding body agreements and policies

Elsevier has established agreements and developed policies to allow authors whose articles appear in journals published by Elsevier, to comply with potential manuscript archiving requirements as specif i ed as conditions of their grant awards. To learn more about existing agreements and policies please visit http://www.elsevier.com/fundingbodies.

Language and language services

Please write your text in good English (American or British usage is accepted, but not a mixture of these). Authors who require information about language editing and copyediting services pre- and post-submission please visit http://webshop. elsevier.com/languageediting or our customer support site at http://support.elsevier.com for more information.

Submission

Submission to this journal proceeds totally online. Use the following guidelines to prepare your article. Via the homepage of this journal ( http://ees.elsevier.com/ajps) you will be guided stepwise through the creation and uploading of the various fi les. The system automatically converts source fi les to a single Adobe Acrobat PDF version of the article, which is used in the peer-review process. Please note that even though manuscript source fi les are converted to PDF at submission for the review process, these source fi les are needed for further processing after acceptance. All correspondence, including notif i cation of the Editor’s decision and requests for revision, takes place by e-mail and via the author’s homepage, removing the need for a hard-copy paper trail. Referees

Please submit, with the manuscript, the names, addresses and e-mail addresses of three potential referees. Note that the editor retains the sole right to decide whether or not the suggested reviewers are used.

Additional Information

Tables and fi gures may be presented with captions within the main body of the manuscript; if so, fi gures should additionally be uploaded as high resolution fi les.

PREPARATION

Use of wordprocessing software

It is important that the fi le be saved in the native format of the wordprocessor used. The text should be in single-column format. Keep the layout of the text as simple as possible. Most formatting codes will be removed and replaced on processing the article. In particular, do not use the wordprocessor’s options to justify text or to hyphenate words. However, do use bold face, italics, subscripts, superscripts etc. When preparing tables, if you are using a table grid, use only one grid for each individual table and not a grid for each row. If no grid is used, use tabs, not spaces, to align columns. The electronic text should be prepared in a way very similar to that of conventional manuscripts (see also the Guide to Publishing with Elsevier: http://www.elsevier.com/guidepublication). Note that source fi les of fi gures, tables and text graphics will be required whether or not you embed your fi gures in the text. See also the section on Electronic illustrations.

To avoid unnecessary errors you are strongly advised to use the “spell-check” and “grammar-check” functions of your wordprocessor.

Article structure

Subdivision - numbered sections

Divide your article into clearly def i ned and numbered sections. Subsections should be numbered 1.1 (then 1.1.1, 1.1.2, ...), 1.2, etc. (the abstract is not included in section numbering). Use this numbering also for internal cross-referencing: do not just refer to “the text”. Any subsection may be given a brief heading. Each heading should appear on its own separate line. Introduction

State the objectives of the work and provide an adequate background, avoiding a detailed literature survey or a summary of the results.

Material and methods

Provide suff i cient detail to allow the work to be reproduced. Methods already published should be indicated by a reference: only relevant modif i cations should be described.

Results and discussion

A combined Results and Discussion section is often appropriate. Results should be clear and concise. Discussion should explore the signif i cance of the results of the work, not repeat them. Avoid extensive citations and discussion of published literature. Conclusions

The main conclusions of the study may be presented in a short Conclusions section, which may stand alone or form a subsection of a Discussion or Results and Discussion section.

Appendices

If there is more than one appendix, they should be identif i ed as A, B, etc. Formulae and equations in appendices should be given separate numbering: Eq. (A1), Eq. (A2), etc.; in a subsequent appendix, Eq. (B1) and so on. Similarly for tables and fi gures: Table A1; Fig. A1, etc.

Essential title page information

· Title. Concise and informative. Titles are often used in information-retrieval systems. Avoid abbreviations and formulae where possible.

· Author names and aff i liations. Where the family name may be ambiguous (e.g., a double name), please indicate this clearly. Present the authors’ aff i liation addresses (where the actual work was done) below the names. Indicate all aff i liations with a lower-case superscript letter immediately after the author’s name and in front of the appropriate address. Provide the full postal address of each aff i liation, including the country name, and, if available, the e-mail address of each author.

· Corresponding author. Clearly indicate who will handle correspondence at all stages of refereeing and publication, also post-publication. Ensure that telephone and fax numbers (with country and area code) are provided in addition to the e-mail address and the complete postal address. Contact details must be kept up to date by the corresponding author.

· Present/permanent address. If an author has moved since the work described in the article was done, or was visiting at the time, a “Present address” (or “Permanent address”) may be indicated as a footnote to that author’s name. The address at which the author actually did the work must be retained as the main, aff i liation address. Superscript Arabic numerals are used for such footnotes.

A concise and factual abstract is required. The abstract should state brief l y the purpose of the research, the principal results and major conclusions. An abstract is often presented separately from the article, so it must be able to stand alone. For this reason, References should be avoided, but if essential, then cite the author(s) and year(s). Also, non-standard or uncommon abbreviations should be avoided, but if essential they must be def i ned at their fi rst mention in the abstract itself.

Graphical abstract

Authors must supply a graphical abstract at the time the paper is submitted. The abstract should summarize the contents of the paper in a concise, pictorial form designed to capture the attention of a wide readership and for compilation of databases. The graphical abstract is posted online only.

Carefully drawn fi gures that serve to illustrate the theme of the paper are desired. Authors may also provide appropriate text, not exceeding 30 words. The content of the graphical abstract will be typeset and should be kept within an area of 5 cm by 17 cm (189 x 642 pixels), images should have a minimum resolution of 300 dpi and line art should be between 1000dpi and 1200dpi. Authors must supply the graphic separately as an electronic fi le. Preferred fi le types: TIFF, EPS, PDF or MS Off i ce fi les. See http://www.elsevier. com/graphicalabstracts for examples.

Authors can make use of Elsevier’s Illustration and Enhancement service to ensure the best presentation of their images also in accordance with all technical requirements: Illustration Service.

Immediately after the abstract, provide a maximum of 6 keywords, using American spelling and avoiding general and plural terms and multiple concepts (avoid, for example,‘a(chǎn)nd’, ‘of’). Be sparing with abbreviations: only abbreviations fi rmly established in the fi eld may be eligible. These keywords will be used for indexing purposes.

Abbreviations

De fi ne abbreviations that are not standard in this fi eld in a footnote to be placed on the fi rst page of the article. Such abbreviations that are unavoidable in the abstract must be defi ned at their fi rst mention there, as well as in the footnote. Ensure consistency of abbreviations throughout the article.

Acknowledgements

Collate acknowledgements in a separate section at the end of the article before the references and do not, therefore, include them on the title page, as a footnote to the title orotherwise. List here those individuals who provided help during the research (e.g., providing language help, writing assistance or proof reading the article, etc.).

Nomenclature and units

Follow internationally accepted rules and conventions: use the international system of units (SI). If other quantities are mentioned, give their equivalent in SI. You are urged to consult IUB: Biochemical Nomenclature and Related Documents: http://www.chem.qmw.ac.uk/iubmb/ for further information.

Math formulae

Present simple formulae in the line of normal text where possible and use the solidus (/) instead of a horizontal line for small fractional terms, e.g., X/Y. In principle, variables are to be presented in italics. Powers of e are often more conveniently denoted by exp. Number consecutively any equations that have to be displayed separately from the text (if referred to explicitly in the text).

Footnotes

Footnotes should be used sparingly. Number them consecutively throughout the article, using superscript Arabic numbers. Many wordprocessors build footnotes into the text, and this feature may be used. Should this not be the case, indicate the position of footnotes in the text and present the footnotes themselves separately at the end of the article. Do not include footnotes in the Reference list.

Table footnotes

Indicate each footnote in a table with a superscript lowercase letter.

Artwork

Electronic artwork

General points

· Make sure you use uniform lettering and sizing of your original artwork.

· Save text in illustrations as “graphics” or enclose the font.

· Only use the following fonts in your illustrations: Arial, Courier, Times, Symbol.

· Number the illustrations according to their sequence in the text.

· Use a logical naming convention for your artwork fi les.

· Provide captions to illustrations separately.

· Produce images near to the desired size of the printed version.

· Submit each fi gure as a separate fi le.

A detailed guide on electronic artwork is available on our website: http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions

You are urged to visit this site; some excerpts from the detailed information are given here.

Formats

Regardless of the application used, when your electronic artwork is fi nalised, please “save as” or convert the images to one of the following formats (note the resolution requirements for line drawings, halftones, and line/halftone combinations given below):

EPS: Vector drawings. Embed the font or save the text as“graphics”.

TIFF: color or grayscale photographs (halftones): always use a minimum of 300 dpi.

TIFF: Bitmapped line drawings: use a minimum of 1000 dpi.

TIFF: Combinations bitmapped line/half-tone (color or grayscale): a minimum of 500 dpi is required.

If your electronic artwork is created in a Microsoft Office application (Word, PowerPoint, Excel) then please supply“as is”.

Please do not:

· Supply fi les that are optimised for screen use (like GIF, BMP, PICT, WPG); the resolution is too low;

· Supply fi les that are too low in resolution;

· Submit graphics that are disproportionately large for the content.

Color artwork

Please make sure that artwork fi les are in an acceptable format (TIFF, EPS or MS Off i ce fi les) and with the correct resolution. If, together with your accepted article, you submit usable color fi gures then Elsevier will ensure, at no additional charge, that these fi gures will appear in color on the Web (e.g., ScienceDirect and other sites) regardless of whether or not these illustrations are reproduced in color in the printed version.

Figure captions

Ensure that each illustration has a caption. Supply captions separately, not attached to the fi gure. A caption should comprise a brief title (not on the fi gure itself) and a description of the illustration. Keep text in the illustrations themselves to a minimum but explain all symbols and abbreviations used.

Tables

Number tables consecutively in accordance with their appearance in the text. Place footnotes to tables below the table body and indicate them with superscript lowercase letters. Avoid vertical rules. Be sparing in the use of tables and ensure that the data presented in tables do not duplicate results described elsewhere in the article.

Please ensure that every reference cited in the text is also present in the reference list (and vice versa). Any references cited in the abstract must be given in full. Unpublished results and personal communications are not recommended in the reference list, but may be mentioned in the text. If these references are included in the reference list they should follow the standard reference style of the journal and should include a substitution of the publication date with either “Unpublished results” or “Personal communication” Citation of a reference as “in press” implies that the item has been accepted for publication.

Web references

As a minimum, the full URL should be given and the date when the reference was last accessed. Any further information, if known (DOI, author names, dates, reference to a source publication, etc.), should also be given. Web references can be listed separately (e.g., after the reference list) under a different heading if desired, or can be included in the reference list.

References in a special issue

Please ensure that the words ‘this issue’ are added to any references in the list (and any citations in the text) to other articles in the same Special Issue.

Reference management software

This journal has standard templates available in key reference management packages EndNote (http://www.endnote.com/support/enstyles.asp) and Reference Manager (http://refman.com/support/rmstyles.asp). Using plug-ins to wordprocessing packages, authors only need to select the appropriate journal template when preparing their article and the list of references and citations to these will be formatted according to the journal style which is described below.

Reference style

Text: Indicate references by number(s) in square brackets in line with the text. The actual authors can be referred to, but the reference number(s) must always be given.

List: Number the references (numbers in square brackets) in the list in the order in which they appear in the text.

Examples:

Reference to a journal publication:

[1] Van der Geer J, Hanraads JAJ, Lupton RA. The art of writing a scientif i c article. J Sci Commun 2000;163:51-59.

[2] Thylefors B, Negrel AD, Pararajasegaram R, et al. Global data on blindness. Bull WHO 1995;73:115-121.

Reference to a book:

[3] Strunk Jr W, White EB. The elements of style. 3rd ed. New York: Macmillan; 1979.

Reference to a chapter in an edited book:

[4] Mettam GR, Adams LB. How to prepare an electronic version of your article. In: Jones BS, Smith RZ, editors. Introduction to the electronic age. New York: E- Publishing Inc; 1999, p. 281-304.

Note non-shortened form for last page number. e.g., 51-59, and that for more than 3 authors, the fi rst 3 should be listed followed by ‘et al.’

Journal abbreviations source

Journal names should be abbreviated according to; Index Medicus journal abbreviations: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/tsd/ serials/lji.html; List of title word abbreviations: http://www. issn.org/2-22661-LTWA-online.php; CAS (Chemical Abstracts Service): http://www.cas.org/sent.html.

Submission checklist

The following list will be useful during the fi nal checking of an article prior to sending it to the journal for review. Please consult this Guide for Authors for further details of any item. Ensure that the following items are present:

One Author designated as corresponding Author:

· E-mail address

· Full postal address

· Telephone and fax numbers

All necessary fi les have been uploaded:

· Keywords

· All fi gure captions

· All tables (including title, description, footnotes)

Further considerations

· Manuscript has been “spellchecked” and “grammar-checked”

· References are in the correct format for this journal

· All references mentioned in the Reference list are cited in the text, and vice versa

· Permission has been obtained for use of copyrighted material from other sources (including the Web)

· Color fi gures are clearly marked as being intended for color reproduction on the Web (free of charge) and in print or to be reproduced in color on the Web (free of charge) and in blackand-white in print

· If only color on the Web is required, black and white versions of the fi gures are also supplied for printing purposes

For any further information please visit our customer support site at http://support.elsevier.com.

AFTER ACCEPTANCE

Use of the Digital Object Identif i er

The Digital Object Identif i er (DOI) may be used to cite and link to electronic documents. The DOI consists of a unique alphanumeric character string which is assigned to a document by the publisher upon the initial electronic publication. The assigned DOI never changes. Therefore, it is an ideal medium for citing a document, particularly ‘Articles in press’because they have not yet received their full bibliographic information. The correct format for citing a DOI is shown as follows (example taken from a document in the journal Physics Letters B): doi:10.1016/j.physletb.2010.09.059

When you use the DOI to create URL hyperlinks to documents on the web, they are guaranteed never to change.

Proofs

One set of page proofs (as PDF fi les) will be sent by email to the corresponding author (if we do not have an e-mail address then paper proofs will be sent by post) or, a link will be provided in the e-mail so that authors can download the fi les themselves. Elsevier now provides authors with PDF proofs which can be annotated; for this you will need to download Adobe Reader version 7 (or higher) available free from http://get.adobe. com/reader. Instructions on how to annotate PDF fi les will accompany the proofs (also given online). The exact system requirements are given at the Adobe site: http://www.adobe.com/products/reader/systemreqs.

If you do not wish to use the PDF annotations function, you may list the corrections (including replies to the Query Form) and return them to Elsevier in an e-mail. Please list your corrections quoting line number. If, for any reason, this is not possible, then mark the corrections and any other comments (including replies to the Query Form) on a printout of your proof and return by fax, or scan the pages and e-mail, or by post. Please use this proof only for checking the typesetting, editing, completeness and correctness of the text, tables and fi gures. Signif i cant changes to the article as accepted for publication will only be considered at this stage with permission from the Editor. We will do everything possible to get your article published quickly and accurately - please let us have all your corrections within 48 hours. It is important to ensure that all corrections are sent back to us in one communication: please check carefully before replying, as inclusion of any subsequent corrections cannot be guaranteed. Proofreading is solely your responsibility. Note that Elsevier may proceed with the publication of your article if no response is received.

Offprints

The corresponding author, at no cost, will be provided with a PDF fi le of the article via e-mail. For an extra charge, paper offprints can be ordered via the offprint order form which is sent once the article is accepted for publication. The PDF fi le is a watermarked version of the published article and includes a cover sheet with the journal cover image and a disclaimer outlining the terms and conditions of use.

More information about article offprint is available here: http://webshop.elsevier.com/

AUTHOR INQUIRIES

You can track your submitted article at http://help.elsevier.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/89/p/8045/. You can track your accepted article at http://www.elsevier.com/trackarticle. You are also welcome to contact Customer Support via http://support.elsevier.com.

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