Information For Authors

The author guidelines are important to make a submission as easy as possible and to make authors aware of the rules before preparing and submitting their manuscripts for this journal. It informs the authors about the types of papers, formatting articles, styles and language, images, figures and tables, conflict of interest, submission declaration, authorship, changes to authorship, copyright and agreement, author rights, the role of the funding source, funding body agreements and policies, submission, referees, preparation, article structure, nomenclature and units, footnotes, artwork, captions, supplementary data, submission checklist. Then information on after submission of the manuscript: proofreading and correction and use of the universal object identifier (DOI) will be provided.

Types of papers

This journal publishes review papers, original research papers and letters.

  1. Research articles: The research articles are expected to be original research findings that have not been published and are not under consideration for publication elsewhere. The length of the article should not exceed 8,000 words including footnotes. An abstract of fewer than 250 words is preferred.

  2. Review articles: These contributions are usually commissioned by the journal. However, high-quality unsolicited review articles are also considered. These articles review and discuss developments in a given domain. These are expected to be well-focused and organized summarizing the findings and recommendations from the specific research fields in the last few decades. The length of the review article should not exceed 10,000 words. An abstract of fewer than 250 words is preferred. The minimum reference used should not be less than 100.

  3. Letters: The journal publishes letters to the journal on specific topics of relevance to the interests of the general clientele. It focuses on comments to recently published articles in the journal or the author’s response to the comments. Letters can also be short communications with new findings but that are not extensive like the original research articles. The length of articles may not exceed 4000 words. An abstract of fewer than 250 words is preferred.

  4. Erratum: An erratum refers to a correction of errors introduced to the manuscript by the publisher. Any errors introduced by the publisher and identified by the author should be corrected before publication during the proofreading stage.

  5. Corrigendum: refers to a change to an article by authors after acceptance. Authors should request the editor to decide on the proposed changes. When the change is accepted by the editor, the correction will be published.

Document format

The journal accepts both word and LaTEX documents that contain title, abstract, keywords, section headings, references, and appendixes. Schemes, Figures, and Tables are also part of the manuscript.

  1. Microsoft word guidelines: There is no specific template to follow when preparing the manuscripts using Microsoft, LibreOffice or any word processing software. However, the author needs to make sure that the fonts are prepared with 12 pt and 1.5 spacing, justified and the heading levels and sections are clearly defined.

  2. (La)TeX preparation guidelines: Submission of LaTex files are highly encouraged. The journal has its own standardized LaTeX template that can be downloaded from the journal website or it can be accessed from Overleaf should the authors be interested in writing in an online environment. It is important to include all .bib or .bst files used when creating the articles.

  3. Frontmatter of paper: This section contains the title of the article, short title, author(s) names and affiliations or address(s) of associated institutions where the work was carried out and the corresponding author. All these are mandatory for the manuscript to be accepted for publication. The short title is an abbreviated version of the article title and it should be 50 characters or fewer, including spaces that appear at the top of every page of the paper. Published articles may also use short titles to identify the article for the reader at a glance.

  4. Author names and affiliations: Many articles are authored by multiples of authors because of the growing list of collaborative research projects. These multi-author projects raise the question regarding the order of the authors in research manuscripts and the impact an author list has on the perceptions of the readers. It is, therefore, advisable to order the authors based on their relative contributions. In theory, all authors are equally important to complete the project successfully and should be credited equally, however, due to customs and other practical reasons, some authors are more visible than others. The advisable order of the manuscript for this journal is: The “first author”: first author position has more visibility than the others because of various citation rules. In most citations, it is the first author’s name that is visible, the other names are simply stated as “et al”. This is the reason why most readers associate the first author with someone having more importance.

In this journal, the authors order is relative, the author who made the most substantial contribution to a research project comes first and the other authors are ranked in descending order of contribution. If the authors can’t verify the relative contribution of the project and all authors have worked on the project equally, the order will be based on an alphabetical list. The alphabetical list will be in ascending order from A to Z. If there are multiples of first and second authors, the list follows alphabetically for the authors who contributed equally. However, the corresponding author should make sure that the order of the authors is negotiated, and all authors are informed before submitting the manuscript.

  1. Author for correspondence: The author's correspondence should contain the addresses of the corresponding author. It may contain the physical address of the corresponding address, email and postal addresses.

  2. Abstract: The abstract is a summary of the contents of the article; it should give enough information to make the reader fully understand the article. This is the reason why it needs to be concise. This section highlights the main points of the article, outlines the methodology followed, results and conclusions and elucidates the significance of the results. It is advisable to avoid citations in the abstract. Citations for the paper’s sources normally appear in the body of the paper.

  3. Keywords: keywords are essential during the submission of the paper. The author needs to make sure he/she uses the same English writing format for the spellings, that is American spelling or British spelling. Avoid plural and general terms and multiple concepts (e.g., avoid “and”, “of”). Only abbreviations firmly established in the field are legible, otherwise, avoid abbreviations. The purpose of the keywords is for indexing reasons.

  4. Abbreviations: Abbreviations that are not standard to the field need to be defined in a footnote and to be placed on the first page of the article. If there are avoidable abbreviations in the abstract, they must be defined at their first mention in the abstract, as well as in the footnote. It is advisable to make sure the abbreviation styles are consistent throughout the article.

  5. Footnotes: Sometimes footnotes are essential. It is advisable to number them consecutively throughout the article, using superscript Arabic numbers. Many word processors build footnotes into the text, and this feature may be used. If this is not the case, indicate the position of the footnotes in the text and present the footnotes themselves separately at the end of the article. It is not acceptable to include footnotes in the References list.

  6. Introduction: In the introduction section the authors are expected to present the aim of the research performed to the readers and attract their attention. It should provide the general topic of the article based on the current literature. This literature review is used to identify the problem and paves the way for the disclosure of the objectives of the manuscript. Once the problems are identified and references are discussed in detail, it should provide recommendations for solutions, indicating the aim of the current research. These are the steps required to track the problem, and its solution from the perspectives of the reader. Otherwise, it is quite difficult to attract the attention of the reader with inadequately written articles.

  7. Materials and methods: In the materials and methods section, the author/s must present the materials and techniques used to achieve the research objectives. The materials of the research include the computational resources, imageries, equipment and lab instruments used for the study. Methods include the datasets, models, computational scripts, modules, statistical and numerical techniques employed for the research study.

  8. Results and discussion: Authors must notify the main findings of the research, providing a clear explanation of their significance and relevance. Its writing should be clear and concise to attract the attention of the reader and conveys the intended message accurately.

  9. Conclusion/s: This section summarizes the paper in a short concluding paragraph. It presents the challenges that arise because of the study, suggests and recommends for future study.

  10. Acknowledgment/s: This section should contain a precise and short acknowledgment text. The author needs to acknowledge the funding organization, data and model sources, colleagues and computational platform providers.

  11. Figures, tables and schemes: There should be no spelling errors in the artwork of the figures. All the figures and tables should be numbered and suitably referenced in the text at their appropriate description, e.g., Figure 1 and Tables 1 and 3. The caption of a figure must appear below the graphic while the caption of tables must be above the table.

  12. References: This section contains abbreviated alphanumeric expressions embedded in the body of an intellectual work that denotes an entry in the bibliographic references section of the work. The purpose of this is to acknowledge the relevance of the works of others to the topic of discussion at the spot where the citation appears.

References to cited literature in the text should be given in the form of an author’s surname and the year of publication of the paper with the addition of a letter for references to several publications of the author in the same year. For two authors, the surnames are separated by the conjunction “and”; for three or more coauthors, only the first surname is given with the addition of et al. It is desirable to include surnames in the text of a sentence; when this is not possible, they should be given in parentheses.

The cited literature is given under the title REFERENCES at the end of the paper in alphabetical order of the surname of the first author. For articles with more than eight authors, the surnames and initials of the first eight authors separated by a comma with the addition of et al. are given in a reference. The abbreviated name of the journal in the CASSI system of abbreviations is given, followed by the volume and the first page of publication after a comma, as well as the year of publication in parentheses. For books, the surname(s) and initials of the author(s) or editor(s) (if it is a collection of works), the full title of the book, and, in parentheses, the publisher, city, and year of publication should be given. In references to papers published in conference proceedings, the conference name and then, in parentheses, editors, publisher, city, year of publication, and its first page should be given. The following examples illustrate the format:

  1. Journal Articles:
    1. Author 1, G.H and Author 2, I.J. Title of the article. Journal Name Year,     Volume, page range.

  2. Books and Book Chapters:
    2. Author 1, A. and Author 2, B. Book Title, 2nd ed.; Publisher: Publisher Location, Country, Year; pp. 1-10.
    3. Author 1, A. and Author 2, B. Title of the chapter.     In Book Title, 2nd ed.; Editor 1, A., Editor 2, B., Eds.; Publisher: Publisher Location, Country, Year; Volume 10, pp. 56-70.

  3. Conference Proceedings:
    4. Author 1, C.D; Author 2, E.F. and Author 3, G.H. Title of Presentation. In Proceedings of the Name of the Conference, Location of Conference, Country, Date of Conference; Editor 1, Editor 2; Publisher: City, Country, Year (if available).

  1. Appendix: If there is an appendix, place it after the References. If there is more than one appendix, add a letter after “Appendix”, e.g., Appendix A, Appendix B, etc.

Journal language

This is an English language journal and both American or British usages are accepted, but not a mixture of the two. Authors, who are not confident with their English language proficiency may consult experts to check their manuscripts with their own responsibility.

Nomenclatures and units

It is advisable to follow the internationally accepted rules and conventions: use the international system of units (SI). If other quantities are mentioned, give their equivalent in SI. The dimensions of quantities should be presented using a slash (e.g., cm/s, g/cm3), but concentrations should be given as cm -3, rather than 1/cm3. The fractional part of a number should be separated from its integer part by a decimal point (e.g., 3.1416). In exponential form, such numbers are written as 1.3 × 102, not 1.3E-2. Approximate equality is denoted by ≈ or, order-of-magnitude equality is denoted by ~ (commonly used in the text), and proportionality is denoted by ∞.

Figures, images, and tables

The acceptable formats for figures, images and photographs are *.eps, *.jpg, *.jpeg, *.png, *.gif, and *.pdf. High resolution and quality images, figures and photographs are expected and the coordinate axes in all plots should be scaled. The figures, images and tables need to be indicated along with the physical quantities and dimensions. Figures, images and tables need to have brief captions explaining the content. It is advisable to have no or few words on figures. It is also important to not add gridlines or gray backgrounds to figures or diagrams. Textual parts of the figure should not touch the graphical parts. The size of characters should match the final size of a figure.

Tables should follow standard formats matching the size of the manuscript page and they should clearly state all columns and rows. For numbers, only the significant number of decimals should be written. Within the text-only short tables should be shown. Large tables and datasets need to be placed at the end of the manuscript. Electronic tables should be prepared and submitted in ASCII format and submitted for revision together with the manuscript. Electronic tables will be accessible through the SSGI website and other databases such as the Strasbourg Astronomical Data Center/CDS, Vizier, etc.

Conflicts of interest

All authors are required to disclose any financial relationship with commercial companies that have an interest in the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript. The “Conflict of interest statement” must be submitted along with the manuscript. The disclosures will be held in confidence while the manuscript is under review and will not influence the peer-review processes.

All authors should declare any conflict of interest that may arise due to their submitted journals. Editor(s) also should check potential reviewers’ conflicts of interest to maintain neutrality or objectivity of the work or its assessment. Hence, the nominated potential reviewers also should decline manuscript reviewing if they think there may be any conflict of interest. When there exists a known conflict of interest on a published article, it may be necessary to publish a corrigendum or reassess the review process.

If there is no conflict of interest, the authors should state “The author(s) declare(s) that there are no conflicts of interest regarding the publication of this paper.” Submitting authors are responsible for coauthors by declaring their interests.

Submission declaration

The submission declaration implies that the research work has not been submitted to other journals and is not under consideration for publication elsewhere. This does not include if the abstract was used in conferences, lecture notes, or academic thesis. Upon acceptance, all authors and the responsible bodies where the work has been carried out should approve its publication. If accepted the authors should duly agree that it will not be published elsewhere including in electronic form, or as it is, in English or in any other language without the consent of the copyright holder. This journal is the copyright holder for the accepted publications.

Submission

The author(s) should submit an electronic version (a PDF file with figures and tables) of the manuscript to the editorial office. The main body of the manuscript in Word, LaTeX, TeX, or Text only formats with an attachment of separate files with figures and tables may be sent upon acceptance of the manuscript for publication. The style file can be found on the web page of the journal.

The authors have to submit, with the manuscript, the names, addresses and email addresses for three potential referees. However, the editor retains the sole right to decide whether or not the suggested reviewers are used.

Manuscript revision and resubmission

Once the manuscript is submitted, the editor assigns referees within 2 weeks. Once the reviewers are assigned, they will give comments within 1 month. Once the comments are submitted to all authors, they will be given a month to re-submit their revised manuscript. In case authors need more than one month for paper re-submission, they should contact the editor for an extension and reasons why they could not submit the revised manuscript within one month. Otherwise, the manuscript will be considered retracted by the authors. The reply should consist of the revised manuscript and an accompanying document describing each reviewer's points in detail. If a manuscript is rejected, the editorial office will not retain a copy of the manuscript. Starting from the first resubmission it is recommended that the peer-reviewing process does not take more than three months until publication.

Work with electronic proofs

A PDF file of the proof of the paper is sent to the authors by email. The file can be read and edited with Adobe Reader (version 9 or higher), which can be downloaded free of charge via the Internet. Notes should be inserted directly into the PDF file using the “Comment and Markup” toolbar in Adobe Reader. Do not use other programs to edit the PDF files; otherwise, the author’s notes can be lost when replies are processed automatically. The name of the PDF file and the subject line of the email message should not be changed for the same reason. Other instructions can be found in the accompanying letter.

Changes to authorship

Due to unforeseeable circumstances, it may arise that the authors names need to be removed, added or arranged after the manuscript has been accepted for publication. Requests to rearrange, remove or add authors must be sent to the editor for the accepted manuscripts stating the reasons why rearrangement, removal or addition of an author is needed and written confirmation from all authors that they agree with the new author arrangement. Confirmation to be added or removed should also be made by the authors to be removed or added.

Once the accepted manuscript is published online, any request to add, remove or rearrange authors follows the same procedure above and results in a corrigendum.

Fees, reprint, and payments for publication

This journal is an open-access journal without any type of payment collected from the authors for publication. It is only an online publishing journal and authors will receive reprints of their papers in the form of PDF files.

Do’s and don’ts for the authors

  1. Authors/contributors have to refrain from using a language style that does not match with the professional ethics of the scientific/technical journal.

  2. Authors/contributors should not consider the Journal as a medium for marketing/ publicity of any product or service of their interests.

  3. Authors/contributors must not manipulate, falsify or misrepresent data or the findings.

  4. Authors/contributors must be honest in making claims for the results and conclusions of their research.

  5. Authors to their utmost efforts, avoid errors in research and exercise due caution in presenting work for publication.

  6. The source material of experiments and research results should be recorded and preserved in a manner that permits verification and maintenance of an audit trail by other scientists. In certain cases, exceptions may be appropriate to preserve privacy or patent protection.

  7. Authors should acknowledge the work of others, that has been used or that has provided support/inspiration in their research and cite publications that have influenced the direction and course of their study.

  8. Information gathered in private correspondence or conversation should only be used with the explicit permission of the individuals involved.

  9. Information collected while providing confidential services, such as refereeing research articles, etc. should not be used without the permission of the original author.

Submission checklist

Authors need to follow the following checking for an article before sending it to the journal for review.

Make sure the following items are included in the submissions:

  1. One author designated as the corresponding author

  1. Email address

  2. Full postal address

  3. Telephone and fax numbers

  1. All necessary files

  1. Keywords

  2. All figure captions

  3. All tables (including title, description, footnotes)

  1. Consider checking

  1. Manuscripts are “spell-checked” and “grammar-checked”

  2. References are in the correct format for this journal

  3. All references in the Reference list are cited in the text and vice versa

  4. Permission has been obtained for the use of copyrighted materials from other sources

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