Guide for authors
- Your Paper Your Way
- Introduction
- Before you begin
- Ethics in publishing
- Declaration of competing interest
- Declaration of generative AI in scientific writing
- Submission declaration and verification
- Use of inclusive language
- Reporting sex- and gender-based analyses
- Changes to authorship
- Copyright
- Role of the funding source
- Preparation
- After acceptance
- Author inquiries
We now differentiate between the requirements for new and revised submissions. You may choose to submit your manuscript as a single Word or PDF file to be used in the refereeing process. Only when your paper is at the revision stage, will you be requested to put your paper in to a 'correct format' for acceptance and provide the items required for the publication of your article.
To find out more, please visit the Preparation section below.
Introduction
PEDOSPHERE is a peer-reviewed international journal of soil science. It welcomes submissions from scientists around the world under a broad scope of topics relevant to timely, high quality original research findings, especially up-to-date achievements and advances in the entire field of soil science studies dealing with environmental science, ecology, agriculture, bioscience, geoscience, forestry, etc. PEDOSPHERE publishes mainly original research articles as well as some reviews, mini reviews, short communications, letters to the Editor and special issues. Its areas of particular interest include soil physics; soil chemistry; soil biology and biochemistry; soil fertility and plant nutrition; soil resources and use; soil mineralogy; soil environment and ecology; soil and water conservation; forest, range, and wetland soils; soil salinity and management; soil and plant analysis and technology; and soil gases and global change. Types of paper
PEDOSPHERE accepts full-length research papers, review or mini review papers, short communications, letters to the Editor and special issues. Authors should indicate the type of manuscript when they submit it. The Editorial Committee may, however, request the authors to change the type of the contribution after review. The manuscript must be written in English and should have been neither published nor submitted for publication elsewhere. All articles will undergo double-blind peer review prior to acceptance. The Editorial Committee reserves the right to make the final decision on the acceptance or rejection of the contribution.
The Editors generally encourage brevity for all papers. A full-length research paper is generally limited to 10 printed pages, a review paper should not exceed 16 printed pages and a short communication and a letter to the Editor must not exceed 4 printed pages, including text, illustrations, tables and references. The total number of illustrations and/or tables should not exceed ten. Editors may allow longer papers if of extraordinary significance and originality.
Contact details for submissionAll manuscripts should be submitted electronically via PEDOSPHERE Online Editorial System (POES)---The web-based online manuscript submission, tracking, peer-review, and editorial management system of PEDOSPHERE---which can be accessed at http://pedosphere.issas.ac.cn, https://mc03.manuscriptcentral.com/pedosphere, or https://cn.manuscriptcentral.com/pedosphere. Please refrain from submitting your manuscript by e-mail attachment.
The first thing you need to do, if you have not done so already, is to register for an account. After this, please consult the instructions below to enable you to submit your article through PEDOSPHERE Online Editorial System (POES).
The manuscript submission process starts by pressing the "Submit Manuscript" link on your "Home" page. Please make sure you have gathered all the required four aspects of information about your manuscript listed below BEFORE commencing online submission.
For questions on the submission and reviewing process, please contact the Editorial Office at [email protected].
Submission checklistYou can use this list to carry out a final check of your submission before you send it to the journal for review. Please check the relevant section in this Guide for Authors for more details.
Ensure that the following items are present:
One author has been designated as the corresponding author with contact details:
• E-mail address
• Full postal address
All necessary files have been uploaded:
Manuscript:
• Include keywords
• All figures (include relevant captions)
• All tables (including titles, description, footnotes)
• Ensure all figure and table citations in the text match the files provided
• Indicate clearly if color should be used for any figures in print
Graphical Abstracts / Highlights files (where applicable)
Supplemental files (where applicable)
Further considerations
• Manuscript has been 'spell checked' and 'grammar checked'
• 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 Internet)
• A competing interests statement is provided, even if the authors have no competing interests to declare
• Journal policies detailed in this guide have been reviewed
• Referee suggestions and contact details provided, based on journal requirements
For further information, visit our Support Center.
Before you begin
Ethics in publishingPlease see our information on Ethics in publishing. Declaration of competing interest
All authors must disclose any financial and personal relationships with other people or organizations that could inappropriately influence (bias) their work. Examples of potential conflicts of interest include employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, paid expert testimony, patent applications/registrations, and grants or other funding. Authors should complete the declaration of competing interest statement using this template and upload to the submission system at the Attach/Upload Files step. Note: Please do not convert the .docx template to another file type. Author signatures are not required. If there are no interests to declare, please choose the first option in the template. More information. Declaration of generative AI in scientific writing
The below guidance only refers to the writing process, and not to the use of AI tools to analyse and draw insights from data as part of the research process.
Where authors use generative artificial intelligence (AI) and AI-assisted technologies in the writing process, authors should only use these technologies to improve readability and language. Applying the technology should be done with human oversight and control, and authors should carefully review and edit the result, as AI can generate authoritative-sounding output that can be incorrect, incomplete or biased. AI and AI-assisted technologies should not be listed as an author or co-author, or be cited as an author. Authorship implies responsibilities and tasks that can only be attributed to and performed by humans, as outlined in Elsevier’s AI policy for authors.
Authors should disclose in their manuscript the use of AI and AI-assisted technologies in the writing process by following the instructions below. A statement will appear in the published work. Please note that authors are ultimately responsible and accountable for the contents of the work.
Disclosure instructions
Authors must disclose the use of generative AI and AI-assisted technologies in the writing process by adding a statement at the end of their manuscript in the core manuscript file, before the References list. The statement should be placed in a new section entitled ‘Declaration of Generative AI and AI-assisted technologies in the writing process’.
Statement: During the preparation of this work the author(s) used [NAME TOOL / SERVICE] in order to [REASON]. After using this tool/service, the author(s) reviewed and edited the content as needed and take(s) full responsibility for the content of the publication.
This declaration does not apply to the use of basic tools for checking grammar, spelling, references etc. If there is nothing to disclose, there is no need to add a statement.
Submission declaration and verificationSubmission of an article implies that the work described has not been published previously (except in the form of an abstract, a published lecture or academic thesis, see 'Multiple, redundant or concurrent publication' for more information), 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 in the same form, in English or in any other language, including electronically without the written consent of the copyright-holder. To verify compliance, your article may be checked by Crossref Similarity Check and other originality or duplicate checking software. Preprints
Please note that preprints can be shared anywhere at any time, in line with Elsevier's sharing policy. Sharing your preprints e.g. on a preprint server will not count as prior publication (see 'Multiple, redundant or concurrent publication' for more information). Use of inclusive language
Inclusive language acknowledges diversity, conveys respect to all people, is sensitive to differences, and promotes equal opportunities. Content should make no assumptions about the beliefs or commitments of any reader; contain nothing which might imply that one individual is superior to another on the grounds of age, gender, race, ethnicity, culture, sexual orientation, disability or health condition; and use inclusive language throughout. Authors should ensure that writing is free from bias, stereotypes, slang, reference to dominant culture and/or cultural assumptions. We advise to seek gender neutrality by using plural nouns ("clinicians, patients/clients") as default/wherever possible to avoid using "he, she," or "he/she." We recommend avoiding the use of descriptors that refer to personal attributes such as age, gender, race, ethnicity, culture, sexual orientation, disability or health condition unless they are relevant and valid. When coding terminology is used, we recommend to avoid offensive or exclusionary terms such as "master", "slave", "blacklist" and "whitelist". We suggest using alternatives that are more appropriate and (self-) explanatory such as "primary", "secondary", "blocklist" and "allowlist". These guidelines are meant as a point of reference to help identify appropriate language but are by no means exhaustive or definitive. Reporting sex- and gender-based analyses
Reporting guidance
For research involving or pertaining to humans, animals or eukaryotic cells, investigators should integrate sex and gender-based analyses (SGBA) into their research design according to funder/sponsor requirements and best practices within a field. Authors should address the sex and/or gender dimensions of their research in their article. In cases where they cannot, they should discuss this as a limitation to their research's generalizability. Importantly, authors should explicitly state what definitions of sex and/or gender they are applying to enhance the precision, rigor and reproducibility of their research and to avoid ambiguity or conflation of terms and the constructs to which they refer (see Definitions section below). Authors can refer to the Sex and Gender Equity in Research (SAGER) guidelines and the SAGER guidelines checklist. These offer systematic approaches to the use and editorial review of sex and gender information in study design, data analysis, outcome reporting and research interpretation - however, please note there is no single, universally agreed-upon set of guidelines for defining sex and gender.
Definitions
Sex generally refers to a set of biological attributes that are associated with physical and physiological features (e.g., chromosomal genotype, hormonal levels, internal and external anatomy). A binary sex categorization (male/female) is usually designated at birth (""sex assigned at birth""), most often based solely on the visible external anatomy of a newborn. Gender generally refers to socially constructed roles, behaviors, and identities of women, men and gender-diverse people that occur in a historical and cultural context and may vary across societies and over time. Gender influences how people view themselves and each other, how they behave and interact and how power is distributed in society. Sex and gender are often incorrectly portrayed as binary (female/male or woman/man) and unchanging whereas these constructs actually exist along a spectrum and include additional sex categorizations and gender identities such as people who are intersex/have differences of sex development (DSD) or identify as non-binary. Moreover, the terms ""sex"" and ""gender"" can be ambiguous—thus it is important for authors to define the manner in which they are used. In addition to this definition guidance and the SAGER guidelines, the resources on this page offer further insight around sex and gender in research studies.
Authors are expected to consider carefully the list and order of authors before submitting their manuscript and provide the definitive list of authors at the time of the original submission. Any addition, deletion or rearrangement of author names in the authorship list should be made only before the manuscript has been accepted and only if approved by the journal Editor. To request such a change, the Editor must receive the following from the corresponding author: (a) the reason for the change in author list and (b) written confirmation (e-mail, letter) from all authors that they agree with the addition, removal or rearrangement. In the case of addition or removal of authors, this includes confirmation from the author being added or removed.
Only in exceptional circumstances will the Editor consider the addition, deletion or rearrangement of authors after the manuscript has been accepted. While the Editor considers the request, publication of the manuscript will be suspended. If the manuscript has already been published in an online issue, any requests approved by the Editor will result in a corrigendum. Copyright
When articles are provisionally accepted, the corresponding author will be asked to return a signed Copyright Transfer Agreement (including signature(s) of the corresponding author or all co-authors) stating that all contributors have seen and approved the article and that the work has not been, and will not be, published elsewhere; and copyright to the article is hereby transferred to the Editorial Committee of PEDOSPHERE, if and when the article is accepted for publication.
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. If excerpts from other copyrighted works are included, the author(s) must obtain written permission from the copyright owners and c redit the source(s) in the article. Elsevier has preprinted forms for use by authors in these cases.
For open access articles: Upon acceptance of an article, authors will be asked to complete an 'Exclusive License Agreement' (more information). Permitted third party reuse of open access articles is determined by the author's choice of user license.
Author rights
As an author you (or your employer or institution) have certain rights to reuse your work. More information.
Find out how you can share your research published in Elsevier journals. Role of the funding source
You are requested to identify who provided financial support for the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the article and to briefly 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 article for publication. If the funding source(s) had no such involvement, it is recommended to state this. Elsevier Researcher Academy
Researcher Academy is a free e-learning platform designed to support early and mid-career researchers throughout their research journey. The "Learn" environment at Researcher Academy offers several interactive modules, webinars, downloadable guides and resources to guide you through the process of writing for research and going through peer review. Feel free to use these free resources to improve your submission and navigate the publication process with ease. Language (usage and editing services)
Please write your text in good English (American or British usage is accepted, but not a mixture of these). Authors who feel their English language manuscript may require editing to eliminate possible grammatical or spelling errors and to conform to correct scientific English may wish to use the Language Editing service available from Elsevier's Language Services. Suggesting reviewers
Please submit the names and institutional e-mail addresses of several potential reviewers.
You should not suggest reviewers who are colleagues, or who have co-authored or collaborated with you during the last three years. Editors do not invite reviewers who have potential competing interests with the authors. Further, in order to provide a broad and balanced assessment of the work, and ensure scientific rigor, please suggest diverse candidate reviewers who are located in different countries/regions from the author group. Also consider other diversity attributes e.g. gender, race and ethnicity, career stage, etc. Finally, you should not include existing members of the journal's editorial team, of whom the journal are already aware.
Note: the editor decides whether or not to invite your suggested reviewers.
Preparation
New SubmissionSubmission to this journal proceeds totally online and you will be guided stepwise through the creation and uploading of your files. The system automatically converts your files to a single PDF file, which is used in the peer-review process. References
All publications referred to in the text should be presented in a list of references and arranged alphabetically by authors' names. The reference list must not contain unpublished observations, personal communications, personal correspondences, unarchived materials obtained from the World Wide Web, etc. "Anonymous" is not acceptable as an author. The author's name (without initials)-year of publication system is used in the text. Please follow the chronological order. The spelling of authors' names and the years of publication must be checked carefully and should be exactly the same in the text as in the reference list. Two or more publications by the same author(s) are listed chronologically; two or more in the same year are indicated by the letter a, b, c, etc. For three or more authors use the first author followed by "et al." in the text. Use international abbreviations such as ISI Journal Title Abbreviations for abbreviations of journal names, and when in doubt give full name of the periodical. The publications in non-Latin alphabets should be translated into English, and for the publications in languages other than English a notation such as "(in German)", "(in Chinese)", "(in Japanese)" and "(in Russian)" must be added behind the name of the periodical, proceedings or book. The name of journal should be given in italic type, and the volume number in bold type. Formatting requirements
There are no strict formatting requirements but all manuscripts must contain the essential elements needed to convey your manuscript, for example Abstract, Keywords, Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, Conclusions, Artwork and Tables with Captions.
If your article includes any Videos and/or other Supplementary material, this should be included in your initial submission for peer review purposes.
Divide the article into clearly defined sections. Revised Submission
The authors will be requested, before final acceptance, to revise and return their manuscripts according to the referees' suggestions, comments or criticisms for improvement of the quality. Failure to return the manuscript revised strictly following the editor's requirements in time will significantly delay processing of the manuscript. Any queries should be answered in full. If not returned within 2 months, the manuscript will be released, and it must then be resubmitted as a new paper. Article structure Introduction
State the objectives of the work and provide an adequate background, avoiding a detailed literature survey or a summary of the results.
An informative, self-explanatory abstract, less than 250 words, must be supplied. It should be specific, telling why and how the study was made, what the major results were, and why they were important. Use quantitative terms where possible. Should not contain full references
Material and methodsProvide sufficient details to allow the work to be reproduced by an independent researcher. Methods that are already published should be summarized, and indicated by a reference. If quoting directly from a previously published method, use quotation marks and also cite the source. Any modifications to existing methods should also be described. Results
Results should be clear and concise.
The authors are requested to pay particular attention to the use of appropriate statistics throughout the text. A detailed description of all statistical methods should be included in the MATERIALS AND METHODS section. The Journal strongly encourages authors to seek expert statistical advice prior to submitting any manuscript that has a statistical content.
DiscussionThis should explore the significance of the results of the work, not repeat them. A combined Results and Discussion section is often appropriate. 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. Essential title page information
• Title. A brief and informative title less than 12 words is required. It must accurately identify and describe the manuscript contents. Titles are often used in information-retrieval systems. Avoid abbreviations and formulae where possible.
• Chinese title.Required in case the 1st or corresponding author is Chinese.
• Running title.It is a shortened title used as a running head and should be less than 50 letters including space between words.
• Author names and affiliations. Please clearly indicate the given name(s) and family name(s) of each author and check that all names are accurately spelled. Present the authors' affiliation addresses (where the actual work was done) below the names. Indicate all affiliations 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 affiliation, 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 the e-mail address is given and that contact details are kept up to date by the corresponding author.
• Number of pages, Number of figures, Number of color figures, Number of black and white figures, Number of tables. Highlights
Highlights are mandatory for this journal as they help increase the discoverability of your article via search engines. They consist of a short collection of bullet points that capture the novel results of your research as well as new methods that were used during the study (if any). Please have a look at the example Highlights.
Highlights should be submitted in a separate editable file in the online submission system. Please use 'Highlights' in the file name and include 3 to 5 bullet points (maximum 85 characters, including spaces, per bullet point).
AbstractA concise and factual abstract is required. The abstract should state briefly 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 defined at their first mention in the abstract itself. Keywords
Immediately after the abstract, provide a maximum of 6-8 key words and arrange them in alphabetical order, using American spelling and avoiding general and plural terms and multiple concepts (avoid, for example, 'and', 'of'). Be sparing with abbreviations: only abbreviations firmly established in the field may be eligible. These key words will be used for indexing purposes. To optimize searching, avoid key words already used in the title. Abbreviations
Define abbreviations that are not standard in this field in a footnote to be placed on the first page of the article. Such abbreviations that are unavoidable in the abstract must be defined at their first 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 or otherwise. List here those individuals who provided help during the research (e.g., providing language help, writing assistance or proof reading the article, etc.). Formatting of funding sources
List funding sources in this standard way to facilitate compliance to funder's requirements:
Funding: This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health [grant numbers xxxx, yyyy]; the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Seattle, WA [grant number zzzz]; and the United States Institutes of Peace [grant number aaaa].
It is not necessary to include detailed descriptions on the program or type of grants and awards. When funding is from a block grant or other resources available to a university, college, or other research institution, submit the name of the institute or organization that provided the funding.
If no funding has been provided for the research, it is recommended to include the following sentence:
This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
FootnotesFootnotes should be used sparingly. Number them consecutively throughout the article. Many word processors 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. Artwork General
Illustrations should be limited to the number necessary for clarity and must not duplicate data given in tables or in the text. All illustrations should be numbered consecutively in the order to which they are referred in the text and should be arranged at the end of the manuscript. The preferred position of each illustration should be indicated in the text. Photographs, charts and diagrams are all to be referred to as "Figure (abbreviated to '(Fig)'. Colour figures can be accepted if necessary, but the authors will be charged for the extra color printing costs at US$ 150.00/printed page with color figure(s). Apply to the Editorial Office for details of the cost after acceptance of your paper. Please note that the printed and online versions must be the same, and it is not possible to have colour figures online only. Image manipulation
Whilst it is accepted that authors sometimes need to manipulate images for clarity, manipulation for purposes of deception or fraud will be seen as scientific ethical abuse and will be dealt with accordingly. For graphical images, this journal is applying the following policy: no specific feature within an image may be enhanced, obscured, moved, removed, or introduced. Adjustments of brightness, contrast, or color balance are acceptable if and as long as they do not obscure or eliminate any information present in the original. Nonlinear adjustments (e.g. changes to gamma settings) must be disclosed in the figure legend. Electronic artwork
Any illustration should be no larger than a width of 81 mm (half-width figure) or 171 mm (full-width figure) and should be prepared at publication quality resolution. Lines should be black, with an adequate thickness (around 1 pt) and curves should be smooth. Particularly, lines of spectra should be of sufficient thickness. Photographs should be of sufficiently high quality with respect to detail, contrast and fineness of grain to withstand the inevitable loss of contrast and detail inherent during the printing process. If necessary, a scale should be marked on the photograph. Please note that photocopies of photographs are not acceptable. A legend for identifying graph lines should not be included in the figure caption, and it should be in the drawing itself.
• Supply files that are too low in resolution.
• Submit graphics that are disproportionately large for the content.
Ensure that each illustration has a caption. Supply captions separately, not attached to the figure. A caption should comprise a brief title (not on the figure itself) and a description of the illustration. Keep text in the illustrations themselves to a minimum but explain all symbols and abbreviations used. Data references
This journal encourages you to cite underlying or relevant datasets in your manuscript by citing them in your text and including a data reference in your Reference List. Data references should include the following elements: author name(s), dataset title, data repository, version (where available), year, and global persistent identifier. Add [dataset] immediately before the reference so we can properly identify it as a data reference. The [dataset] identifier will not appear in your published article. Preprint references
Where a preprint has subsequently become available as a peer-reviewed publication, the formal publication should be used as the reference. If there are preprints that are central to your work or that cover crucial developments in the topic, but are not yet formally published, these may be referenced. Preprints should be clearly marked as such, for example by including the word preprint, or the name of the preprint server, as part of the reference. The preprint DOI should also be provided. Reference management software
Most Elsevier journals have their reference template available in many of the most popular reference management software products. These include all products that support Citation Style Language styles, such as Mendeley and Zotero, as well as EndNote. Using the word processor plug-ins from these products, authors only need to select the appropriate journal template when preparing their article, after which citations and bibliographies will be automatically formatted in the journal's style. If no template is yet available for this journal, please follow the format of the sample references and citations as shown in this Guide.
Users of EndNote can easily install the reference style for this journal by clicking the following link: http://endnote.com/downloads/style/pedosphere When preparing your manuscript, you will then be able to select this style using EndNote for Microsoft Word.
Reference formattingReferences should be arranged as follows:
For journal article: Sato E, Toyota K. 2006. Application of PCR-DGGE into community structure analysis of soil nematodes. Jpn J Soil Sci Plant Nutr (in Japanese). 77: 157-163.
For book: Van Meurs A P H. 1971. Petroleum Economics and Offshore Mining Legislation. Elsevier, Amsterdam.
For article or chapter in edited books or symposium proceedings: Chen J F, He Q. 1985. Chemical distribution of oxide mineral in soil colloid. In Hseung Y et al. (eds.) Methods for Soil Colloid Research (in Chinese). Science Press, Beijing. pp. 241-303.
For dissertation: Cairn R B. 1964. Infrared spectroscopic studies of solid oxygen. Ph.D. Dissertation, Beijing University.
For web reference: Ohio Department of Development. 1997. Ohio county profiles: Tuscarawas county. Available online at http://www.odod.ohio.gov/osr/profiles/pdf/tuscaraw.pdf (verified on June 12, 2003).
After acceptance
Edited version checkingBefore preparation of proofs, all authors will be asked to check the edited version for errors produced in our editing process and typographical or some other possible errors. Proof correction
All authors will be asked to check the proofs thoroughly for any possible layout or typographical errors before publication. Because of the high cost of alterations, only typographical or data errors of fact can be corrected in proof and no major changes can be included at this stage. Authors will be billed for excessive changes (not due to the printer's errors) on proofs. Please note that authors are urged to check their proofs carefully before return, since the inclusion of late corrections can not be guaranteed. All proofs should be returned to the Editorial Office of PEDOSPHERE within 48 hours of receipt. Failure to do so may result in a delay to publication. Offprints
The corresponding author will, at no cost, receive a customized Share Link providing 50 days free access to the final published version of the article on ScienceDirect. The Share Link can be used for sharing the article via any communication channel, including email and social media. Two copies of the issue containing the article will also be supplied free of charge to the authors for each article following publication. Additional copies of the issue may be ordered at extra cost when returning proofs.
Author inquiries
Visit the Elsevier Support Center to find the answers you need. Here you will find everything from Frequently Asked Questions to ways to get in touch.
You can also check the status of your submitted article or find out when your accepted article will be published.