The Official Journal of the European Society for Agronomy


The European Journal of Agronomy, the official journal of the European Society for Agronomy, publishes original research papers reporting experimental and theoretical contributions to crop science in the following fields:
•crop physiology
•crop production and management
•agroclimatology and modelling
•plant soil relationships
•crop quality and post-harvest physiology
•farming and cropping systems
•agroecosystems and the environment


In determining the suitability of submitted articles for publication, particular scrutiny will be placed on the degree of novelty and significance of the research and the extent to which it adds to existing knowledge in agronomy. Confirmatory research and results from routine cultivar or agronomy trials will not normally be considered for publication. Review articles are normally written on invitation from the Editor-in-Chief. Authors intending to prepare review papers for the Journal are advised to consult the Editor-in-Chief before writing their reviews.

Types of contribution
1. Original research papers(regular papers). Original research papers should report the results of original research. The material should not have been previously published elsewhere, except in a preliminary form.
2. Review articles. Review articles should cover subjects falling within the scope of the journal which are of active current interest. They are normally written upon invitation by the Editor-in-Chief. Intending authors should first consult with the Editor-in-Chief.


Online Submission of manuscripts
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and tacitly or explicitly by the responsible authorities where the work was carried out, and that, if accepted, it will not be published elsewhere in the same form, in English or in any other language, without the written consent of the Publisher.
Upon acceptance of an article, authors will be asked to transfer copyright (for more information on copyright see http://authors.elsevier.com.

English language help service: Upon request, Elsevier will direct Authors to an agent who can check and improve the English of their paper (before submission). Please contact www.elsevier.com/locate/elsevierpublishing for further information.

This transfer will ensure the widest possible dissemination of information. A letter will be sent to the corresponding author confirming receipt of the manuscript. A form facilitating transfer of copyright will be provided.
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: contact Rights Department, P.O. Box 800, Oxford, OX5 1DX, UK; phone: (+44) 1865 843830, fax: (+44) 1865 853333, e-mail: permissions@elsevier.com


Papers for consideration should be submitted to:Elsevier Editorial System

Submission to this journal proceeds totally on-line. Use the following guidelines to prepare your article. Via the homepage of this journal ( http://ees.elsevier.com/euragr/ you will be guided stepwise through the creation and uploading of the various files.
The system automatically converts source files 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 files are converted to PDF at submission for the review process, these source files are needed for further processing after acceptance. All correspondence, including notification 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.

Electronic format requirements for accepted articles We accept most wordprocessing formats, but Word, WordPerfect or LaTeX is preferred. Always keep a backup copy of the electronic file for reference and safety. Save your files using the default extension of the program used.
Wordprocessor documents
It is important that the file 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. Do not embed 'graphically designed' equations or tables, but prepare these using the wordprocessor's facility. 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/wps/find/authorshome.authors/howtosubmitpaper). Do not import the figures into the text file but, instead, indicate their approximate locations directly in the electronic text and on the manuscript. See also the section on Preparation of electronic illustrations.
To avoid unnecessary errors you are strongly advised to use the 'spellchecker' function of your wordprocessor


Preparation of manuscripts
1.It is essential to give a fax number and e-mail address when submitting a manuscript. Articles must be written in good English. Authors whose native language is not English are strongly advised to have their manuscripts checked by an English-speaking colleague prior to submission.
Language Polishing. Authors who require information about language editing and copyediting services pre- and post-submission please visit http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/authorshome.authors/languagepolishing or contact authorsupport@elsevier.com for more information.
English language help service: Upon request, Elsevier will direct Authors to an agent who can check and improve the English of their paper (before submission). Please contact www.elsevier.com/locate/elsevierpublishing for further information.

Please note Elsevier neither endorses nor takes responsibility for any products, goods or services offered by outside vendors through our services or in any advertising. For more information please refer to our Terms and Conditions http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/termsconditions.cws_home/termsconditions. 2. Manuscripts should be prepared with numbered lines, with wide margins and double spacing throughout, i.e. also for abstracts, footnotes and references. Every page of the manuscript, including the title page, references, tables, etc. should be numbered. However, in the text no reference should be made to page numbers; if necessary, one may refer to sections. Avoid excessive usage of italics to emphasize part of the text.
3. Manuscripts in general should be organized in the following order:
•Title (should be clear, descriptive and not too long)
•Name(s) of author(s)
•Complete postal address(es) of affiliations
•Full telephone and Fax no. of the corresponding author and one or more other authors (if any)
•Present address(es) of author(s) if applicable
•Abstract
•Key words (indexing terms), normally 3–6 items
•Introduction
•Material studied, area descriptions, methods, techniques
•Results
•Discussion
•Conclusion
•Acknowledgements and any additional information concerning research grants, etc.
•References
•Tables
•Figure captions
4. In typing the manuscript, titles and subtitles should not be run within the text. They should be typed on a separate line, without indentation. Use lower-case lettertype.
5. SI units should be used.
6. Units and their abbreviations should be those approved by ISO (International Standard 1000:92
7. SI units and recommendations for the use of their multiples and of certain other units). Abbreviate units of measure only when used with numerals.
8. If a special instruction to the copy editor or typesetter is written on the copy it should be encircled. The typesetter will then know that the enclosed matter is not to be set in type. When a typewritten character may have more than one meaning (e.g. the lower case letter l may be confused with the numeral l), a note should be inserted in a circle in the margin to make the meaning dear to the typesetter. If Greek letters or uncommon symbols are used in the manuscript, they should be written very clearly, and if necessary a note such as "Greek lower-case chi" should be put in the margin and encircled.
9. Elsevier reserves the privilege of returning to the author for revision accepted manuscripts and illustrations which are not in the proper form given in this guide.

Abstracts
The abstract should be clear, descriptive and not longer than 400 words.

Tables
1. Authors should take notice of the limitations set by the size and lay-out of the journal. Large tables should be avoided. Reversing columns and rows will often reduce the dimensions of a table.
2. If many data are to be presented, an attempt should be made to divide them over two or more tables.
3. Drawn tables, from which prints need to be made, should not be folded.
4. Tables should be numbered according to their sequence in the text. The text should include references to all tables.
5. Each table should be typewritten on a separate page of the manuscript. Tables should never be included in the text.
6. Each table should have a brief and self-explanatory title.
7. Column headings should be brief, but sufficiently explanatory. Standard abbreviations of units of measurement should be added between parentheses.
8. Vertical lines should not be used to separate columns. Leave some extra space between the columns instead.
9. Any explanation essential to the understanding of the table should be given as a footnote at the bottom of the table.

Preparation of electronic illustrations
Submitting your artwork in an electronic format helps us to produce your work to the best possible standards, ensuring accuracy, clarity and a high level of detail.


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, Helvetica, Times, Symbol.
•Number the illustrations according to their sequence in the text.
•Use a logical naming convention for your artwork files, and supply a separate listing of the files and the software used.
•Provide all illustrations as separate files and as hardcopy printouts on separate sheets.
•Provide captions to illustrations separately.
•Produce images near to the desired size of the printed version.

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

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 finalised, 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: Colour or greyscale 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 (colour or greyscale): a minimum of 500 dpi is required.
DOC, XLS or PPT: If your electronic artwork is created in any of these Microsoft Office applications please supply "as is".


Please do not:
• Supply embedded graphics in your wordprocessor (spreadsheet, presentation) document;
• Supply files that are optimised for screen use(like GIF,BMP,PIC,WPG) the resolution is too low ;
• Supply files that are too low in resolution;
• Submit graphics that are disproportionately large for the content.


Colour illustrations
Please make sure that artwork files are in an acceptable format (TIFF, EPS or MS Office files) and with the correct resolution. If, together with your accepted article, you submit usable colour figures then Elsevier will ensure, at no additional charge, that these figures will appear in colour on the Web (e.g., ScienceDirect and other sites) regardless of whether or not these illustrations are reproduced in colour in the printed version. For colour reproduction in print, you will receive information regarding the costs from Elsevier after receipt of your accepted article. Please indicate your preference for colour in print or on the Web only. For further information on the preparation of electronic artwork, please see http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions.
Please note: Because of technical complications which can arise by converting colour figures to 'grey scale' (for the printed version should you not opt for colour in print) please submit in addition usable black and white prints corresponding to all the colour illustrations.

Supplementary files


Preparation of supplementary data. Elsevier accepts supplementary material to support and enhance your scientific research. Supplementary files offer the author additional possibilities to publish supporting applications, movies, animation sequences, high-resolution images, background datasets, sound clips and more. Supplementary files supplied will be published online alongside the electronic version of your article in Elsevier Web products, including ScienceDirect: http://www.sciencedirect.com. In order to ensure that your submitted material is directly usable, please ensure that data is provided in one of our recommended file formats. Authors should submit the material in electronic format together with the article and supply a concise and descriptive caption for each file. For more detailed instructions please visit our artwork instruction pages a http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions.

References
1. All publications cited in the text should be presented in a list of references following the text of the manuscript. The manuscript should be carefully checked to ensure that the spelling of authors names and dates are exactly the same in the text as in the reference list.
2. In the text refer to the author's name (without initial) and year of publication, followed if necessary by a short reference to appropriate pages. Examples: "Since Peterson (1988) has shown that..." "This is in agreement with results obtained later (Kramer, 1989, pp. 12-16)".
3. If reference is made in the text to a publication written by more than two authors the name of the first author should be used followed by "et al.". This indication, however, should never be used in the list of references. In this list names of first author and co-authors should be mentioned.
4. References cited together in the text should be arranged chronologically. The list of references should be arranged alphabetically on authors' names, and chronologically per author. If an author's name in the list is also mentioned with co-authors the following order should be used: publications of the single author, arranged according to publication dates - publications of the same author with one co-author - publications of the author with more than one co-author. Publications by the same author(s) in the same year should be listed as 1974a, 1974b, etc.
5. Use the following system for arranging your references:
a. For periodicals
Munier-Jolain, N.G., Ney, B., Duthion, C. 1993. Sequential development of flowers and seeds on the main stem of an intermediate soybean. Crop Sci. 33, 768-771.
b. For edited symposia, special issues, etc., published in a periodical
Rice, K., 1992. Theory and conceptual issues. In: Gall, G.A.E., Staton, M. (Eds.), Integrating Conservation Biology and Agricultural Production. Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment 42, 9-26.
c.For books
Gaugh, Jr., H.G., 1992. Statistical Analysis of Regional Yield Trials. Elsevier, Amsterdam.
d. For multi-author books
Snobas, B.A., Wilkins, D.E., Hadjichristodoulou, A., Haddad, N.I., 1988. Stand establishment in pulse crops. In: Summerfield, R.J. (Ed.), World Crops: Cool Season Food Legumes. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, pp 257-259.
6.In the case of publications in any language other than English, the original title is to be retained. However, the titles of publications in non-Latin alphabets should be transliterated, and a notation such as "(in Russian)" or "(in Greek, with English abstract)" should be added.
7. Work accepted for publication but not yet published should be referred to as "in press".
8. References concerning unpublished data and "personal communications" should not be cited in the reference list but may be mentioned in the text.

Formulae
1.Leave ample space around the formulae.
2. Subscripts and superscripts should be clear.
3. Take special care to show clearly the difference between zero (0) and the letter O, and between one (1) and the letter l.
4. Give the meaning of all symbols immediately after the equation in which they are first used.
5. For simple fractions use the solidus (/) instead of a horizontal line.
6. Equations should be numbered serially at the right-hand side in parentheses. In general only equations explicitly referred to in the text need be numbered.
7. The use of fractional powers instead of root signs is recommended. Also powers of e are often more conveniently denoted by exp.
8. Levels of statistical significance which can be mentioned without further explanation are *P< 0.05, **P< 0.01 and ***P< 0.001.
9. In chemical formulae, valence of ions should be given as, e.g. Ca²⁺ not as Ca⁺⁺.
10. Isotope numbers should precede the symbols, e.g.¹⁸O.
11. The repeated writing of chemical formulae in the text is to be avoided where reasonably possible; instead, the name of the compound should be given in full. Exceptions maybe made in the case of a very long name occurring very frequently or in the case of a compound being described as the end product of a gravimetric determination (e.g. phosphate as P₂O₅).

Footnotes
1. Footnotes should only be used if absolutely essential. In most cases it should be possible to incorporate the information in normal text.
2. If used, they should be numbered in the text, indicated by superscript numbers, and kept as short as possible.

Nomenclature
1. Authors and editors are, by general agreement, obliged to accept the rules governing biological nomenclature, as laid down in the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature, and the International Code of Nomenclature of Bacteria.
2. All biotica (crops, plants, insects etc.) should be identified by their scientific names when the English term is first used, with the exception of common domestic crops.
3. All biocides and other organic compounds must be identified by their Geneva names when first used in the text. Active ingredients of all formulations should be likewise identified.
4. For chemical nomenclature, the conventions of the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry and the official recommendations of the IUPAC-IUB Combined Commission on Biochemical Nomenclature should be followed.

Copyright
1. An author, when quoting from someone else's work or when considering reproducing an illustration or table from a book or journal article, should make sure that copyright is not being infringed.
2. Although in general an author may quote from other published works, permission from the holder of the copyright should be obtained if substantial extracts are taken or tables, plates, or other illustrations are reproduced. If the copyright-holder is not the author of the quoted or reproduced material, it is recommended that the permission of the author should also be sought.
3. Material in unpublished letters and manuscripts is also protected and must not be published unless permission has been obtained.
4. A suitable acknowledgement of any borrowed material must always be made.

Proofs
One set of page proofs in PDF format will be sent by e-mail to the corresponding author (if we do not have an e-mail address then paper proofs will be sent by post). Elsevier now sends PDF proofs which can be annotated; for this you will need to download Adobe Reader version 7 available free from http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html. Instructions on how to annotate PDF files will accompany the proofs. The exact system requirements are given at the Adobe site: http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/acrrsystemreqs.html#70win.
If you do not wish to use the PDF annotations function, you may list the corrections (including replies to the Query Form) and return 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 figures. Significant 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. Therefore, it is important to ensure that all of your 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 file of the article via e-mail. The PDF file 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. Additional paper offprints can be ordered by the authors. An order form with prices will be sent to the corresponding author.

Author Services
Authors can track accepted articles at http://www.elsevier.com/trackarticle and set up e-mail alerts to inform you of when an article's status has changed, as well as copyright information, frequently asked questions and more.
Contact details for questions arising after acceptance of an article, especially those relating to proofs, are provided after registration of an article for publication.

The European Journal of Agronomy carries no page charges


For further information, please see the journal home page at: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/eja .