An International Journal in Astronomy and Astrophysics
Guide for Authors
Submission checklist
It is hoped that this list will be useful during the final checking of an article prior to sending it
to the journal's Editor 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 files have been uploaded: • Keywords; • All figure captions;
• All tables (including title, description, footnotes).
Further considerations: • Manuscript has been "spellchecked".
• 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).
It is essential to give a fax number and e-mail address when submitting a manuscript.
Articles must be written in good English.
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carried out, and that, if accepted, it will not be published elsewhere in the same form, in English or in any other language, without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://www.elsevier.com/copyright). 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 Elsevier's Rights
Department, Oxford, UK: phone (+44) 1865 843830, fax
(+44) 1865 853333, e-mail: permissions@elsevier.com. Requests may
also be completed on-line via the Elsevier homepage at
http://www.elsevier.com/locate/permissions .
Submission
to the journal prior to acceptance
Authors should upload their article in electronic form through the online
submission system and select any of the Receiving Editors covering the subject area of the article. This electronic version
will be used for the reviewing process. Authors, Reviewers and Editors send and receive all correspondence by e-mail and no paper correspondence
is necessary.
Electronic articles submitted for the review process may need to be edited after acceptance to follow journal standards.
For this an "editable" file format is necessary. See the section on "Electronic format requirements for accepted articles"
and the further general instructions on how to prepare your article below.
Electronic format requirements for accepted articles
General points
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 http://www.elsevier.com/locate/guidepublication). 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.
LaTeX documents
If the LaTeX file is suitable, proofs will be produced without rekeying the
text. The
article should preferably be written using Elsevier's document class "elsart", or alternatively the standard document class "article". The Elsevier LaTeX package (including detailed instructions for LaTeX
preparation) can be obtained from http://www.elsevier.com/latex
or from the Comprehensive TeX
Archive Network (CTAN): see below, in the directory
/tex-archive/macros/latex/contrib/supported/elsevier.
It consists of the files:
elsart.cls, guidelines for users of elsart, a template file for quick start, and
the instruction booklet "Preparing articles with LaTeX". CTAN is an archive with up-to-date copies of all the public-domain versions
of TeX, LaTeX,
Metafont and ancillary programs, which is made available via a
mirrored network of FTP servers. You can enter the CTAN archive via a
Web
interface in the UK at http://www.tex.ac.uk, in the USA at
http://www.ctan.org, or in Germany at
http://www.dante.de/software/ctan
(page in German). You can
search for a package on CTAN via http://www.ucc.ie/cgi-bin/ctan/.
You can also enter the archive
via FTP at ftp://ftp.tex.ac.uk, at
ftp://ftp.dante.de, at http://ctan.tug.org, or at one of the
many
mirror servers; see for a list the UK or USA CTAN Web pages. When a CTAN server
does not respond, please try another one. Note
that CTAN is not related to Elsevier, and that Author Support cannot accept complaints or answer questions about the availability of
any CTAN server. Figures may be inserted in the usual way using an \includegraphics command,
at the position in the article where
they are cited. Your LaTeX file will be most useful as input for the printed article if you
obey the following rules of thumb: 1.
Be consistent. If you use a macro for a phrase, use it throughout. 2. Use standard LaTeX mark-up. Do not hardcode your own layout
for e.g.
section headings, but use the usual LaTeX macro for this purpose. 3. Keep it simple. Do not define macros that accomplish
complicated layout.
They will also make the input process complicated. Although Elsevier can process most wordprocessor file formats,
should your electronic file prove to be unusable, the article will be typeset from the hardcopy printout.
Preparation of text
Presentation of manuscript
General
Please write your text in good English (American or British usage is accepted,
but not a mixture of these). Italics are not to be used for expressions of Latin origin, for example, in vivo, et al., per se. Use decimal
points (not commas); use a space for thousands (10 000 and above).
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 authorsupport@elsevier.com
for further information.
Title page
Provide the following data on the title page (in the order given).
Title.
Concise and informative. Titles are often used in information-retrieval systems. Avoid abbreviations and formulae where possible.
Author names and affiliations. Where the family name may be ambiguous (e.g., a double name), please indicate this clearly.
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 is willing to 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.
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, affiliation address. Superscript Arabic numerals are used for such footnotes.
Abstract.
A 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 separate from the article, so it must be able to stand alone.
Keywords.
Immediately after the abstract, provide a maximum of 4 keywords, to be chosen preferably from the ApJ Subject Headings, to be found at
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/ApJ/instruct.key.html. These keywords will be used for indexing purposes.
Classification
codes. Please provide, in addition to keywords, up to 4 standard PACS codes. The available codes may be accessed at http://www.elsevier.com/locate/pacs
.
Specific remarks
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.
Appendices.
If there is more than one appendix, they should be identified as A, B, etc. Formulae and equations in appendices should be given separate
numbering: (Eq. A.1), (Eq. A.2), etc.; in a subsequent appendix, (Eq. B.1) and so forth.
Preparation of supplementary data.
Elsevier now accepts electronic supplementary material (e-components) 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 at 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 at http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions.
References
Responsibility for the accuracy of bibliographic citations lies entirely with the authors.
Citations in the text. 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.
Citing and listing of
web references. As a minimum, the full URL should be given. Any further information, if known (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.
Text. All citations in the text should refer to:
1. (in
case of a single author) the author's name (without initials, unless there is ambiguity) and the year of publication;
2. (in case
of two authors) both authors' names and the year of publication;
3. (in case of three or more authors) the first author's name followed
by "et al." and the year of publication.
Citations may be made directly (or parenthetically). Groups of references should
be listed first alphabetically, then chronologically.
Examples: "as demonstrated (Allan, 1996a, 1996b, 1999; Allan and Jones,
1995). Kramer et al. (2000) have recently shown ..."
List. References should be arranged first alphabetically and then
further sorted chronologically if necessary. More than one reference from the same author(s) in the same year must be identified by the
letters "a", "b", "c", etc., placed after the year of publication.
Examples:
Reference to a journal
publication:
Van der Geer, J., Hanraads, J.A.J., Lupton, R.A., 2000. The art of writing a scientific article. J. Sci. Commun. 163,
51-59.
Reference to a book:
Strunk Jr., W., White, E.B., 1979. The Elements of Style, third ed. Macmillan, New York.
Reference
to a chapter in an edited book:
Mettam, G.R., Adams, L.B., 1999. How to prepare an electronic version of your article, in: Jones,
B.S., Smith , R.Z. (Eds.), Introduction to the Electronic Age. E-Publishing Inc., New York, pp. 281-304.
Journal names.
Journal names should be abbreviated according to the simplified abbreviations used in astronomy journals (e.g. ApJ, AJ, MNRAS, A&A,
PASP, PASJ). Refer to New Astronomy as NewA.
DOI citations. The digital object identifier (DOI) may be used to cite and
link to electronic documents. The DOI consists of a unique alpha-numeric 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:
doi:10.1016/j.physletb.2007.06.033
For Articles in Press, please do not include an "In Press" denotation to
your citation. When you use the DOI to create URL hyperlinks to documents on the web, they are guaranteed never to change.
Astronomical
objects
Elsevier will provide hypertext links to CDS (Simbad) for every astronomical object mentioned in the text. We would
be grateful if you mark the objects in the Latex file of the final version, by using the LaTeX command \astrobj{...}. For instance,
if NGC 255 is mentioned in the text, replace this by \astrobj{NGC 255}. Insert the following LaTeX definition for the astronomical object
command together with the other LaTeX definitions (at the beginning of the manuscript): \def\astrobj#1{#1}.
Preparation of illustrations
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 • Always supply
high-quality printouts of your artwork, in case conversion of the electronic artwork is problematic. • 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 at 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 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,
PICT, 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
Submit colour illustrations as original photographs, high-quality computer
prints or transparencies, close to the size expected in publication, or as 35 mm
slides. Please make sure that artwork files are in
an acceptable format (TIFF,
EPS or MS Office files) and with the correct resolution. Polaroid colour prints
are not suitable. 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) as well as in the printed version. For further
information on the
preparation of electronic artwork, please see
http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions.
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 versions of all the colour illustrations.
Captions
Ensure that each illustration
has a caption. Supply captions on a separate
sheet, 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.
Proofs
When your manuscript is received by the Publisher it is considered to be in
its
final form. Proofs are not to be regarded as "drafts".
One set of page proofs in PDF format will be sent by e-mail to the
corresponding author, to be checked for typesetting/editing. No changes in, or additions to, the accepted (and subsequently edited) manuscript
will be allowed at this stage. Proofreading is solely your responsibility.
The Publisher reserves the right to proceed with publication
if corrections are not communicated. Return corrections within 3 days of receipt of the proofs. Should there be no corrections, please
confirm this.
Elsevier will do everything possible to get your article corrected and published as quickly and accurately as possible.
In order to do this we need your help. When you receive the (PDF) proof of your article for correction, it is important to ensure that
all of your corrections are sent back to us in one communication. Subsequent corrections will not be possible, so please ensure your
first sending is complete. Note that this does not mean you have any less time to make your corrections, just that only one set of corrections
will be accepted.
Author Benefits
No page charges: Publishing in New Astronomy is free. No colour charges:
Publishing print and electronic colour figures in New Astronomy is free.
Fast online publication: Accepted articles will
be published online in their untypeset version within five days after acceptance. These articles can be cited by doi.
Free 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.
Discount: Contributors to Elsevier journals are entitled to a 30% discount on all Elsevier books. See books.elsevier.com/thankyou.
