Information for Authors

Journal of Earth System Science

Manuscript Submission

A manuscript must present results of original, unpublished work. Critical reviews of important topics or fields are also considered. The manuscripts should be concise and well-written.

Submission of a manuscript implies that the same manuscript or a part of the manuscript has not been published elsewhere, nor is being submitted elsewhere, nor will be submitted for publication elsewhere while JESS Editorial decision is pending. Details of any related manuscripts (already published or submitted) should be supplied. The responsibility for this will rest with the corresponding author. The Indian Academy of Sciences views plagiarism seriously.

The jurisdiction for all disputes concerning submitted articles, published material, subscription and sale will be at courts/tribunals situated in Bengaluru City only.

Submission of Fresh Manuscript

Authors are required to submit ORIGINAL RESEARCH manuscripts online to http://www.editorialmanager.com/jess/

Please note the journal ‘strongly recommends’ the corresponding/Lead author to provide ORCID Ids of all the co-authors, though it is not mandatory. If ORCID is provided it will help in quick processing of the article.

For reviews, please contact the editor and mark a copy of your mail to the journal office (jess@ias.ac.in).

Editorial Manager is a user-friendly online submission and review management system. Authors can submit manuscripts and track the processing of their paper. Electronic files in LATEX are preferred. However, MS-WORD files are also acceptable.

For information on Academy's policy on plagiarism, manuscript submission form, authorship confirmation and copyright transfer, Index terms, please click on the respective links listed below:

• Academy's Policy on Plagiarism
• Manuscript Submission Form
• Authorship Confirmation and Copyright Transfer
• Index terms

Manuscripts in a language other than English cannot be considered for publication in Journal of Earth System Science.

Preprint Submissions: Indian Academy of Sciences journals permit the submission of manuscripts that are already posted as preprints on servers like arXiv, etc. The guidelines for submission are the same as those for original submissions, and the submitted manuscript will undergo the same review process as “non-preprint” manuscripts.

Permissions

Authors should submit written permission from appropriate sources for material to be included that has been published elsewhere.

Authors have to provide the manuscript and figures as electronic files. The manuscript (including tables and figure captions) should be provided as a single PDF file. For figures, see figure section.

The manuscript should be arranged in the following order.

1. Title page including authors' names and affiliation,
2. Abstract,
3. Text (including appendices),
4. Acknowledgements,
5. Author statement,
6. Reference list,
7. Tables,
8. Figure captions,
9. Fgures and
10. Research highlights

• If LaTeX is used to process the manuscript, use the default Computer Modern font (12 pt). If your article contains math, use the AMSmath package if necessary. If figures are included in the file, keep the figures to the end of the file. Use BibTeX, if necessary, to format the references; then cut and paste the references from the bbl file into the LaTeX file. At this stage, JESS does not accept separate BibTeX files and does not provide a bst file for processing the bibliography. Prepare a PDF file for submission.
• If MS Word is used to typeset the manuscript, use 12 pt Times New Roman. Export as a PDF file using Adobe Distiller. (Authors may also use OpenOffice to typeset their manuscript; OpenOffice allows a document to be exported directly as a PDF file.)
• Use British English as the language.
• Indent or space between all paragraphs. Use one-and-half spacing for the manuscript.
• Use the metric system throughout; use of appropriate SI units is encouraged. If using other, more commonly used units, give the SI equivalent in parentheses.
• Do not use italic font for units of measure or chemical elements.
• Do not use any special typeface for emphasis.
• Avoid text footnotes; they should be incorporated into the text or eliminated completely.
• Do not create math equations or tables as pictures.
• Format the manuscript in a single column.

Upon submission of a manuscript for publication by the corresponding author, an email intimation is sent to all co-authors with a link to submit their consent to submission. Unless the consent is received from each co-author, the manuscript will not be further processed.

Title page

The title of the paper must be short and contain words useful for indexing. Include in the title page the names (with initials) of authors and the name and address of the institution, where the work was done. Also required is an abbreviated running title of not more than 50 characters (including spaces).

Font sizes

Set the title at 16 pt and the authors' names and affiliations at 12 pt. Set all the text at 12 pt. Use 14 pt bold roman font for section headings, 14 pt italics for sub-section headings, and 12 pt italics for sub-subsection headings. Use 12 pt italic font for table captions and 12 pt roman font for figure captions. Use 12 pt for the rest of the table.

Abstract

The purpose of the abstract is to summarise the objectives of the investigation and the important conclusions. Set the abstract as a single paragraph of not more than 200 words. Do not include references in the abstract.

Index terms

Choose up to three index terms from the list provided on the web site. Ensure that the chosen index terms are the most appropriate for the manuscript because they will be used for classification and indexing. Of the three terms, choose one as the primary index term: this term should be the best descriptor for the manuscript.

In addition, authors may choose up to six keywords; these keywords are for information and may be used later to modify the list of index terms.

The text

The paper must be divided into sections starting, preferably, with 'Introduction' and ending with 'Discussion' or 'Conclusions'. The main sections should be numbered 1, 2, etc., sub-sections 1.1, 1.2, etc., and sub-sub-sections (if necessary) 1.1a, 1.1b, etc.

Mathematical material

Equations must be clearly written, each on its own line, well away from the text. All equations must be numbered consecutively in Arabic numerals with the equation number in parentheses near the right hand margin; number displayed equations consecutively within the article, not within the section. Use italic for variables, bold for vectors and matrices, script for transforms, and sans serif for tensors. Use superscripts and subscripts in superior or inferior position; do not use raised and lowered fonts. Extend fraction bars under the entire length of the numerator. Use the "degree" symbol instead of superscript lowercase "o." Use "exp" rather than "e" if the argument of an exponential is complicated or lengthy. Avoid awkward fractional composition by using negative powers. Use solidus fractions (l/r) in text. Use the following to avoid ambiguity: parentheses, brackets, and braces, in this order {[()]}. Add one extra line space above and below all displayed equations.

Appendices

All appendices should be numbered consecutively in Arabic numerals.

Author statement

Individual contributions of each author need to be spelt out in this section (mandatory).

References

References should be cited in the text by author and year. If there are more than two authors, reference should be to the first author followed by "et al." in the text; italicize "et al.". References at the end of the paper should be listed alphabetically by authors' names, followed by initials, year of publication, title of the paper, name of the journal (abbreviated according to the World List of Scientific Periodicals, Butterworths, London), volume number, and starting and ending page numbers. References to books should include: name(s) of author(s), initials, year of publication, title of the book, edition if not the first, initials and name(s) of editor(s) if any, preceded by ed(s), place of publication, publisher, and chapter or pages referred to. References to thesis must include the year, the title of the thesis, the degree for which submitted, and the University.

Tables

All tables must be numbered consecutively in arabic numerals in the order of appearance in the text. Include all tables in the PDF file containing the manuscript text. The tables should be self-contained and have a descriptive title. All columns must have headings arranged to clarify their relation to the data. Footnotes should be indicated by superscript, lowercase letters. Each table must be cited in text. Avoid tables created with the tab key, pictures, and embedded objects.

Format the tables according to the journal style. The caption is on top, followed by a thick line. The column headings are followed by a thin line and the table ends with another thick line.

Figures

All figures including photographs should be numbered consecutively in arabic numerals in the order of appearance in the text. The figure captions must be typed on a separate sheet. Do not include in the figure any information that could easily be included in the caption.

The journal publishes colour figures free of cost if the reviewers and the editors are convinced that colour is essential for a figure.

Authors are requested to avoid plotting national borders on maps unless these borders are essential. If national borders are unavoidable, then they must conform to the regulations of the Government of India.

Authors are encouraged to prepare all figures to final size. Decide if the figure is to be a one-column figure (maximum width 8.5 cm, including all labels and legends) or a two-column figure (maximum width 17.5 cm, including all labels and legends). An obvious advantage of doing this is that it helps reduce the work to be done when revising the manuscript or communicating the final version to the publishing office of the journal. A more subtle advantage, however, is that the reviewers (and the editor) see exactly what the reader will see in the printed journal, making it possible for them to spot potential difficulties that a reader may face in interpreting the figures. Preparing figures initially to the expected final size also avoids the need for the publisher to enlarge or reduce the figure to fit the journal requirements, thereby maintaining the original quality. Given the quality of modern laser printers and the relative ease, compared to even a few years ago, of obtaining laser printouts of figures, providing the publisher with camera-ready figures or electronic copies ensures better figures in print.

Combine multipart figures or plates, adding letter labels as needed for captions, or provide separate captions for each part. The number of figure files should equal the number of figure captions.

For most graphics with lines and text only, use vector graphics EPS (Encapsulated PostScript). EPS is preferred because it is scalable and one can zoom in without seeing large pixels in most cases. Most vector-based illustration software allows you to save an illustration as an EPS file.

For images or photographs, use TIFF or high-resolution JPEG. JPEG is the best format for photos with a large file size because of the automatic compression used, which dramatically reduces file size while still providing good detail.

For false-colour imagery, shading, or texture, use TIFF. TIFF provides the highest resolution to ensure patterns and shading are maintained, yet it offers lossless compression and thus smaller file size.

Use Helvetica as the font for legends and labels. Ensure that no label or legend is smaller than 8 pt. All lines must be at least 0.5 pt (no hairline rules).

Research highlights

Authors may include four to five listed points (not more than 100 words) of main conclusions of the paper. It will appear online along with the abstract of the paper.

Submission of Revised Manuscript

Authors have to provide the manuscript and figures as electronic files. The manuscript (including tables and figure captions) should be provided as a single PDF file. For figures, see figure section above.

Along with the revised manuscript, authors should provide an annotated version that highlights the changes made to the earlier version of the manuscript. This can be done easily with the "track changes" or "record changes" option available in modern word processors.

The instructions for submission of the revised manuscript are as for a fresh submission. The only additional instructions given here are for framing the point-by-point reply to the reviewers' comments. Reply to each reviewer's comments separately and include the reviewer's comments in the reply. The reply should be framed as follows.

Comment 1: [Text of comment 1 from reviewer 1.]
Reply 1: [Text of your reply.]
Comment 2: [Text of comment 2 from reviewer 1.]
Reply 2: [Text of your reply.]

This helps the reviewer and the editor because they do not have to look at another sheet for the comments. Avoid statements like 'corrected' or 'necessary corrections have been made'. Instead, state clearly, but briefly, what has been done in response to the comments. Give a brief description of the changes made in response to the comment, and give the reviewers and editor a pointer to the changes in the revised manuscript.

After Acceptance

Authors have to provide the final (accepted) version manuscript and figures as electronic files. The following formats for text and figures are acceptable.

• If LaTeX is used to process the manuscript, the files needed by the publishing office are the LaTeX file (including references cut and pasted from the bbl file output by BibTeX) and the figure files to be included when compiling the LaTeX file. Keep the figures to the end of the file. Do not use non-standard style files for formatting the manuscript.
• If MS Word is used to typeset the manuscript, use 12 pt Times New Roman. Export as a PDF file using Adobe Distiller. (Authors may also use OpenOffice to typeset their manuscript; OpenOffice allows a document to be exported directly as a PDF file.)
• Authors have to submit the final, accepted version in MS Word or LaTeX formats and the PDF print-ready version for comparison.
• PostScript (PS) or Encapsulated PostScript (EPS) are the required formats for vector graphics. The publishing office can also handle Adobe Illustrator and Corel Draw formats, but these will be used to create EPS output. If you are submitting Adobe Illustrator or Corel Draw files, please indicate the version of the software used to create the figures.
• TIFF is the preferred format for raster graphics (images or photographs). For images with a large file size, JPEG is acceptable owing to compression.

Authors will be sent the proofs by email and have to send their corrections within 48 hours.