Oxford Journals

GENERAL INSTRUCTIONS FOR AUTHORS

From 1st November 2007 all article submissions must be made online through Manuscript Central

From 1st July 2005 all authors have had an Open Access Option

Please follow these instructions carefully. The editors will not accept manuscripts that are not in accordance with these instructions: failure to follow the instructions will therefore slow down the processing of your manuscript.

Scope of the Journal
Categories of papers
Submission of Manuscript
Review
Proofs
Reprints
Copyright
Conflict of Interest
Open Access Option for Authors

Scope of the Journal
Journal of Plankton Research publishes innovative papers that significantly advance the field of plankton research. All kinds of marine, brackish and freshwater plankton are considered: viruses, bacteria, fungi, phytoplankton and zooplankton, including meroplankton and ichthyoplankton. The main topics covered are:

plankton ecology and behaviour, including model studies
plankton physiology, including experimental results
genetics and taxonomy of planktonic organisms
biological properties and content of natural waters as they impinge directly on plankton physiology and ecology
development and testing of new methods for plankton research

Hypothesis-driven work is particularly welcomed; purely descriptive papers will generally not be considered. Investigations carried out using interdisciplinary methods are encouraged.

Categories of papers
The Journal of Plankton Research publishes papers in each of the following five categories:

Original articles- traditional research papers. Text not normally exceeding 7500 words. Max. 20 printed pages inclusive of text, appropriate references, figs, and tables.
Short communications – these should not normally exceed 2000 words of text (excl. references and figures). The method, results and discussion should all be presented in a single, untitled section. Include a short Abstract (30 words) and present the acknowledgements and references as in a full-length paper. Max. 5 printed pages inclusive of text, appropriate references, figs, and tables.
Horizons articles - topical and provocative reviews; Manuscripts for consideration should be short, approximately 2500 words. Max. 8 printed pages inclusive of text, appropriate references, figs, and tables
Review articles- more comprehensive reviews on topics of wide general interest within plankton research. Potential authors are advised to contact the Editor regarding topic and proposed length.
Responses - comments on, or replies to published papers, particularly Horizons articles, within 6 months of appearance in the Journal of Plankton Reasearch; approximately 500 words. Max. 2 printed pages.

*The aim of "Horizons" is to be somewhat provocative, to set hypotheses and to suggest methods for testing them. Based on a concise review of the current issues in a particular field of plankton research, the intention is to stimulate new research and to indicate new directions. For example, Xabier Irigoien (2004) Some ideas about the role of lipids in the life cycle of Calanus finmarchicus. J. Plankton Res. 26:259–263.

Journal of Plankton Research also publishes “Themed Clusters” of papers and occasional Special Issues on appropriate topical themes. These may be based on submissions at special sessions at scientific meetings or workshops. For example, “The role of zooplankton predator–prey interactions in structuring plankton communities”, J. Plankton Res., 27: 957. Please contact the Editor-in-Chief with proposals for themed clusters of papers or potential Special Issues.

Submission of manuscripts
Submission of a paper implies that it reports unpublished work and that it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere. If previously published tables, illustrations or more than 200 words of text are to be included then the copyright holder's permission must be obtained. For further information regarding the preparation of manuscripts before submission click here. To submit a manuscript click here.

Proofs
Page proofs are sent to authors as a PDF file by e-mail. To avoid delays in publication, proofs should be checked immediately for typographical errors and returned as intructed in the proof e-mail. Essential changes of an extensive nature may be made only by insertion of a Note Added in Proof.

Page charges will not be levied. Authors will, however, be charged for extensive changes made in proof and for special items such as colour that appear in the printed Journal (but see below under 'Illustrations' for inclusion of colour online without charge).

Reprints
The publishers supply free of charge 25 reprints and a unique URL that gives access to both PDF and html versions of the paper. Offprint order forms are sent out with the proofs, and must be returned with the proofs to Oxford University Press in order to claim the 25 free print copies or if extra offprints are required. If the form is not returned before the issue in which an article appears in print has gone to press then free print offprints will not be provided. Late orders submitted after the journal has gone to the press are subject to a 100% surcharge (to cover the additional printing cost).

Copyright
It is a condition of publication in the Journal that authors assign an exclusive licence to Oxford University Press. This ensures that requests from third parties to reproduce articles are handled efficiently and consistently and will also allow the article to be as widely disseminated as possible. In assigning a licence, authors may use their own material in other publications provided that the Journal is acknowledged as the original place of publication and Oxford University Press is notified in writing and in advance. (Note that a few employers, usually governmental organizations, prohibit such copyright or license assignment. If this applies to you, please indicate on the license assignment form that will be sent to you with the proofs).

Conflict of Interest
All authors must declare any conflicts of interest. When submitting your manuscript via Manuscript Central, you will be asked whether you have any conflicts of interest. As submitting author, it is your responsibility to ascertain any conflicts of interest from your co-authors and to highlight these accordingly. If you are unable to declare any conflicts of interest on behalf of your co-authors, all contributing authors will need to complete and return Conflict of Interest forms. These must be sent to the editorial office by fax to: +44 (0)1865 355 969.

Any potential conflict of interest that might constitute an embarrassment to any of the authors if it were not to be declared and were to emerge after publication should be declared. It is the Corresponding author’s responsibility to ensure that all authors adhere to this policy.
If the manuscript is published, Conflict of Interest information will be communicated in a statement in the published paper.

Preparation of Manuscripts for Submission

Funding

Details of all funding sources for the work in question should be given in a separate section entitled 'Funding'. This should appear after the 'Acknowledgements' section.

The following rules should be followed:

The sentence should begin: ‘This work was supported by …’
The full official funding agency name should be given, i.e. ‘National Institutes of Health’, not ‘NIH’ (full RIN-approved list of UK funding agencies) Grant numbers should be given in brackets as follows: ‘[grant number xxxx]’
Multiple grant numbers should be separated by a comma as follows: ‘[grant numbers xxxx, yyyy]’
Agencies should be separated by a semi-colon (plus ‘and’ before the last funding agency)
Where individuals need to be specified for certain sources of funding the following text should be added after the relevant agency or grant number 'to [author initials]'.

An example is given here: ‘This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health [AA123456 to C.S., BB765432 to M.H.]; and the Alcohol & Education Research Council [hfygr667789].’

Oxford Journals will deposit all NIH-funded articles in PubMed Central. See http://www.oxfordjournals.org/for_authors/repositories.html for details. Authors must ensure that manuscripts are clearly indicated as NIH-funded using the guidelines above.

Author Self-Archiving/Public Access policy

For information about this journal's policy, please visit our Author Self-Archiving policy page.

Open Access Option for Authors

Starting in July 2005, Journal of Plankton Research authors have had the option, at an additional charge, to make their paper freely available online immediately upon publication, under the Oxford Open initiative. After your manuscript is accepted, as part of the mandatory licence form required of all corresponding authors, you will be asked to indicate whether or not you wish to pay to have your paper made freely available immediately. If you do not select the Open Access option, your paper will be published with standard subscription-based access and you will not be charged.

For those selecting the Open Access option, the charges for Journal of Plankton Research vary depending on the institution at which the Corresponding author is based:

Optional Oxford Open charges:

For a Corresponding author based at an institution with an online subscription to Journal of Plankton Research:
Regular charge per paper – £900 / €1350 / $1800
List B developing country charge* – £450 / €675 / $900
List A developing country charge* – £0 / €0 /$0

For a Corresponding author based at an institution that does not subscribe to the online journal:
Regular charge per paper – £1500 / €2250 / $3000
List B developing country charge* – £750 / €1125 / $1500
List A developing country charge* – £0 / €0 /$0

*Visit http://www.oxfordjournals.org/jnls/devel/for list of qualifying countries

Orders from UK will be subject to a 17.5% VAT charge. For orders from the rest of the EU, we will assume that the service is provided for business purposes, please provide a VAT number for yourself or your institution and ensure you account for your own local VAT correctly.

The above Open Access charges are in addition to any page charges and colour charges that might apply.

If you choose the Open Access option you will also be asked to complete an Open Access charge form online. You will be automatically directed to the appropriate version of the form depending on whether you are based at an institution with an online subscription to Journal of Plankton Research. Therefore please make sure that you are using an institutional computer when accessing the form. To check whether you are based at a subscribing institution please use the Subscriber Test link for Journal of Plankton Research.