Author Guidelines
Guidelines for authors are based on CSE’s White Paper on Promoting Integrity in Scientific Journal Publications, 2012 Update.
The Journal publishes the original papers on all aspects of substances composition, structure, and properties investigation (for more details see Aims and Scope). The journal also publishes reviews, feature articles, brief communications, and letters to the editor in Russian and English.
Manuscript preparation
The manuscript must not be considered or published elsewhere; all the authors must agree to manuscript transfer and accept manuscript publication.
The manuscript should be organized in the following order.
1. Manuscript title
The title must correspond to the content of the manuscript and should be specific and informative.
2. Authors’ full names
Authors are generally defined as persons who have contributed sufficiently to a scientific research to be listed on the byline of the published manuscript.
Persons who contributed to the work but whose contributions were not of sufficient magnitude to warrant authorship should be identified by name in an ACKNOWLEDGMENTS section.
Persons listed as authors should review and approve the manuscript before publication.
3. Affiliation
This section must include the complete mailing address of the organization where the author works, i.e. postal code, city, street, and number; for universities, faculty or department should be given. Use corresponding superscripted numbers following an author’s surname if authors work in different organizations.
The corresponding author should be indicated by an asterisk with his e-mail address provided.
4. Abstract
An abstract (200 – 250 words) should describe briefly and clearly the purpose of the research, the principal results, and the major conclusions. Non-standard or uncommon abbreviations should be avoided, but if essential, they must be defined at their first mention in the abstract itself.
5. Keywords
5 – 7 Words or word combinations characterizing the substantive part of the manuscript should complement the abstract.
6. Text
The text of the manuscript should be structured in the following way:
- Introduction that states the purpose of the investigation and includes appropriate citations of relevant, precedent work. If the manuscript describes a new or improved method, the older or competing methods must be referenced and compared. Absence of appropriate literature references can be grounds for rejection of the paper;
- Experimental that describes the apparatus and reagents used, and the main steps of the experimental procedure. Published procedures should be cited but not described.
- Results and Discussion that presents the obtained results in tables or figures (simple findings can be presented directly in the text). The discussion should be concise and deal with the interpretation of the results.
- Conclusion that summarizes the interpretation of the most significant results (should not duplicate an abstract).
7. Acknowledgments
In this section at the end of the manuscript the authors should list funding sources according to fund's requirements (including grunt number), and also those persons who provided help during the research but whose involvement in a study did not qualify them for authorship (e.g. technical, laboratory or writing assistance); the specific contribution should be noted.
8. Conflicts of Interest
Conflicts of interest can be defined as conditions in which an individual holds conflicting or competing interests that could bias editorial decisions. Conflicts of interest may be only potential or perceived, or they may be factual. Personal, political, financial, academic, or religious conflicts of interest should be avoided or disclosed. The author must notify the editor about factual or potential conflict of interest by including the appropriate information in the end of the manuscript.
9. Illustrations
All illustrations must be prepared and submitted in digital format, and should be inserted into the main body of the manuscript; additional files with illustrations should be provided.
Illustrations must fit a single- or two-column format (86 or 180 mm respectively).
Raster formats TIFF (preferable format), JPEG, PNG, BMP, PSD are acceptable.
Illustrations should have the following resolution: not smaller than 120 dpi up to 350 dpi for the planned print size; not larger than 1140 pixels for single-column illustrations, and not larger than 2480 pixels for double column (full width).
Vector and raster formats CDR - CorelDRAW version not higher than 15 (preferable format), CMX, PDF, Al - version not higher than 8, EPS are acceptable.
The journal doesn't accept RTF, DOC, DOCX, PPT, PPTX, .XLS, .XLSX formats as well as any video formats including animated .GIF.
Color models other than RGB or CMYK should be avoided.
All illustrations should be numbered according to their sequence in the text.
All figures must have captions.
The journal reserves the right to editing and other enhancement required for high-quality reproduction of illustrations.
10. Tables
Tables must be prepared as editable text (not as images).
Tables should be placed next to the relevant text in the manuscript, and should be numbered consecutively in accordance with their appearance in the text.
All tables must have headings that should include the general information only to avoid the heading overloading. Less important information should be indicated in the notes below the table body (marked by asterisks).
11. Footnotes
Footnotes should be used sparingly, and may include author's comments, references to anonymous Internet sources, tutorials, state standards, dissertations and their abstracts, etc.
Footnotes should be numbered consecutively throughout the manuscript and should not be included in the Reference list.
12. References
It is strongly recommended to include in the list of references as a minimum 10-15 publications most of which refers to the last 5 years. Self-citation shouldn't exceed 15%.
The references cited should be numbered in the order they are mentioned in the text. The serialized number in the text is enclosed in square brackets (in line).
Citation of a reference as "in press" implies that the manuscript has been accepted for publication (provide the manuscript title, volume number, and year, if known). Otherwise, the author should use “unpublished work” with the name of the place where the work was done and the date.
For “personal communications”, name, affiliation, and date should be indicated. For manuscript published online, the DOI should be furnished in addition to the standard bibliographic information.
For Web references, the full URL should be given and the date when the reference was last accessed (with any further information, if known).
Data references should include the following elements:
for books - author name(s); chapter title; book title; editor name(s); city; publisher; publication year; number of pages;
for journal papers - author name(s); journal title; publication year; volume; issue; page numbers.
The author should use Chemical Abstracts Service Source Index abbreviations for journal names (http://cassi.cas.org/search.jsp).
Examples:
1. Welz B., Becker-Ross H., Florek S., Heitmann U. High-Resolution Continuum Source AAS. – Weinheim: Wiley-VCH, 2005. - 295 p.
2. Geisler S., Okruss M., Becker-Ross H., et al. Spectrometer system using a modular echelle spectrograph and a laser-driven continuum source for simultaneous multi-element determination by graphite furnace absorption spectrometry / Spectrochim. Acta, Part B. 2015. Vol. 107. P. 11–16.
3. Grigorovich K. V. New Possibilities of Modern Methods for Determination of Gas-forming Impurities in Metals / Zavod. Lab. Diagn. Mater. 2007. Vol. 73. N 1. Part II. P. 23 – 34 [in Russian].
4. Pouchou J. L., Pichoir F. Quantitative analysis of homogeneous or stratified micro volumes applying the model “PAP” / Electron Probe Quantitation. Ed. By K. F. J. Heinrich and D. E. Newbury. – New York: Plenum Press, 1991. P. 31 – 75.
5. CIPM. Consultative Committee for Amount of Substance —Metrology in Chemistry and Biology (CCQM). Mise en pratique for the definition of the mole in the SI. http://www.bipm.org/cc/CCQM/Allowed/22/CCQM16-04_Mole_m_en_p_draft_2018.pdf (accessed November 13, 2018).
6. Pouchou J. L., Pichoir F. Proc. of 11th Inter. Congress on X-Ray Optics and Microanalysis. – Canada: University of Western Ontario, 1987. P. 249.
7. RF Pat. N 2649136. Method of determination of Au and Co dopants in semiconducting materials based on SnO2 / Filatova D. G., Rumyantseva M. N., Gaskov A. M. Publ. March 29, 2018 [in Russian].
Manuscript Submission
The author should submit the manuscript via the electronic submission system. Editable files (*.doc, *.docx, *.rtf) are required for further consideration.
Relationship between journal and author
The journal contacts with the corresponding author at all stages of refereeing and publication.
All submitting manuscripts are checked for compliance with formal requirements, and may be returned to the author for additional information or correction of mistakes. At this stage, the manuscript may be rejected due to non-compliance with the journal aims and scope, or lack of scientific novelty and interest.
After preliminary checking the manuscript is sent to reviewer with indication of the time requested.
In disputable cases, several specialists and the editor-in-chief may be involved in the review process.
If the positive review contains remarks or suggestions, the editor returns the manuscript to the corresponding author for revision. The author should complete the revision within the time requested (2 months). Otherwise, the returned manuscript is considered newly submitted.
In the case of the negative review, an explanatory statement with the review is sent to the author. The editorial board does not discuss rejected manuscripts with authors, except for cases of obvious misunderstanding.
Reconsideration of editorial decision
If the author does not agree with manuscript evaluation or some remarks, he can challenge the editorial decision. For that purpose, the author should revise the manuscript along with the valid reviewer and editor’s comments, and provide good reasons why the decision may have been wrong.
Some manuscripts that are declined may be considered upon resubmission if significant additional work is completed.
The editors encourage resubmission of manuscripts that are potentially acceptable but were rejected because major revision or additional data were required, explaining precisely what is needed to make the manuscript potentially acceptable, and the process and procedures that will be followed in handling the resubmitted manuscript.
Identification of research misconduct
The term “research misconduct” applies to any action that involves purposeful manipulation of the scientific record such that it no longer reflects observed truth (i.e. fabrication, falsification, piracy, or plagiarism in proposing, performing, or reviewing research, or in reporting research results).
Research misconduct does not include honest error or honest differences in the design, execution, interpretation, or judgment in evaluating research methods or results.
The journal follows the Code of
Conduct of the
Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), and in the case of research misconduct identification, according to the
COPE Flowcharts the manuscript is rejected.
