Author Instructions
All manuscripts should be submitted via ScholarOne Manuscripts.
- Publishing Policies
- Peer review
- Authorship
- Licence to publish
- Open access
- Journal policy and notes
- Distribution information and lodging specimens
- Online publication
- Manuscript Categories
- Supplementary material
- General presentation
- Use of inclusive language
- Submission and preparation of manuscripts
- Title
- Summary text for the Table of Contents
- Abstract
- Keywords
- Text
- Data Availability Statement
- Conflicts of Interest
- Declaration of Funding
- Acknowledgements
- References
- Use of referencing software
- Units
- Mathematical formulae
- Gene sequences
- Enzyme nomenclature
- Chemical nomenclature
- Tables
- lllustrations
- Photographs
- Line drawings
Publishing Policies
Australian Journal of Botany insists on high standards of ethical behaviour throughout the publication process. Our journal editors work within the guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE). Further information on our policies can be found at http://www.publish.csiro.au/bt/PublishingPolicies.
Peer review
Australian Journal of Botany is a peer-reviewed journal that uses a single-blind peer-review. The Editor-in-Chief is responsible to maintain high-quality peer-review of papers submitted to the journal and works together with Associate Editors and an Editorial Board to ensure a thorough and fair peer-review and the highest scientific publishing standards. All submissions undergo preliminary assessment by the Editor-in-Chief, who may reject a paper before peer review when it is outside the journal’s scope or is of insufficient quality. Associate Editors select reviewers and after at least two review reports are received, they make the decision whether to accept/reject or send a manuscript for revision. The final decision is made by the Editor-in-Chief.
Under our single-blind policy, reviewers’ names are not disclosed to the authors. To increase transparency, reviewers may choose to sign their reports. We ask reviewers and authors not to directly contact each other while the manuscript is under consideration, rather keep all communication through ScholarOne with the Editor’s involvement.
Authorship
The conditions around authorship for Australian Journal of Botany should follow the recommendations of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), for more information see http://www.publish.csiro.au/bt/PublishingPolicies.
Licence to publish
For details regarding copyright, please see Copyright/Licence to Publish.
Open access
Authors may choose to publish their paper Open Access on payment of a publication fee. See Open Access for more details.
Journal policy and notes
Papers of relevance to Southern Hemisphere ecosystems will be considered for publication in the Journal in the fields of ecology and ecophysiology; conservation biology and biodiversity; forest biology and management; cell biology and tissue culture; paleobotany; reproductive biology and genetics; mycology and pathology; and structure and development. Review articles will also be considered. Authors interested in publishing a review article are invited to contact the Editor-in-Chief or an appropriate member of the Editorial Board. Australian Journal of Botany does not publish the results of biological surveys if the main body of the results is only the results of a biological survey. However, the Journal will publish papers that present survey data in comparative and ecological contexts. All papers are refereed. Please be aware that the acceptance rate of papers is about 33%.
Submission of a paper implies that the results have not been published and are not being considered for publication elsewhere. It also implies that all coauthors of the paper have consented to its submission. Authors of multi-authored papers may wish to assign relative values to their contributions, or to indicate that two or more authors contributed equally to a paper. This can be done in a note at the end of the address field on the paper. The Journal will use its best endeavours to ensure that work published is that of the named authors except where acknowledged and, through its reviewing procedures, that any published results and conclusions are consistent with the primary data. It takes no responsibility for fraud or innaccuracy on the part of the contributors. There are no page charges.
Distribution information and lodging specimens
In cooperation with other botanical institutions, distributional data for rare and threatened plant taxa will be masked. Precise distributional data are not published for species that are listed as known only from the type locality, or whose conservation status is given as E or V by Briggs and Leigh (1988). Where specimen citations for rare taxa have been deliberately abbreviated to achieve less precision in order to protect the taxa, this should be stated. The Wildlife Protection (Regulation) of Exports and Imports Act of 1982 (amended in 1986) states that all type material and unicates collected in Australia must be lodged in an appropriate national or state institution. Consequently, Journal policy requires that type material of all of the taxa collected in Australia after 1982, and discussed by the author of a manuscript, be lodged in a suitable Australian herbarium.
For all papers, whether presenting morphological, cytological or molecular data, voucher specimens must be cited, along with the herbarium where lodged. For population studies where large series of specimens of one taxon are examined, citation of exemplar specimens is acceptable. In tables that list material examined, the voucher specimen (collection) and the herbarium where lodged are to be listed for each entry. If there are one or few herbaria involved, this can be indicated instead of in the materials and methods, or in the table caption.
Online publication
Papers are published online immediately after final corrections are completed. No corrections are allowed after this time.
Manuscript Categories
Australian Journal of Botany publishes the following paper types. All submissions are subject to peer review.
Research papers are complete reports of original research not previously published, except possibly in the form of a preliminary communication. They are typically up to 8000 words in length (the word limit refers to text from the introduction to conclusion, i.e., excluding the title, abstract, references, figure captions, and tables). Includes an abstract not longer than 250 words.
Reviews are literature review or syntheses articles typically up to 8500 words in length (the word limit refers to text from the introduction to the conclusion, i.e., excluding the title, abstract, references, figure captions, and tables). Includes an abstract not longer than 250 words. Reviews are generally invited and authors considering submitting a Review should first discuss their proposal with the Editor. Reviews should give a concise, critical overview of a subject of high current interest, in which there have been important recent developments.
The Australian Journal of Botany also publishes Turner Reviews, named in recognition of Professor John Turner, Professor of Botany and Plant Physiology at the University of Melbourne (1938-1973); he was a foundation member of the Advisory Committee of the Australian Journal of Botany. The Turner Reviews aim to provide critical, state-of-the-art evaluations that advance knowledge in current, key areas of botanical research. The review will be commissioned by invitation and should be less of an exercise in literature documentation and more of a forum for the synthesis and presentation of new ideas.
Method papers are intended to provide presentation of new analytical techniques, new databases, new code packages or critical evaluation of methods in plant biology. Method articles are up to 6500 words in length (the word limit refers to text from the introduction to conclusion, i.e., excluding the title, abstract, references, figure captions, and tables. Includes an abstract not longer than 250 words.
Short Communications are intended to provide rapid dissemination of concise material of general interest with respect to plant biology that does not fall into the research paper category, but which provides important and scientific insights or makes a major contribution to the scientific debate. Lively titles are encouraged, and materials should be as topical as possible They generally should not exceed 3000 words and three tables and/or graphics. Includes an abstract not longer than 100 words.
Australian Journal of Botany Reflections are a prestigious review series. These are invited reviews that are authored by a leader in a research field on a topic of their choosing that relates to the development of Botanical Science. The reviews will reflect historically on our science and participating scientists, providing context for the current state of a discipline. This may include a scientist's reflection on their own work and the ways in which the history of their discipline informs current understanding. Biographical papers will provide an insight into scientists who we often recognise as a name on a paper but know little else about them. Reflections are intended to acknowledge the importance of the history of botanical science and suggestions for topics and authors are encouraged and should be discussed with the Editors-in-Chief.
Comments can provide opportunities for comments, questions and criticisms of recently published work (i.e., within the past 12 months). The goal of a comment is to encourage further scientific discussion and debate and should be written in a professional manner. Comments should only discuss issues relevant to the content of the original article. All commentaries will be peer reviewed. After peer review, the comment will be sent to the author(s) of the original article to give an opportunity to reply. Both the original Comment and the Response will be published together in the journal. The Editors maintain the right to not publish a Comment if not deemed relevant regarding the conclusions made by the original article. Comments should have a short abstract (<75 words) and should not exceed 2000 words. Responses should have no abstract and should not exceed 1000 words. They should comprise no more than one typeset page in total (including figures, tables and references). If the corresponding or contributing authors of the previously published paper decline their right to reply or fail to do so in a reasonable timeframe, the Comment will be published without a Response.
Supplementary material
Supplementary material of a detailed nature that may be useful to other workers, but which is not essential to the printed paper, may be lodged with the Editor-in-Chief, provided that it is submitted with the manuscript for inspection by the referees. Such material will be made available on request and a note to this effect should be included in the paper. Where practicable and appropriate this material will also be made available online.
General presentation
The works should be presented concisely and clearly in English. Introductory material, including a review of the literature, should not exceed what is necessary to indicate the reason for the work and the essential background. All pages of the manuscript should contain line numbering to aid the referees in their task. Authors are advised to note the typographical conventions and the layout of headings, tables, and illustrations exemplified in recent issues of the Journal. Observance of these and the following requirements will shorten the interval between submission and publication.
Corresponding authors will be sent a free PDF of their paper upon publication. The conditions under which the paper is distributed is as follows:
Authors may
- Print out the PDF
- Store the PDF on their personal hard disk
- Send copies to individual colleagues for non-commercial purposes
- Include the PDF in a course pack, subject to the usual copyright licencing agency fees
Authors may not
- Aggregate the PDF with other papers on related topics (other than the author´s own papers).
Use of inclusive language
These guidelines should be used to assist in identifying appropriate language, but are by no means exhaustive or definitive. Inclusive language comprises carefully chosen words and phrases that are respectful and promote the acceptance and value of all people. It is language which is free from words, phrases or tones that demean, insult, exclude, stereotype, or trivialise people on the basis of their membership of a certain group or because of a particular attribute. As such, inclusive language should make no assumptions about the beliefs or commitments of any reader, and contain nothing which might imply that one individual is superior to another on any grounds including but not limited to: age, gender, race, ethnicity, culture, sexual orientation, disability or health condition. We encourage the use of plural nouns (e.g., 'they' as default wherever possible instead of 'he/she'), and recommend avoiding the use of descriptors that refer to personal attributes, unless there is scientific or clinical relevance. For further guidance on inclusive language see Inclusive language | Style Manual. If there are questions about language use and/or publishing with regards to First Nations people, please contact the Journal.
Submission and preparation of manuscripts
To submit your paper, please use our online journal management system ScholarOne Manuscripts, which can be reached directly through this link or from the link on the journal´s homepage. If a first-time user, register via the ´Register here´ link, or use your existing username and password to log in. Then click on the ´Author Centre´ link and proceed.
A covering letter must accompany the submission and should include the name, address, fax and telephone numbers, and email address of the corresponding author. The letter should also contain a statement justifying why the work should be considered for publication in the journal, and that the manuscript has not been published or simultaneously submitted for publication elsewhere.
A Table of Contents entry must also be supplied, containing an appropriate graphic and a short (ca. 50 words) text written for interested non-experts, an example of which is shown below:
Six Eucalyptus species with diverse seed sizes were sown in vertosol soils in a glasshouse to investigate the influence of sowing depth and three soil-moisture scenarios on seedling emergence. All species had greater emergence when sown superficially but responded differently to the watering treatments. Seed size had little effect.
If you encounter any difficulties, or you have any queries, please contact:
Australian Journal of Botany
CSIRO Publishing
Locked Bag 10
Clayton South VIC 3169
Australia
Telephone +[61 3] 9545 8400
Email publishing.ajb@csiro.au
Authors are advised to read recent issues of the journal to note details of the scope of papers, headings, tables, illustrations, style, and general form. Observance of these and the following details will shorten the time between submission and publication. Poorly prepared and unnecessarily lengthy manuscripts have less chance of being accepted.
Title
This should be concise and informative and should contain all keywords necessary to facilitate retrieval by modern searching techniques. Titles including generic or specific names should also contain the name of taxa at higher rank, e.g. Division, Class, Order or Family. Nomenclatural authorities should be omitted from the title.
Summary text for the Table of Contents
This is a three-sentence paragraph of 50 to 80 words written for interested non-experts, such as journalists, teachers, government workers, etc. The text should be free from scientific jargon, and written at the level of an article in a science magazine. Your first sentence should engage the reader, convincing them that this is an important area. The second sentence should introduce the problem addressed in the paper, and state your main discovery. The final sentence should describe how the results fit into the bigger picture (i.e. implications or impact of the discovery).
Abstract
Abstracts should be no more than 250 words. Abstracts of Research articles should be formatted to include the following labelled sections: Context; Aims; Methods; Key results; Conclusions; Implications. Using these headings, the Abstract should state concisely why the study was done, what hypothesis was tested, and how the study was undertaken; should give the principal findings and conclusions; and should highlight the implications for future research. Abstracts of Reviews, Short Communications and Comment/Response papers do not need to be formatted with sections but should still provide a concise overview of the full manuscript. As a general rule, avoid including references and abbreviations in Abstracts.
Keywords
A minimum of 8 keywords or phrases are required to improve online discoverability of your work. These terms can be repeated from the title if necessary. List the keywords under the abstract, with terms separated by commas.
Text
This should normally be divided into sections, e.g. Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, Discussion, Acknowledgments, References. All main headings should be in upper and lower case bold type, aligned at the left. Minor headings should be in light italics. The folllowing also should be adhered to: spell out numbers lower than 10 unless accompanied by a unit, e.g. 2 mm, 15 mm, two plants, 15 plants, but 5 out of 15 plants; leave a space between a numeral and its unit; use the ´ise´ construction, not ´ize´; indicate approximate positions of figures and tables on the manuscript.
Synonymies should be indicated by a smaller font size and the first line of each synonymous species should be indented. Where presented, synonymy should immediately follow taxon headings.
Latin diagnoses for new species should be given in English to allow checking by the referees.
Material examined should be the last section presented in each taxon treatment and should be indicated by a minor heading and a smaller font size. Where presented, Etymology and Illustration sections should immediately precede Material examined. For clarity, authors should provide a minor heading, on a separate line, for each section of a taxon treatment, except for the taxon description. This may appear without a heading.
Data Availability Statement
CSIRO Publishing encourages authors to share the research data underlying their papers to support transparency and reproducibility of research. A Data Availability Statement must be included at the end of the manuscript indicating whether the data used to generate the results in the paper are available and, if so, where to access them. For more information on CSIRO Publishing’s data sharing policy and for examples of what to include in the data availability statement please see https://www.publish.csiro.au/journals/publishingpolicies#6.
Authors can get credit for their work by citing their research data in the reference list of their article. Citations should include at a minimum: all authors, year of publication, title of dataset, record ID, publisher. DOI or URL if available. Examples of how to cite research data:
Wang L, Edwards D, Bailey A, Carr L, Boreham C, Grosjean E, Anderson J, Jarrett A, MacFarlane S, Southby C, Carson C, Khider K, Palu T, Henson P (2021). Well log data analysis and interpretation on the pre-Carboniferous succession in Waukarlycarly 1, Canning Basin, Western Australia. Record 2021/003 [Dataset]. Geoscience Australia, Canberra. Available at http://pid.geoscience.gov.au/dataset/ga/144547
Fiddes S, Pepler A, Saunders K, Hope P (2020) Southern Australia’s climate regions (Version 1.0.0) [Dataset] Zenodo. doi:10.5281/zenodo.4265471
Digital Earth Australia (2021). Wetlands Insight Tool Queensland Wetlands Polygons. Version 1.0.0 [Dataset]. Geoscience Australia, Canberra. Available at http://pid.geoscience.gov.au/dataset/ga/144795
Conflicts of Interest
A ´Conflicts of Interest´ section should be included at the end of the manuscript. It should identify any financial or non-financial (political, personal, professional) interests/relationships that may be interpreted to have influenced the manuscript. If there is no conflict of interest, please include the statement "The authors declare no conflicts of interest".
Declaration of Funding
Under a subheading ´Declaration of Funding´ at the end of the text authors are required to declare all sources of funding for the research and/or preparation of the article, and the inclusion of grant numbers is recommended. Authors should declare sponsor names along with explanations of the role of those sources if any in the preparation of the data or manuscript or the decision to submit for publication; or a statement declaring that the supporting source had no such involvement. If no funding has been provided for the research, please include the following sentence: 'This research did not receive any specific funding'.
Acknowledgements
The contribution of colleagues who do not meet all criteria for authorship should be acknowledged. Anyone included in the Acknowledgements section should have granted permission to be listed. Sources of financial support should be acknowledged in a separate ‘Declaration of Funding’ rather than here.
References
In the text, references should be listed in chronological order, separated by semi-colons. Use ´and´ to link the names of two coauthors and ´et al.´ where there are more than two. Do not use a comma between the author´s name and the date. References after names of taxa, e.g. in synonymies, should include the author´s name followed by a comma, the journal name (suitably abbreviated) in roman type, the volume number followed by a colon, then the page numbers, and finally the year in parentheses. References occurring only in synonymy should not be given in the reference list. Make sure that all references in the text (except synonymies) are listed at the end of the paper and vice versa. At the end of the paper, list references in alphabetical order. Give titles of books and names of journals in full.
- Journal article
Lucas EJ, Harris SA, Mazine FF, Bellsham SR, Lughadha EMN, Telford A, Gasson PE, Chase MW (2007) Suprageneric phylogenetics of Myrteae, the generically richest tribe in Myrtaceae (Myrtales). Taxon 56, 1105-1128.
- Book
Hesse M, Halbritter H, Zetter R, Weber M, Buchner R, Frosch-Radivo A, Ulrich S (2009) ´Pollen terminology: an illustrated handbook.´ (Springer: New York)
- Book chapter
Walton TJ (1990) Waxes, cutin and suberin. In ´Methods in plant biochemistry. Vol. 4: lipids, membranes and aspects of photobiology´. (Eds PM Dey, JB Harbone) pp. 105-108. (Academic Press: London)
- Online reference
Radcliffe J, Catley M, Fischer T, Perrett K, Sheridan K (2003) ´Review of plant research biosecurity protocols.´ (Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry: Canberra) Available at http://www.daff.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0006/146913/review.pdf [Verified 1 April 2012]
Use of referencing software
If using ´EndNote*´ software, you can obtain the style file for this journal at http://www.endnote.com/support/enstyles.asp.
*You will find the style file under the ´Botany´ category, listed as Australian Journal of Botany.
Units
The International System of Units (Système International d´Unités, SI units) should be used for exact measurement of physical qualities and as far as practical elsewhere. Measurements of radiation should be given as irradiance or photon flux density, or both, and the waveband of the radiation should be specified. Luminous flux density units (e.g. lux) should not be used. Do not use the double solidus in complex groupings of units, e.g.mmol/m2/s; use the negative index system instead, i.e. mmol m-2 s-1.
Mathematical formulae
Correctly align and adequately space all symbols. Avoid two-line mathematical expressions wherever possible especially in the running text. Display each long formula on a separate line with at least two lines of space above and below it.
Gene sequences
All sequences used as data must be deposited in one of the international nucleotide sequence databases, preferably GenBank, National Center for Biotechnology Information, 8600 Rockville Pike, Bethesda, MD 20894, USA. Email: gb-sub@ncbi.nlm.nih.gov. Request information at gsdb@gsdb.ncgr.org. Post-review final manuscript will not be accepted until sequence database accession numbers are included.
Enzyme nomenclature
Names should conform to Recommendations (1992) of the Nomenclature Committee of the International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology on the Nomenclature and Classification of Enzymes as published in ´Enzyme Nomenclature 1992´ (Academic Press: San Diego). If you wish to use a name other than the recommended name, at the first mention of the alternative name identify it by giving the recommended name and its EC number.
Chemical nomenclature
The recommendations of the IUPAC-IUB Commission on Biochemical Nomenclature should be followed when naming compounds such as amino acids, carbohydrates, lipids, steroids, vitamins, etc. Refer to other biologically active compounds, such as metabolic inhibitors, plant growth regulators, buffers (in accordance with IUPAC Rules of Chemical Nomenclature), once and then by their most widely accepted common name.
Tables
These should be numbered with arabic numerals and be accompained by a title. The title should be in bold upper and lower case and should be in a separate paragraph from the headnote. Tables should be arranged with regard to the proportions of the printed page (1 column 8.5 cm width, 2 columns 17.5 cm width). Include in the headnote, any information relevant to the table as a whole, and where applicable, the levels of probability attached to statistics in the body of the table. Use *, **, *** only to define probability levels. Use footnotes only to refer to specific items in the body of the table; use A and B etc. for footnotes. Insert horizontal rules above and below the column headings and across the bottom of the table; do not use vertical rules. If using Microsoft Word, use table formatting to prepare tables (i.e. use table cells, not tabs), otherwise use tabs, not spaces to align columns. The first letter only of headings of rows and columns should be capitalised. Include the symbols for the units of measurement in parentheses below the column heading. Each table must be referred to in the text.
lllustrations
Line diagrams and photographs must be prepared using either a draw or chart/graph program such as MacDraw, Illustrator, CorelDraw, Excel, Sigmaplot, Harvard Graphics or Cricket Graph and files should be saved in one of the following formats: encapsulated PostScript (EPS), Illustrator or Excel (provided the Excel files have been saved with the chart encapsulated in it). The submission of scanned images or illustrations prepared in a paint program, e.g. Photoshop (and PICT and JPEG files) is discouraged, because of the difficulty in making editorial corrections to these files. If illustrations are created in a paint program, save the file as a TIFF or EPS (these files should be 600 dpi for line drawings and 300 dpi for halftone figures).
Refer to each figure in the text, and number each according to the order in which it appears in the text. All lettering must be of a standard suitable for reduction (if necessary) and reproduction. Use a sans-serif typeface (e.g. Helvetica, Univers, Futura) that contrasts with its background, and which will be 1.5-2 mm high when printed. Use hatching not shading in bar graphs.
Photographs
Arrange photographs so that they abut each other without gaps, but allow 2-3 mm for the printer to insert a ´gutter´. Figures should be sized to fit either on 1 column (8.5 cm width) or over 2 columns (17.5 cm width). Depth should not exceed 22 cm. Include a scale bar on all micrographs. Important features mentioned in the text should be indicated. Lettering should be in sans-serif type that contrasts with its background. Colour photographs will be accepted, but the cost of production must be borne by the author.
Line drawings
The following symbols should be avoided: +, x or *. Explain the symbols used in the caption of the figure or in a legend. State on the axes of a graph what is being measured and give the appropriate units in parentheses.
Dense stippling does not reproduce well, and should be avoided. Lettering should be in sans-serif type (Helvetica is ideal) with only the first letter of the first word and any proper names capitalised, and should not be in bold type. Grid marks should point inwards.
