Phyton-International Journal of Experimental Botany
ISSN: 0031-9457 (Print)
ISSN: 1851-5657 (Online)
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Cover Letter
Templates
General Format of Articles
Declarations
Research and Supplementary Materials
Suggesting Reviewers
English Editing Service
Authorship and Contribution
Publication Ethics
Editors and Journal Staff as Authors
Conflicts of Interest
Copyright and Licensing
Corrections and Retractions
Appeals and complaints
All manuscripts must be submitted via the online system, and manuscripts submitted for publication must be prepared according to the guidelines given below.
Template in MS Word: Sample.dot.
References Style file for EndNote: Vancouver
This guideline is intended to assist authors as they prepare their manuscripts. To avoid any delay and time-consuming restructuring, Phyton-International Journal of Experimental Botany (PHYTON) asks and encourages authors to read the guidelines before writing the manuscript.
PHYTON publishes review and research articles. All papers must be written in English, and follow a clear, concise style. The language editors may have to check the language and grammar of your submitted manuscript, and make editorial changes if deemed necessary.
Review Articles
A Review article is a paper based on other published research. It is a secondary source. It does not report original research but rather critically evaluate previously published material. Typically, a review article analyzes or synthesizes existing literature on a subject with the aim of expanding on its current understanding or sums up the already existing work to relate it to its present status and suggest new research directions. Structured reviews and meta-analyses should use the same structure as research articles and adhere to the PRISMA guidelines, and authors should also include a completed PRISMA checklist and flow diagram as supporting files.
Guidelines for Cover Story
We select cover images for their scientific interest and aesthetic appeal. The editorial team will select those images they consider most appropriate for the cover positions and contact the chosen images' authors. The cover images should be in an original, high-resolution format, and editable vector graphic images are preferred. Authors may receive request emails for permission to use their images as a cover story by us. Please send your approval and along with the electronic files, including a short legend concisely explaining the image (50-60 words).
The cover of the journal is editorial material. As such, the editors reserve the right to adapt it during the final design process or ask you to make changes to your suggestion. No charge is required at present for Cover Story.
Other Requirements:
Image type: TIFF/PSD files are preferred
Design suggestion: A cover is a showcase for your research and the journal. It should be eye-catching and make people want to learn more about your article.
Image layout: The image should have a full-page layout. Space should be available for the journal-title and other information on the page, but aside from that, the full area is available for your image.
Copyright: Any cover must be a completely new design. It is not appropriate to use elements taken from third-party content, such as in previously published work or any elements that are otherwise subject to copyright or licensing restrictions, as the license should be transferable to Phyton-International Journal of Experimental Botany.
1 Cover Letter
A submitted manuscript must be accompanied by a cover letter. The cover letter must clearly state that the manuscript is an original work with its own merit, has not been previously published in whole or in part, and is not being considered for publication elsewhere. It should also include statements clearly indicating that all authors have read the final manuscript, have approved the submission to the journal, and have accepted full responsibilities pertaining to the manuscript’s delivery and contents. If there are any ethical, copyright, disclosure issues that come with the manuscript, please reveal them in the cover letter. In the cover letter, authors need to declare that there is no conflict of interests or disclose all the conflicts of interest regarding the manuscript submitted.
2 Templates
Authors are encouraged to use the Microsoft Word template (see links above).
3 General Format of Articles
3.1 General Style
The paper size is US Letter (8.5“ × 11” or 21.59 cm × 27.94 cm) All margins — top, bottom, left, and right — are set to 1” (2.54 cm).
Use Times New Roman 11-point size for the main body of the paper, single spacing, except for the heading as outlined in Section 3.4.
The paper must be in a single column format.
Use British English or American English spellings throughout your manuscript, but not both.
Use 2-character indentation on the first line of each new paragraph.
Do not use page breaks or multiple returns between Sections.
Do not insert page numbers or line numbers.
3.2 Manuscripts
3.2.1 Title and Author Information
The title and author information should use Minion Pro font.
The title should be in bold, 14-point, left align of the page. Use capital letter on each word of the title.
Provide full names of all authors and their affiliations. The author line should be Minion Pro, 11-point and left aligned.
Authors should be numbered regard to their affiliations. There should be no space between the author name and the number.
Affiliation lines should be Minion Pro font, 9-point.
Corresponding author should be marked *.
3.2.2 Abstract
The font of the Abstract should be in 10-point size, Minion Pro.
Abstract of a research paper should be 200–400 words, and 150–300 words for review paper.
Abstract should be left aligned.
The abstract should be in one continuous paragraph without reference numbers.
All abbreviations should be defined in full unless the abbreviation appears more than once in the abstract.
3.2.3 Keywords
Keywords should be in the same section with the abstract, and use 10-point size, Minion Pro font.
Three keywords are the minimum. Use a comma to divide each keyword.
Keywords should be left aligned.
Each keyword except the first one should be lowercase unless an uppercase letter is necessary.
3.3 Headings
In the main body of the paper, three different levels of headings (for sections, subsections, and sub-subsections) may be used.
The section of abstract should not be numbered. Subsequent sections should be numbered consecutively in Arabic numbers, starting from 1.
Level one headings for sections should be in bold, and be flushed to the left, e.g., 1, 2, ….
Level two headings for subsections should be bold-italic, and be flushed to the left. Level two headings should be numbered after the level one heading, e.g., 1.1, 1.2,….
Level three headings should be italic; and be flushed to the left, e.g., 1.1.1, 1.1.2,….
Use 12-pound before paragraph distance and 3-pound after paragraph distance.
Do not use page breaks or multiple returns between sections.
3.4 Units and Symbols
Units of measurement should be used concisely according to the International System of Units (SI). All units should be converted to SI units whenever possible.
There should be a space between the unit and Arabic number: 5 mm NOT 5mm.
Please use Arabic number and relevant unit in the manuscript: 5 kg NOT five kilograms or 5 kilograms or five kg.
Do not use hyphen/dash or any connector symbol between the value and its unit: 5 kg NOT 5-kg.
Please clarify all units during a calculation or a mathematical relationship: 3 cm × 5 cm NOT 3 × 5 cm, 123 g± 2 g or (123±2) g NOT 123± 2 g, 70%–85% NOT 70–85%.
Greek letters must be inserted using the correct Greek symbol (using Times, Helvetica or Symbol font), NOT written in full, i.e., alpha: α; beta: β, (available in Times and Helvetica); and gamma: γ, etc.
Abbreviations
Abbreviations should be defined in parentheses the first time they appear in the abstract, main text, and in figure or table caption and used consistently thereafter. Accepted abbreviations for statistical parameters are: P, n, SD, SEM, df, ns, ANOVA, t. Naming of chemicals should follow that given in Chemical Abstracts Service.
Equations
If you are using MS Word, please use either the Microsoft Equation Editor or the MathType add-on. Please submit math equations as editable text and not as images.
Statistical Analysis
Appropriate statistical treatment of the data is essential. When the statistical analysis is performed, the name of the statistical test used, the n number for each analysis, the comparisons of interest, the alpha level and the actual p-value for each test should be provided.
3.5 Figures and Tables
3.5.1 Figures
When submitting manuscripts to PHYTON, authors must provide the original raw images of both the figures (e.g., diagrams, charts, graphs, and photographs) cited in the main text and the supporting information reported in the article. These files are required for the peer review process and must be received before a manuscript can be accepted.
All of the figures displayed in the text should be as simple as possible while maintaining clarity.
Figures should be centered and should include an explanatory caption placed underneath.
Each figure should be located in the text soon after its first mention in the manuscript.
Figures should have no frames or borders.
3.5.2 Format for Figures
Figures should be in the form of either a TIFF file without layers or a JPEG file (but only if the image was originally saved as the highest possible quality JPEG).
Figures may be supplied as separate JPEG files if the authors are unable to include them with the text.
All other formats, including BMP, GIF, PCT, PNG, and low-quality JPEG files, are unacceptable.
Figures should be neither stretched nor distorted but in their original dimensions.
Photoshsop, Powerpoint, MS Word, or similar software should not be used to export or alter the color or appearance of figures.
3.5.3 Dimensions of Figures
Images and figures are measured in centimeters or inches. Figures should measure 17 cm (6.70 in) wide by 20 cm (7.87 in) high.
Any excess white space surrounding a figure should be removed before calculating its size.
If a figure is wider than 17 cm (6.70 in), it should be divided into two or more separate and clearly labeled parts.
3.5.4 Quality of Images
Images must be clear, high-contrast, and clearly legible at the size in which they are to appear in the journal.
The resolution of images should be at least 300 dpi.
Any low-resolution figures must be re-created from scratch.
3.5.5 Multi-Panel Figures
Each panel of a multi-panel figure (referred to as, e.g., Figs. 1A, 1B, 1C, and 1D in the text) should be logically connected to the other panels, and all of the panels should be assembled into a single file on a single page. Images that contain large amounts of information should be broken down into multiple figures to ensure that all of the information is visible. To repeat, multiple panels must be assembled and submitted as a single file rather than as separate files.
3.5.6 Color Mode
RGB (8 bit/channel), CMYK, or greyscale mode are acceptable.
3.5.7 Labels for Figures
The font size for labels should be at least 8-point and no larger than the font size of the main text.
All labels should be in black font.
Figure labels must be proportionate to the image in size and sharp and legible in appearance.
Labels must be in standard fonts (Arial, Helvetica, or Symbol) and use the same font style and size across all of the figures in a paper.
Labels should not overlap or appear faded, disjointed, or distorted.
The letters of labels must not overlap, feature unnecessary gaps or irregular spacing, or appear condensed, expanded, or otherwise distorted either horizontally or vertically.
The sublabels for panels (again, referred to as, e.g., Fig. 1A, 1B, 1C, and 1D in the text) should be placed in the top left-hand corner of the panels and contrast clearly with the background. Note that each panel should be labeled with only a letter (e.g., A, B, C, and D—not 1A, 1B, 1C, and 1D).
3.5.8 Captions for Figures
Figures should have explanatory captions that do not repeat information that already appears in the main text.
The caption should appear directly after the title of the figure to which it belongs. Any credits should appear at the end of the caption or legend.
Captions should not be included as part of the figure files or submitted as a separate document.
The captions should be numbered consecutively using Arabic numbers.
A one-line caption should be centered in the column, e.g., Figure 1: The text caption …
A caption of more than one line should be justified.
The first letter of each sentence must be capitalized (not each word).
3.5.9 In-Text Citation of Figures
In the main text, when referring to figures, use “Fig.” or “Figs.” followed by a space and the appropriate number (e.g., “Fig. 1,” “Figs. 1A and 1B,” “Fig. 2,” “Fig. 3”).
Cite figures (as well as text boxes and tables) in ascending numerical order as each first appears in the manuscript. In the published article, the figures are inserted based on the placement of the first citation and caption.
The lettered subpanels of whole figures may be cited in any order in the text following the first mention of each whole figure in numerical order. For example, any subpart of Fig. 3 may be cited in any order (e.g., Fig. 3C before Fig. 3A) provided that Figs. 1 and 2 have already been cited.
3.5.10 Copyright of Figures
If a figure or table has been published previously—even by an author of the manuscript being submitted for review—the copyright holder’s written acknowledgment and permission for its reuse are often required.
For any figures (or tables) that contain data from a public database (e.g., Gene Ontology/KEGG), the source should be cited in the caption, legend, or title explicitly. For publicly available DNA sequences, the accession number should be provided.
3.5.11 Images of Gels and Blots
Images of gels and blots in figures should not be over cropped around the bands of interest. Rather, figure panels should include some background area above and below bands. Any non-specific bands from the original image should be included in the figure and explained in the text or figure caption or legend.
When a comparative analysis of bands is presented, all of the relevant samples should be run on the same gel/blot.
Each figure should include all of the relevant controls, and, when appropriate, control samples should be run on the same blot or gel alongside the experimental samples.
A figure panel should not include composite images of bands originating from multiple blots, exposures, or gels. If data from multiple blot or gel images are necessary to illustrate the results, the various images should be clearly distinguished as separate panels within the figure (not spliced together), and the caption or legend should make clear that multiple gels, blots, or exposures are being presented.
Any rearrangement of lanes from a single blot/gel image during the preparation of a figure as well as any image splicing should be clearly indicated with vertical black lines on the figure, and the caption or legend should explain how the figure was made. The addition of the lines would be appropriate, for example, when fragments of the same original image have been spliced together to re-order lanes or to remove irrelevant lanes.
Quantitative comparison of samples across multiple gels/blots is strongly discouraged. If such comparison is unavoidable, the figure legend must state whether the samples derive from the same experiment or parallel experiments and whether the gels/blots were processed in parallel.
The rearrangement of lanes that are non-adjacent in a gel must be clearly indicated in a manner that delineates the boundary between the lanes and should be acknowledged in the figure caption or legend.
Loading controls (e.g., GAPDH, actin) must be run on the same blot. When sample processing controls are run on different gels, this fact must be acknowledged in the caption or legend. Any cropped images of gels must retain all of the important bands.
High-contrast gels and blots are discouraged because overexposure may mask additional bands.
Authors should take care to (1) check figures for duplications, (2) check blots and gels for the splicing of lanes, (3) indicate whether panels show sample processing or loading controls, and (4) ensure that the unprocessed scans provided match the figures.
3.5.12 Figure Samples
From:
Song, Q., Zhang, J., Zhang, Q., Liu, J., Lv, K. et al. (2020). Exosomes derived from circBCRC-3-knockdown mesenchymal stem cells promoted macrophage polarization. BIOCELL, 44(4), 623–629.
Figure 1: Identification of circBCRC-3 in MSCs. A. The genomic structure indicates that circular RNA BCRC-3 consists of nine exons (1,002 bp) from the PSMD1 gene. B. Agarose gel electrophoresis analysis of PCR product with divergent and convergent primers of circBCRC-3 in cDNA and gDNA. GAPDH was used as the negative control.
From:
Zhang, J., Huang, Y., Liu, W., Li, L., Chen, L. (2020). Chaperone-mediated autophagy targeting chimeras (CMATAC) for the degradation of ERα in breast cancer. BIOCELL, 44(4), 591–595.
Figure 2: The binding of peptide αI to ERα. (A) Design TAT-αI-CTM and TAT-αI peptides. (B) Production of GST and GST-TAT-αI using an E. coli expression system. Coomassie blue staining after SDS-PAGE assessed their purity. (C) Pull-down of TAT-αI and ERα. HEK 293T cells were transiently transfected with plasmids pEGFP-N2-ERα. 48 h after transfection, cell lysates were subjected to GST pull down, and the pull-down fractions were immunoblotted analyzed. (D) Pull-down of TAT-αI and ERα in ERα-positive breast cancer cell lines, MCF-7 and T47D.
From:
Fu, S., Yun, T., Ma, D., Zheng, B., Jiang, D. et al. (2021). Thylakoid Transit Peptide Is Related to the Expression and Localization of NdhB Subunits in Soybean. Phyton-International Journal of Experimental Botany, 90(1), 99–110.
Figure 3: Comparisons of sizes, relative abundance of mRNA and protein, and immunolocalization for NdhB subunits in Melrose and S111-9. (A) Sizes of NdhB subunits were analyzed by SDS-PAGE. NdhB proteins were isolated and purified from the leaves of Melrose and S111-9 extracted with Crosslink IP Kit. (B) Relative mRNA expression level of ndhB in Melrose and S111-9. Bars represent the mean ± SD of three biological replicates. Student t-test was applied to assess difference of means between two varieties. Different letters indicate a significant difference between varieties (P < 0.05). (C) The content of NdhB were analyzed using western blotting in the leaves of Melrose and S111-9. The equal loading of lower pictures is shown by coomassie staining. (D) Immunolocalization of NdhB subunits in S111-9 (a,b) and Melrose (c,d). All immunogold particles were mainly concentrated in chloroplast, not in the cytosol. T, Thylakoid; S, Cytosol Stroma. Scale bars = 0.2 μm.
From
Yang, Y., Xu, K., Zhao, B., Liu, N., Zhou, J. (2021). The Bacteria Absorption-based Yolk-Shell Ni3P-Carbon @ Reduced Graphene Oxides for Lithium-Ion Batteries. Journal of Renewable Materials, DOI: 10.32604/jrm.2021.014525.
Figure 1: Schematic diagram of material synthesis process (a, b, c) and XRD pattern of the NPC @ RGO (d).
3.5.13 Tables
Tables should be placed in the text after the point where they are referenced, and should be consistent with the main text.
Tables should be centered and should have a title placed above.
Table titles must be numbered consecutively using Arabic numbers.
One-line table title should be centered and multiple-line title should use justified alignment.
Use Times New Roman, font size smaller than 12 for table titles.
Titles should be centered in the format “Table 1: The text …”, e.g., Table. 1.
Table notes should be aligned with the left table frame.
Where reference the Tables, please use abbreviation “Table.”. followed by the number, e.g., Table. 1.
Table 1: Table caption
1 | 2 | 3 |
11 | 12 | 13 |
21 | 22 | 23 |
3.6 Equations and Mathematical Expressions
3.6.1 In-line Style
In-line equations/expressions are embedded in paragraphs of the text. For example, E = mc2.
In-line equations/expressions should not be numbered.
In-line equations/expressions should be use as same/similar size font as the main text.
3.6.2 Display Style
Equations in display format are separated from the paragraphs of text.
Equations should be flushed to the left margin of the column.
Equations should be editable.
Equations should be numbered consecutively using Arabic numbers. See Eq. (1) for an example. The number should be right aligned.
E = mc2 (1)
3.7 In-Text Citations
Please cite references by number in square brackets in the main text, e.g., [1], [2], [3]…
If the cited references are consecutive more than 2, please see the example, [1–3], [4–6].
No citation to the page number should be used.
Citation to the figures should be in Section 5.1. Citation to the tables should be in Section 5.3.
3.8 References
Manuscripts are prepared according to the Vancouver reference style. The in-text citation is placed immediately after the text which refers to the source being cited:
Using square brackets: as one author has put it “the darkest days were still ahead” [1].
All references should be listed at the end of the manuscript. When the number of authors is six or fewer, please include all their names. If there are more than six authors, list the first six authors' names and use et al. to denote the remaining authors. The journal title should be an abbreviation. After the journal abbreviation, include the publication year, volume number (issue number), and page number. For example: N Engl J Med. 2002;347(4):284-7
Reference Examples
Reference of a book:
Author AA. Title. Publisher Location: Publisher; Year.
1. Murray PR, Rosenthal KS, Kobayashi GS, Pfaller MA. Medical microbiology. 4th ed. St. Louis: Mosby; 2002.
Reference of a book (works in non-English languages):
Author AA. English Title. Publisher Location: Publisher; Year (In original language).
1. Zhou CH, Luo JC. Geo–Computing of high resolution satellite remote sensing images. China: Science Press; 2009. p. 1–3 (In Chinese).
Reference of a book chapter:
Author AA. Chapter title. In: Authors. Title. Publisher Location: Publisher; Year. Page.
1. Meltzer PS, Kallioniemi A, Trent JM. Chromosome alterations in human solid tumors. In: Vogelstein B, Kinzler KW, editors. The genetic basis of human cancer. New York: McGraw-Hill; 2002. p. 93–113.
Reference of a journal article:
Author AA. Title. Journal Name(abbreviation). Year Published; volume number(issue number):page number.
When the number of authors is six or fewer, please include all their names. If there are more than six authors, list the first six authors' names and use et al. to denote the remaining authors. (See example 2).
1. Halpern SD, Ubel PA, Caplan AL. Solid-organ transplantation in HIV-infected patients. N Engl J Med. 2002;347(4):284–7.
2. Hallal AH, Amortegui JD, Jeroukhimov IM, Casillas J, Schulman CI, Manning RJ, et al. Magnetic resonance cholangiopancreatography accurately detects common bile duct stones in resolving gallstone pancreatitis. J Am Coll Surg. 2005;200(6):869–75.
3. Kanneganti P, Harris JD, Brophy RH, Carey JL, Lattermann C, Flanigan DC. The effect of smoking on ligament and cartilage surgery in the knee: a systematic review. Am J Sports Med. 2012;40(12):2872–8. Available from: http://ajs.sagepub.com/content/40/12/2872 doi: 10.1177/03635465124582236.
Reference of an online source:
Author AA. Title. URL. [Year Published].
1. Atluri SN. The meshless method (MLPG) for domain & BIE discretizations. Available from: http://www.techscience.com/info/mlpg_atluri. [Accessed 2004].
Reference of a thesis:
Author AA. Title (Level). Institution Name: Location; Year Published.
1. Darius H. Savant syndrome-theories and empirical findings (Ph.D. Thesis). University of Turku: Finland; 2014.
Reference of conference:
Author AA. Title. In: Conference Name, Year Published; Location.
1. Howe B, Lee P, Grechkin M, Yang ST, West JD. Deep mapping of the visual literature. In: Proceedings of the 26th International Conference on World Wide Web Companion; 2017 Apr 3–7; Perth, Australia. Geneva; International World Wide Web Conferences Steering Committee; 2017 [cited 2021 Aug 12]; p. 1273–7. Available from: ACM Digital Library doi:10.1145/3041021.3053065
Reference of government reports:
Author AA, Author BB. Title of report. Place of publication: Publisher; Date of publication. Total number of pages. Report No.:
1. Rowe IL, Carson NE. Medical manpower in Victoria. East Bentleigh (AU): Monash University, Department of Community Practice; 1981. 35 p. Report No.: 4.
4 Declarations
Submitted manuscripts should, where appropriate, contain the following parts right before the list of references:
Acknowledgement: This section is intended for acknowledging any support not covered under the author contributions or funding sections. This may include administrative and technical assistance, as well as in-kind contributions such as materials or equipment provided for the research. Please be aware that the specific funding grant number should only appear in the Funding Statement. In the event that the authors have no acknowledgments to make, kindly include the term "None" in this section to indicate its absence.
Funding Statement: Authors should describe sources of funding that have supported the work, including specific grant numbers, initials of authors who received the grant, and the URLs to sponsors’ websites: “This research was funded by Name of Funder, grant number xxx” or “The APC was funded by xxx”. If there is no funding support, please write “The author(s) received no specific funding for this study”.
Author Contributions: The Author Contributions statement is mandatory. It should represent all the authors and is to be included upon submission. It can be up to several sentences long and should briefly describe the tasks of individual authors. All listed authors should have substantially contributed to the manuscript and have approved the final submitted version, which should include a description of each author’s specific work and contribution.
We suggest the following format for the contribution statement (Please provide the full names of authors when listing their contributions):
The authors confirm contribution to the paper as follows: study conception and design: Firstname Lastname1, Firstname Lastname2; data collection: Firstname Lastname1; analysis and interpretation of results: Firstname Lastname1, Firstname Lastname2, Firstname Lastname3; draft manuscript preparation: Firstname Lastname2, Firstname Lastname3. All authors reviewed the results and approved the final version of the manuscript.
Availability of Data and Materials: This statement should make clear how readers can access the data used in the study and explain why any unavailable data cannot be released.
You can take one of the following forms:
a. The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available in the [NAME] repository, [PERSISTENT WEB LINK TO DATASETS].
b. The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
c. All data generated or analyzed during this study are included in this published article (and its supplementary information files).
d. The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are not publicly available due to [REASON(S) WHY DATA ARE NOT PUBLIC] but are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
e. Data sharing not applicable to this article as no datasets were generated or analyzed during the current study.
f. The data that support the findings of this study are available from [THIRD PARTY NAME] but restrictions apply to the availability of these data, which were used under license for the current study, and so are not publicly available. Data are however available from the authors upon reasonable request and with permission of [THIRD PARTY NAME].
Ethics Approval: Guidelines for ethical approval statements may differ based on the journal, a standard ethical approval statement will usually include:
1. Whether or not the study included human or animal subjects. In all cases, the ethical approval status of the work should be stated in the ethical approval statement.
2. The committee which approved the study.
3. The compliance documents. What policies, declarations, acts, etc.
4. Persistent identifier: reference or approval number. Include the registration ID/reference number if applicable.
5. “Not applicable.” for studies not involving humans or animals.
Conflicts of Interest: Declare conflicts of interest or state “The authors declare no conflicts of interest to report regarding the present study/The author declares no conflicts of interest to report regarding the present study.”.
Supplementary Materials: Supplementary Materials should be uploaded separately on submission. The supplementary files will also be available to the referees as part of the peer-review process. Any file format is acceptable; however, we recommend that common, non-proprietary formats are used where possible.
Supplementary materials should be clean, without tracked changes, highlights, comments or line numbers.
Supplementary figures must be clear and readable, and we recommend a minimum resolution of 300 dpi, figure legends must be clear and accurate.
Supplementary materials must be mentioned in the main text. The citation format of Supplementary Figure, Table, Equation, etc., should start with a prefix S (i.e., Fig. S1, Eq. (S2), Table S1, etc.).
5. Research and Supplementary Materials
In addition to the data, computer code, and research materials transparency guidelines, TSP encourages authors to provide supplementary materials that complement their main articles and enhance the readers' understanding of the research. These supplementary materials may include additional data, figures, tables, multimedia content, or relevant information.
5.1 Supplementary Materials Submission: Authors should submit supplementary materials along with their main article during the manuscript submission process. These materials should be in a separate section and clearly labeled as "Supplementary Materials."
5.2 Content Relevance: All supplementary materials should be directly relevant to the main research article and provide valuable additional insights or data that support or expand upon the article's findings. Supplementary materials should not duplicate information already presented in the main text.
5.3 File Formats: Supplementary materials can be submitted in various formats, such as Word, PDF, Excel, CSV, images (JPEG or PNG), audio (MP3), video (MP4), or any other appropriate format for the content type.
5.4 Supplementary Data: Authors can provide raw data or additional data that support the article's findings but are not included in the main text due to space constraints. Data should be well-organized, properly labeled, and accompanied by clear explanations of the data's context and significance.
5.5 Supplementary Figures and Tables: Authors may include extra figures or tables that complement those in the main article. These should be numbered separately (e.g., Supplementary Figure S1, Supplementary Table S1) and referred to in the main text.
6 Data Sharing
Researchers share their data so that other researchers can replicate and build on their published claims. We encourage authors to share the data described and discussed in their articles. Research data can be uploaded to repositories and the access information provided in a published article or appended to the article in supplementary files. Any restrictions on the availability of research materials or information must be disclosed to the editors directly at the time of submission and in the submitted manuscript.
6.1 Reporting Requirements for Research in the Life Sciences, Behavioral and Social Sciences, and Ecology, Evolution, and Environmental Sciences
Authors of research articles in the life sciences, behavioral and social sciences, and ecology, evolution, and environmental sciences may be required to make available details about aspects of experimental and analytical design to the editors and reviewers for the purpose of assessing the manuscript.
7 Chemical Compounds
Chemical and Chemical Nomenclature and Abbreviations
Authors should provide the exact structure of the chemical compound, and if there are appeared as new chemical compounds, authors should submit the small-molecule crystallographic data to the Cambridge Structural Database (CSD) and deposit relevant information to PubChem. The final version of the manuscript should contain the accession codes. When possible, authors should use systematic nomenclature to identify chemical compounds, and biomolecules using IUPAC is preferred. Standard chemical and chemical abbreviations should be used. Chemical structures should be included as high-resolution files according to Cell Press Figure Guidelines.
Combinatorial Compound Libraries
The authors should include standard characterization data for a diverse panel of library components when describing the preparation of combinatorial libraries in the manuscript.
Chemical Structures for Organic and Organometallic Compounds
Chemical structures for organic and organometallic compounds should be established through spectroscopic analysis. The authors should provide standard peak listings for both 1H NMR and proton-decoupled 13C NMR for all new compounds. Other NMR data, when appropriate, such as 31P NMR, 19F NMR, etc. should be reported. For the identification of functional groups, both UV and IR spectral data should be reported when appropriate. For crystalline materials, melting-point ranges should be included. For the analysis of chiral compounds, specific rotations should be reported. For known compounds, authors should provide detailed references.
Spectral Data
Detailed spectral data for new compounds should be provided in the Materials and methods section. The authors should explain how specific, unambiguous NMR assignments were made in the Materials and methods section.
Crystallographic Data for Small Molecules
For crystallographic data for small molecules, authors should provide a standard crystallographic information file (CIF) and a structural figure with probability ellipsoids. The authors should check the CIF using the International Union of Crystallography (IUCr) checkCIF. For the structure, the structure factors must be included either in the main CIF or in a separate CIF. Crystallographic data for small molecules should be submitted to the Cambridge Crystallographic Data Centre (CCDC), and the accession number must be referenced in the manuscript.
Biomolecular Materials
Manuscripts reporting new biomolecular structures should contain a table summarizing structural and refinement statistics. If suitable, high-field NMR or X-ray crystallography may also be used. For new biopolymeric materials (e.g., oligosaccharides, peptides, nucleic acids, etc.), if it is not possible for structural analysis by NMR spectroscopic methods. Authors must provide evidence of the identity based on sequence (when appropriate) and mass spectral characterization.
Biological Constructs
Authors should provide sequencing or functional data that validates the identity of their biological constructs (plasmids, fusion proteins, site-directed mutants) upon request.
Polymers
For new materials, as well as 1H NMR and 13C NMR, the mass spectral analysis should be used to support the identification of molecular weight. Ideally, high-resolution mass spectral (HRMS) data are preferred.
Nanomaterials
The authors must provide a detailed characterization of both individual objects and bulk composition.
8 Data Sharing and Deposition
8.1 Data Availability Statement: At Tech Science Press, we value open scientific exchange and believe in promoting transparency and reproducibility in research. We encourage Authors to submit to TSP journals to include a Data Availability Statement in their manuscripts. This statement should provide information about the availability of the research data and any restrictions or conditions associated with accessing it.
8.1.1 Data sharing may be inappropriate when ethical, legal, or privacy considerations arise. In such cases, authors must clearly outline any limitations in the Data Availability Statement during manuscript submission. It is the author's responsibility to ensure that any shared data adhere to the consent obtained from participants regarding the use of confidential information.
8.1.2 Data Repositories: Authors are strongly encouraged to deposit their research data in reputable and discipline-specific data repositories. Preferred data repositories should be recognized and indexed by organizations like DataCite, re3data, or other relevant repositories in their respective fields.
8.1.3 Data Citation: Research data should be cited in the main article to give proper credit and acknowledge the efforts of data creators. Authors must properly reference the deposited data in their reference list, including the dataset's persistent identifier (DOI, accession number, etc.).
8.2 Analytic Methods (Code) Transparency
For work where novel computer code was developed, authors should release it either by depositing it in a recognized, public repository such as GitHub or uploading it as supplementary information to the publication. The name, version, corporation and location information for all software used should be clearly indicated. Please include all the parameters used to run software/program analyses.
8.2.1 Code Availability: Authors are strongly encouraged to share the computer code and software used to generate results presented in their articles. The availability of code enhances research reproducibility and allows other researchers to build upon the work.
8.2.2 Code Repositories: Authors should deposit their code and software in well-established and reputable code repositories such as GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket, or other relevant platforms. Providing a link to the code repository should be included in the Data Availability Statement.
8.2.3 Code Documentation: Authors must ensure that the deposited code is well-documented, readable, and easy to understand. Sufficient comments and explanations should be provided within the code to facilitate its usage by others.
8.2.4 Citation: Authors must provide a citation for the code in the article's reference list. Include the code's persistent identifier (e.g., DOI or URL) to facilitate proper acknowledgment and citation by other researchers.
8.3 Data Deposition and Suggested Repositories
Prior to manuscript submission, please choose the appropriate repository, below are recommended data repositories for your research:
Dataverse, Dryad, figshare, GigaScience, Mendeley Data, Zenodo
You may also visit DataCite, re3data to identify registered data repositories for your data sharing.
For journals with health research subjects, the deposition of sequence information to the community-endorsed, public repository is necessary. Accession numbers and other relevant, unique identifiers provided by the database should be included in the submitted manuscript.
DNA and RNA Sequences: Genbank, European Nucleotide Archive (ENA), DDBJ, Protein DataBank, UniProt
DNA Sequencing Data: GEO, ArrayExpress, NCBI Trace and Short-Read Archive, ENA's Sequence Read Archive
New microarray (Data must be MIAME compliant, as described at the MGED website specifying microarray standards): Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO), ArrayExpress. Genetic polymorphisms: dbSNP, dbVAR
Linked genotype and phenotype data: dbGAP, European Genome-phenome Archive (EGA)
Protein sequences: UniProt (submission tool SPIN). Flow cytometry: FlowRepository
Chemical Compound Screening and Assay Data: PubChem
9 Suggesting Reviewers
Authors are welcome and encouraged to suggest reviewers when they submit their manuscripts by using the submission system. Authors should make sure they are totally independent and without conflicts of interest in any way. When suggesting reviewers, the Corresponding Author must provide an institutional email address for each suggested reviewer.
10 English Editing Service
Clear and concise language enables both the journal editors and reviewers to concentrate on the scientific content of your manuscript. In order to facilitate a proper peer review process and ensure that submissions are judged exclusively on academic merit, PHYTON strongly encourages authors to prepare the language of their manuscripts with the utmost care. The use of the recommended language polishing service on your manuscript does not indicate the acceptance of your manuscript for publication in PHYTON.
If you are an author whose native language is not English—or you have any concerns regarding the language quality of your manuscript—we recommend having your manuscript professionally edited by a qualified English-speaking researcher in your field prior to submission.
Tech Science Press offers paid language editing services, or you may choose to use an alternative service that provides a confirmation certificate.
11.1 Authorship
Tech Science Press follows the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) guidelines regarding authorship and contributions. Authorship should be based on the following 4 criteria:
Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; AND
Drafting the work or reviewing it critically for important intellectual content; AND
Final approval of the version to be published; AND
Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.
All those designated as authors should meet all four criteria for authorship, and those who do not meet all four criteria should be acknowledged in the acknowledgement section.
The corresponding author is the one individual who takes primary responsibility for communication with the journal during the manuscript submission, peer-review, and publication process. The corresponding author typically ensures that all the journal’s administrative requirements, such as providing details of authorship, ethics committee approval, clinical trial registration documentation, and disclosures of relationships and activities are properly completed and reported, although these duties may be delegated to one or more co-authors. The corresponding author should be available throughout the submission and peer-review process to respond to editorial queries in a timely way, and should be available after publication to respond to critiques of the work and cooperate with any requests from the journal for data or additional information should questions about the paper arise after publication.
When the work has to be conducted by a large multi-author group, it is advised that the list of authors be decided before the work starts and confirmed before the manuscript submission. All members of that group listed as authors should have met all the above four criteria for authorship with final approval of the manuscript, and should be able to take public responsibility for the work with full confidence in the accuracy and integrity of the work of all group authors. As such, they will be required as individuals to complete conflict-of-interest disclosure forms.
Submissions by any individual other than one of the listed authors will strictly not be considered. All authors will take responsibility for the content of the manuscript they submitted, and ensure they are familiar with the other authors individual contribution.
11.2 Non-author Contributor
Contributors who meet fewer than all 4 of the above criteria for authorship should not be listed as authors, but they should be acknowledged. Examples of activities that alone (without other contributions) do not qualify a contributor for authorship are acquisition of funding; general supervision of a research group or general administrative support; and writing assistance, technical editing, language editing, and proofreading. Those whose contributions do not justify authorship may be acknowledged individually or together as a group under a single heading (e.g. "Clinical Investigators" or "Participating Investigators"), and their contributions should be specified (e.g., "served as scientific advisors," "critically reviewed the study proposal," "collected data," "provided and cared for study patients," "participated in writing or technical editing of the manuscript").
11.3 Alteration to Authorship
Requests made for an authorship change after submission must be made to the editorial office with an explanation for the change, include the signature of all authors, and be submitted by the corresponding author.
TSP places significant importance on maintaining the integrity and transparency of authorship contributions, and TSP journals do not accept any requests to change the first author or corresponding author during any stage of manuscript processing. Any insistence on altering the first author or corresponding author will result in the rejection of the manuscript without further review or consideration.
Please note that if you have changed affiliation during the course of the research, your new affiliation could be acknowledged in a note. TSP does not normally take requests for changes to affiliations after the acceptance of manuscripts.
Authorship issues found after publication may result in a correction. If and when the authors are unable to resolve among themselves an authorship-related dispute, TSP may raise the issue with the authors’ institution(s) and abide by its/their guidelines.
11.4 Authorship Contribution Statement
All listed authors should have substantially contributed to the manuscript and have approved the final submitted version, which should include a description of each author’s specific work and contributorship.
We suggest the following format for the contribution statement (Please provide the full names of authors when listing their contributions):
The authors confirm contribution to the paper as follows: study conception and design: Firstname Lastname1, Firstname Lastname2; data collection: Firstname Lastname1; analysis and interpretation of results: Firstname Lastname1, Firstname Lastname2, Firstname Lastname3; draft manuscript preparation: Firstname Lastname2, Firstname Lastname3. All authors reviewed the results and approved the final version of the manuscript.
11.5 Authorship and the Use of AI or AI-Assisted Technologies
TSP follows the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) position statement when it comes to the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and AI-assisted technology in manuscript preparation. Tools such as ChatGPT and other large language models (LLMs) do not meet authorship criteria and thus cannot be listed as authors on manuscripts.
In situations where AI or AI-assisted tools have been used in the preparation of a manuscript, this must be appropriately declared with sufficient details at submission via the cover letter. Furthermore, authors are required to be transparent about the use of these tools and disclose details of how the AI tool was used within the “Materials and Methods” section, in addition to providing the AI tool’ s product details within the “Acknowledgments” section.
Authors are fully responsible for the originality, validity, and integrity of the content of their manuscript and must ensure that this content complies with all of TSP’s Publication Ethics Policies.
12 Editors and Journal Staff as Authors
In the circumstances where Editors or editorial staff of the journal submit their own studies to the journal, they shall not be involved in the reviewing process, and the review process must be made transparently and rigorously. Submissions authored by editors or editorial staff of the journal will be handled by another editor who has least COIs with the authors to minimize the bias.
13 Conflicts of Interest
Conflicts of interest (COIs, also referred to as “competing interests”) may indicate the potential to influence the validity or objectivity of research. Editors, authors, and reviewers may be involved into COIs, and PHYTON considers it essential to identify and seek to mitigate them so as to ensure the integrity of its role in the dissemination and preservation of knowledge. Failure to declare competing interests may result in decline of a manuscript.
Authors must declare all potential conflicts of interest; if they have none to declare, they should state plainly, “The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest to report regarding the present study”.
In order to limit COIs, all roles involved in the peer-review process must identify and declare any personal circumstances or associations that may be perceived as having such influence and acknowledge all funding sources for the work. However, COI statements relating to public funding sources, such as government agencies and charitable or academic institutions, need not be supplied.
To be specific, PHYTON defines a COI as any relationship that may have an impact on the authors, reviewers, or editors of a manuscript during the peer review process, on the making of editorial decisions, or generally on any stage in the path toward publication.
Thus, COIs may include (but not limited to):
Financial COIs
Stock or share ownership
Patent applications
Research grants
Consultancies
Royalties
Non-financial COIs
Affiliation with the same institution;
Personal relationships, e.g., between thesis advisers and their students, friends, family members, etc.;
Academic relationships, e.g., among co-authors, collaborators, or competitors;
Government employees;
Members of PHYTON editorial board of a TSP journal.
COIs are not considered permanent; such relationships that have ended more than two years prior to the submission of a manuscript need not be identified as sources of potential conflict.
Authors
PHYTON requires a declaration from all authors of a manuscript regarding any potential COIs that could be relevant to the integrity or reliability of the scientific and professional judgment presented therein, as well as that of otherwise unassociated studies in the same journal. Potential conflict, unless already declared, will be held in confidence while the paper is under review. If the article is accepted for publication, the potential conflict of interest will be included in the acknowledgments. If there is, in fact, no conflict of interest, the authors should state plainly.
Reviewers
Reviewers should declare any COIs when they are assigned a manuscript and disclose this information to the editor, who will then assess whether they should proceed with the review process.
Editors
Editors, including Editors-in-Chief, Associate Editors and Guest Editors should be aware of their own potential COIs. If the Editors have authored or coauthored the manuscripts submitted to PHYTON, Editors might be perceived to be influenced by the relationship. PHYTON expects the Editor(s) to declare any COIs or potential COIs.
14 Copyright and Licensing
PHYTON publishes all articles under an open-access license, which means that the articles remain accessible to all without charge and without technical or legal barriers and that they can be reused with proper acknowledgment and citation. Financial support for the open access publication is provided by the authors’ institutions or by research funding agencies in the way of article processing charge (APC) once manuscripts have been accepted. More specifically, PHYTON publishes articles under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) License. PHYTON is committed to open access publishing as a means to foster the exchange of research among scientists, especially across disciplines.
The copyright and other proprietary rights related to papers published by PHYTON are retained by the authors. If the authors reproduce any text, figures, tables, or illustrations from the papers published by PHYTON in their own future research, they must cite the originally published version. They are further asked to inform PHYTON’s editorial office of any exceptional circumstances in this regard at the time of submission, for which exceptions may be granted at the discretion of the publisher.
Articles published in PHYTON are likely to contain material republished with permission under a more restrictive license. When this situation arises, it should be indicated; it is the responsibility of the authors to seek permission for reuse from the copyright holder.
15 Corrections & Retractions
TSP journals will issue corrections, and/or retraction statements, when deemed proper.
Corrections
PHYTON aims to publish every article online in its final form. Upon receiving the proofs of their accepted manuscripts, authors will have an opportunity to check for errors and oversights. Occasionally, a mistake is pointed out in a published article, necessitating the issuance of a correction statement. A correction is a statement rectifying an error or an omission, Authors or readers may submit such a statement either through the journal’s online manuscript submission system (https://www.techscience.com/phyton), or by sending an email, along with the submission ID, to the PHYTON’s editorial office (phyton@techscience.com). A correction notice, published and linked to the corresponding article, is freely accessible to all readers.
When making corrections to the original articles, the original article both in PDF and XML versions are corrected and bi-directionally linked to and from the published amendment notice that details the original error. Any changes made to the original articles affect data in figures, tables or text, the amendment notice will reproduce the original data. If it is not possible to correct the original article in both PDF and XML versions, the article will remain unchanged but will contain links that direct to and from the published correction notice.
Author’s Correction: An Author’s Correction may be published to correct an important error(s) made by the author that affects the scientific integrity of the published article, the publication record, or the reputation of the authors or the journal. The Managing Editor of that manuscript will be responsible for handling the correction process.
Publisher’s Correction: A Publisher’s Correction may be published to correct an important error(s) made by the journal that affects the scientific integrity of the published article, the publication record, or the reputation of the authors or of the journal.
Retractions
A retraction is a notice that a previously published paper should no longer be regarded as part of the published literature. The primary purpose of a retraction is to ensure the integrity and completeness of scholarly records by withdrawing any manuscript which is found to contain infringements of professional ethical codes, major errors, or where its main conclusion is seriously undermined as a result of new evidence coming to light.
Violations of professional ethical codes include multiple submissions without proper citations or permission, redundant publications, fake claims of authorship, plagiarism, fraudulent use of data, etc. Major errors cover any or all miscalculations or experimental errors, intentionally or due to honest mistakes.
The retraction will be referred to the Editors-in-Chief, Associate Editors, and the Managing Editor who have handled the paper. Retracted articles will not be removed from the printed copies of the journal (e.g., from libraries) nor from the electronic archives. Their retracted status will be indicated as clearly as possible. Bibliographic information about the article will be retained to ensure the permanence and integrity of the published scientific record. When an article is retracted, in most of the cases, the original manuscript is corrected and is bi-directionally linked (to and from) the published retraction notice which details the original error. For the purpose of transparency, when corrections made to the original article affect any data, figures, tables or texts, the retraction notice will display the original data alongside the corrected version. When a correction is not possible, all existing versions of the article will remain unchanged but will contain the bi-directional links, to and from, the published retraction notice.
The notice of retraction is permanently linked to its corresponding retracted article and is freely available and accessible by all readers.
Articles may be retracted by their Author(s), by the Journal Editors, or by the Publisher, i.e., Tech Science Press. In all instances, the retraction should indicate the reason for the action as well as the entity behind the decision. A retraction made without the unanimous agreement of the authors is feasible and indicated as such.
Article Withdrawal
Article Withdrawal is only used for articles in press, which represent early versions of articles and sometimes contain errors, or may have been accidentally submitted twice. Occasionally, an articles may contain infringements of professional ethical codes, such as multiple submissions, bogus claims of authorship, plagiarism, and fraudulent use of data or the like. Articles that include errors or are discovered to be accidental duplicates of other published article(s), or are determined to violate our publishing ethics guidelines in the view of the editors (such as multiple submissions, bogus claims of authorship, plagiarism, fraudulent use of data or the like), may be “Withdrawn” by the article author or the journal editor.
Removal of Published Content
Under special circumstances, TSP reserves the right to remove an article, book or other content from TSP’s website and submission system. Such action may be taken when:
There are evidence indicating that the published content is defamatory, infringes on intellectual property rights, privacy rights, other legal rights, or is plainly unlawful;
A court or government order requires removal of such content;
The content, if acted upon, would pose an immediate and serious risks to health. Removal may be temporary or permanent. A statement will be published explaining the decision behind the removal.
Addressing Post-publication Issues
TSP is fully committed to maintaining the integrity and completeness of the scientific record and recognizes its importance to researchers and the academic community at large. As such, TSP will thoroughly investigate concerns that are directly raised with us by authors and/or readers. Authors are strongly encouraged to address any raised issues. In the course of our investigation, we may request original raw data, and consult with experts and other scholars in the field. Depending on the seriousness of the issues, the following outcomes may ensue:
A manuscript still under consideration may be rejected and returned to the author.
A published online article, depending on the nature and severity of the issues, may result in a correction notice or a retraction notice.
Issues deemed to be serious may prompt TSP to inform the authors’ institution and related affiliations.
Our actions are driven by our dedicated aim for transparent notification to our readers and unabated commitment to the integrity of the published record, and not by any motivation to sanction individuals or attribute responsibility to specific named individuals. We may refer readers to the institutional investigations’ reports if they are publicly available. While we are committed to addressing post-publications issues and correcting the record swiftly, investigations typically take some time to reach resolutions given the complexity of the discussions, the diligence in our process and the need to obtain original data and consult with experts. We will issue and regularly update relevant Editor’s Notes and/or Editor’s Expression of Concern as interim notifications to alert our readership of any of concerns with published material.
16 Appeals and Complaints
PHYTON’s appeal and complaint procedures pertain to grievances against editorial decisions, discontent with procedural inaccuracies (such as tardiness in manuscript handling), and complaint regarding publishing ethics.
Queries of appeal and complaint must be accompanied by comprehensive justifications, and authors are requested to submit appeals and complaints in writing to TSP Feedback Center at https://ijs.tspsubmission.com/user/feedback. The editorial office will provide a prompt response upon receipt of a formal appeal or complaint, and endeavor to resolve the matter within a reasonable time frame.
Concerns regarding ethical misconducts may also be reported to TSP’s Editorial Integrity Team (editorial@techscience.com). The Editorial Integrity Team adheres to COPE Core Practices and Guidelines, and subsequently determines a suitable course of action, authorizing editorial offices to furnish the complainant with feedback.
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