Electronic manuscripts: Whenever possible, manuscripts should be submitted electronically by email or on disk. Common text processing software (e.g. Microsoft Word) should be used. Files should be saved in a standard format. Figure legends and tables should be listed at the end of the document.

Figures and tables should be saved as separate files. They should NOT be embedded within manuscripts. Figures should be supplied using one of the following formats: .pdf, .eps, .tif, .jpg or .gif

Email your manuscript to: submit@sapienspublishing.com

Your manuscript will be passed to the appropriate editor and you will be advised of its safe receipt. In exceptional circumstances manuscripts may also be submitted to the publishers in paper form by mail – using the Sapiens Publishing email address shown above.

GUIDELINES FOR AUTHORS
All manuscripts submitted for publication should be in English and submitted through the Sapiens website (submit@sapienspublishing.com). Manuscripts may be editorially rejected, without review, on the basis of poor English or lack of conformity to the Guidelines for Authors outlined below.

Copyright: It is a condition of publication that the authors transfer the world copyright of their manuscript to the publishers. All manuscripts should be accompanied by a statement that: the article is original, is not being considered by another publisher, nor has it been previously published elsewhere.

Authors will be entitled to publish parts of their paper elsewhere without permission provided that the usual acknowledgement is given. Illustrations, tables or quotations from other publications are already copyrighted and can only be reproduced with written permission from the copyright owner. You, as author, are responsible for obtaining written permission to reproduce illustrations or tables from another (copyrighted) source.

Authority and responsibility: The intellectual content of the paper is the responsibility of the authors. The Editor and Publishers accept no responsibility for opinions and statements made by the authors. While every effort will be made by the Editor and Publishers to avoid inaccurate and misleading data, they accept no liability whatsoever for the consequences of wrong information.

The authors undertake to keep the Editor and the Publishers fully and effectually indemnified against any liability or claims that may arise out of the publication of inaccurate and/or misleading data.

Type of manuscripts: Manuscripts that contain new and significant findings are welcome. Should any related papers be in press or submitted elsewhere, the authors are requested to give details on submission. Each manuscript is classified as a Research Paper, Short Research Paper, Short Communication, Review or Book Review.

* Research Papers are full-length articles that contain new and significant findings (5,000–10,000 words).

* Short Research Papers should contain new findings of exceptional interest and novelty (2,000–5,000 words).

* Short Communications should present significant new information to readers in a short but complete form (<3,000 words).

* Reviews are published only after an invitation from the Editors.

* Book Reviews will be included for relevant books that are less than 2 years old.

Submission to this journal proceeds totally on-line. All correspondence, including notification of the Editor's decision, requests for revisions and proofs takes place by email.

Reviewing: The journal will not accept manuscripts that contain purely descriptive information, that are simply confirmatory, or have been published elsewhere. Manuscripts that do not meet the appropriate criteria may be declined without review.

Presentation of manuscripts: Papers should be structured into headed sections: Title page, Summary, Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, Acknowledgements and References. Manuscripts should be double-spaced, with page numbers on every page. Computer formatting (e.g. text in two columns, embedded figures or tables) should NOT be used. Justification should be set to ‘off’ or ‘left margin only’.

On submission of a manuscript, authors may suggest the names and addresses of up to five potential reviewers who have not seen the manuscript before its submission. The Editors are not, however, bound by these suggestions.

MANUSCRIPT PREPARATION

Format

We recommend that authors prepare the text as a Microsoft Word or similar file (.doc). Main text, figure legends and tables should be provided in DOC or RTF format using the same font throughout.

Do not use the space bar to make indents, where these are required use the TAB key.

To avoid unnecessary errors you are strongly advised to use the 'spellchecker' function of your word processor.

Abbreviations: Words or phrases that are abbreviated should be written out in full the first time that they appear in the text, with each abbreviated form in parenthesis.

Name, address and email for the corresponding author.

Summary should be less than 250 words for a full paper, and up to 100 words for a Short Communication.

Headings

Materials and Methods must be described completely enough to replicate results and verify claims. Statistical analysis must explain the methods used. Define all statistical measures and models clearly. Identify the number of independent replications and the number of times individual experiments were repeated.

Tables: should be prepared in Word and should be numbered consecutively with Arabic numerals. Each table should be prepared on a separate page. Use Word's ‘create table’ feature, not tabbed text with spaces and lines. All Tables should be referred to in the text. Notes to explain Table contents should be below the Table, accompanied by superscript letters, if required.

Figures and Illustrations: Submit original figures that are reasonably sized and laid out. Figures will normally have to be reduced to fit the printed page. Please ensure that lettering is of a suitable size to allow for reduction. Each figure legend should appear below its corresponding figure and should be in Word. Figures should provide enough information so that the reader can understand them without significant additional text. Line drawings must be clear, with high black and white contrast. TIFF, EPS or Word files are preferable.

Embedded Figures are not accepted. Figures submitted in colour will be printed in colour at the authors’ expense.

Style: Units of measurement should follow the Systeme International d’Inités (SI units). Use negative exponents to indicate units in the denominator when three or more units are used (e.g. µmol m^-2 s^-1 rather than µmol/m²/s). Standard abbreviations, symbols and acronyms should be used throughout. Single quotation marks are preferred. Equations should be numbered serially at the right-hand side in parentheses. Footnotes should only be used if absolutely essential. In most cases it should be possible to incorporate the information in the normal text.

The Editor reserves the right to alter manuscripts whenever necessary to make them conform to the stylistic and bibliographic conventions of the journal.

Numbers and fractions: Write out numerals one through nine, except when used with units of measure. Write out all numbers or fractions that begin a sentence. Decimals are preferred over fractions; however, when simple fractions are used, write them out, e.g. ‘three-quarters’. For decimals smaller than one, insert a zero before the decimal point: 0.379. To avoid numbers with many digits, use powers of 10.

References. Literature citations in the text should be made by author name(s) and year (e.g. Smith 1999; Smith and Jones 2005). For references with more than two authors, use the name of the first author followed by 'et al.' The list of references should be arranged alphabetically on authors' names, and chronologically per author. In the case of publications in any language other than English, a notation such as ‘(in Russian)’ or ’(in Chinese, with English abstract)’ should be added. The digital object identifier (DOI) may be used to cite and link to electronic documents.

Journal article; one author: Daly HE. Towards some operational principles of sustainable development. Ecological Economics 1990;2:1-6

Journal article; two or more authors: Webb LJ, Tracey JG, Williams WT and Lance GN. Prediction of agricultural potential from intact forest vegetation. Journal of Applied Ecology 1971;8:99-121

Book, numbered edition: Burns W. Noise and Man. 2nd ed. London: Illiffe Books; 1973

Article in numbered congress; volume number: Hatano T and Tsutsumi H. Dynamical compressive deformation and failure of concrete under earthquake load. In: 2nd World Congress on Earthquake Engineering. Tokyo: Science Council of Japan; 1960:3:1963-78

Paper presented: Eaton KH, Mayne JR and Menzies JB. Wind pressures on low-rise buildings at Aylesbury. Presented at the Symposium on Full-scale Fluid Dynamic Measurements. 1974; Leicester, UK

In press: Arthur S. Species diversity and economics. Environmental Conservation 2004; in press

Book: Whittaker RH. Communities and Ecosystems. New York: Macmillan; 1970:19-26

Article in an edited book: Childe VG. Early forms of society. In: Slinger CJ, Holonyard EJ and Hall AR, eds. A History of Technology. New York: Oxford University Press; 1954:19-26

Acknowledgements: The scientific and material contributions of others to the work should be acknowledged. Any grant support should be listed and permission for reproduction of published material acknowledged.

Reviewing. You will receive an email with the reviewers’ comments. Please revise your manuscript accordingly. If necessary, prepare a cover letter containing point-by-point responses to the reviewers' comments.

Proof reading. Authors are responsible for reading page proofs and correcting typographical errors. One set of proofs in PDF format will be sent by email to the corresponding author. If you do not wish to use the PDF annotations function, you may list the corrections by page, column and line, and return them by email. Major changes from the manuscript should be avoided, but if made, they will be sent to the Editor for subsequent instructions. Authors will be asked to defray the expense of any major alterations to the proofs that are departures from the original copy.