Submissions

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Submission Preparation Checklist

As part of the submission process, authors are required to check off their submission's compliance with all of the following items, and submissions may be returned to authors that do not adhere to these guidelines.
  • The submission has not been previously published, nor is it before another journal for consideration (or an explanation has been provided in Comments to the Editor).
  • The submission file is in OpenOffice, Microsoft Word, or RTF document file format.
  • Where available, URLs for the references have been provided.
  • The text is single-spaced; uses a 12-point font; employs italics, rather than underlining (except with URL addresses); and all illustrations, figures, and tables are placed within the text at the appropriate points, rather than at the end.
  • The text adheres to the stylistic and bibliographic requirements outlined in the Author Guidelines.

Author Guidelines

The Journal welcomes the submission of manuscripts that meet the genThe Ambo University Journal of Science & Sustainable Development (JSSD) is an open access peer reviewed journal that provides rapid publication (bi-annually) of articles in all subject areas covering natural and Social Sciences, Agriculture, Technology and art etc. The Journal welcomes the submission of manuscripts that meet the general criteria of significance and scientific excellence.

Submission of Manuscript:

The Journal of Science and Sustainable Development will only accept manuscripts submitted online through article submission portal. Electronic submission of manuscripts is strongly encouraged, provided that the text, tables, and figures are included in a single Microsoft Word file. The submitted manuscript should include all the authors and corresponding author’s full address. Corresponding author must declare that the manuscript submitted is on behalf of all authors and with their consent (See change to authorship). After successful submission of manuscript, acknowledgement shall be made automatically to the corresponding author and a manuscript number will be mailed shortly after.

Article Types:  Three types of manuscripts may be submitted:

Original Articles: These should describe new and carefully confirmed findings, and experimental procedures should be given in sufficient detail for others to verify the work. The length of a full paper should be the minimum required to describe and interpret the work clearly. The original article should not have been previously published and not being considered for publication elsewhere. Papers should be in English and be prepared in A4 (8.27" X 11.69") page size, using standard fonts with size of 12, with double-spacing, and margins of at least 1" (2.5cm) all around. Times New Roman fonts must be used and remain uniform throughout the text. The authors must strictly adhere to the proper format of the Journal in all the manuscript sections. Original articles are limited to 8000 words which may contain a maximum of 6 Tables/Figures with a maximum reference list of 45.

Short Communications: A Short Communication is suitable for recording the results of completed small investigations or giving details of new models or hypotheses, innovative methods, techniques or apparatus. The items of standard manuscript preparation as listed are applicable, though the style of main sections need not conform to that of full-length papers. Abstracts are limited to between 100 and 150 words, results and discussion should be combined into a single section. Short Communications are limited to a maximum of two figures and one table, and to a total of 3000 words without including Figures and Tables. It should be noted that short communication may not be used for preliminary publications of the data; therefore, the same material cannot be published elsewhere as an original paper after it has been published.

Reviews: Submissions of reviews and perspectives covering topics of current interest are welcome and encouraged. Reviews should be concise and no longer than 10000 words with a maximum of 10 Figures/Tables and 100 referances. Reviews are also peer-reviewed. It is expected that review articles would be written by individuals with years of experience and have done substantial work on the subject area being reviewed.

Note that systematic review articles should be submitted as Reviews and meta-analysis should be submitted as Original article.

Review Process:
All manuscripts are reviewed by an editor and members of the Editorial Board or qualified outside reviewers. Authors cannot nominate reviewers. Only reviewers randomly selected from our database with specialization in the subject area will be contacted to evaluate the manuscripts. The process will be double blind review.Decisions will be made as rapidly as possible, and the Journal strives to return reviewers’ comments to authors as soon as possible. The editorial board will re-review manuscripts that are accepted pending revision. It is the goal of the JSSD to publish manuscripts shortly after submission.
 
Original Articles:
All portions of the manuscript must be typed double-spaced and page numbering starts from the title page.The Title should be a brief phrase describing the contents of the paper. The Title Page should include the authors’ full names and affiliations, the name of the corresponding author along with current phone, fax and E-mail information.
 
The Abstract should be informative and completely self-explanatory, briefly present the topic, state the scope of the experiments, indicate significant data, and point out major findings and conclusions. The abstract should be 250 to 300 words in length. Complete sentences, active verbs, and the third person should be used, and the abstract should be written in past tense. Standard nomenclature should be used and abbreviations should be avoided. No literature should be cited. Following the abstract, about 3 to 5 key words that will provide indexing references should be listed. A list of non-standard Abbreviations should be added. In general, non-standard abbreviations should be used only when the full term is very long and used often. Each abbreviation should be spelt out and introduced in parentheses the first time it is used in the text. Only recommended SI units should be used. Standard abbreviations (such as ATP and DNA) need not be defined.
 
The Introduction should provide a clear statement of the problem, the relevant literature on the subject, and the proposed approach or solution. It should be understandable to colleagues from a broad range of scientific disciplines.
 
Materials and Methods should be complete enough based on laid down standard procedures for science, arts, and social research that allow trials/surveys/experiments to be reproduced. Detailed information should be provided on design, sampling population/techniques and data analysis procedure. However, only truly new procedures should be described in detail; previously published procedures should be cited, and important modifications of published procedures should be mentioned briefly. Capitalize trade names and include the manufacturer’s name and address. Subheadings should be used. Methods in general use need not be described in detail.
 
Results should be presented with clarity and precision. The results should be written in the past tense when describing findings in the author(s)’ experiments. Previously published findings should be written in the present tense. Results should be explained, but largely without referring to the literature. Discussion, speculation and detailed interpretation of data should not be included in the results but should be put into the discussion section.
 
The Discussion should interpret the findings in view of the results obtained in this and in past studies on this topic. State the conclusions in a few sentences at the end of the paper. The Results and Discussion sections can include subheadings, and when appropriate, both sections can be combined.

The Acknowledgments of people, grants, funds, etc should be as brief as possible.

Table and Figure legends should be typed in numerical order. Graphics should be prepared using applications capable of generating high resolution GIF, TIFF, JPEG or PowerPoint before pasting in the Microsoft Word manuscript file. Tables should be prepared in Microsoft Word. Use Arabic numerals to designate figures and upper case letters for their parts (Figure 1). Begin each legend with a title and include sufficient description so that the figure is understandable without reading the text of the manuscript. Information given in legends should not be repeated in the text.
 
Notice: Tables, Figures and their legends are preferably to be embedded in the text on appropriate places.
 
References:
In the text, a reference identified by means of an author‘s name should be followed by the date of the reference in parentheses. When there are more than two authors, only the first author‘s name should be mentioned, followed by ’et al‘. In the event that an author cited has two or more works published during the same year, the reference, both in the text and in the reference list, should be identified by a lower case letter ’a‘and ’b‘after the date to distinguish the works.
 
Examples:
  • Abayomi (2000), Agindotan et al., (2003), (Kelebeni, 1983), (Usman and Smith, 1992), (Chege, 1998; Chukwura, 1987a,b; Tijani, 1993,1995), (Kumasi et al., 2001)

References should be listed at the end of the paper in alphabetical order. Articles in preparation or articles submitted for publication, unpublished observations, personal communications, etc. should not be included in the reference list but should only be mentioned in the article text (e.g., A. Kingori, University of Nairobi, Kenya, personal communication). Journal names are abbreviated according to Chemical Abstracts. Authors are fully responsible for the accuracy of the references, while strictly adhering to the APA style of referencing as shown below:

  • Chikere, C. B., Omoni, V. T. and Chikere, B. O. 2008. Distribution of potential nosocomial pathogens in a hospital environment. Afr. J. Biotechnol. 7, 3535-3539.
  • Moran, G. J., Amii, R. N., Abrahamian, F. M., and Talan, D. A. 2005. Methicillinresistant Staphylococcus aureus in community-acquired skin infections. Emerg. Infect. Dis. 11,  928-930.
  • Pitout, J. D. D., Church, D. L., Gregson, D. B., Chow, B. L., McCracken, M., Mulvey, M., Laupland, K. B.  2007. Molecular epidemiology of CTXM-producing Escherichia   coli in the Calgary Health Region: emergence of CTX-M-15-producing isolates. Antimicrob. Agents Chemother. 51, 1281-1286.
  • Pelczar, J. R., Harley, J. P. and Klein, D. A. 1993. Microbiology: Concepts and Applications. McGraw-Hill Inc., New York, pp. 591-603.
Proofs and Reprints:
Electronic proofs will be sent (e-mail attachment) to the corresponding author as a portable document format (PDF) file.  Page proofs are considered to be the final version of the manuscript. With the exception of typographical or minor clerical errors, no major changes will be made on the manuscript at proof stage.  Because Ambo University JSSD will be published freely online to attract a wide audience, authors will have free electronic access to the full text (in PDF) of the article. Authors can freely download the PDF file from which they can print copies of their articles.
 
Change to authorship:
Before an accepted manuscript is published, requests to add or remove an author, or to rearrange the author names, must be sent to the Editor in Chief from the corresponding author of the accepted manuscript and must include: (a) why the name should be added or removed, or the authors names rearranged and (b) written confirmation from all authors showing that they agree with the addition, removal or rearrangement. In the case of addition or removal of an author; this includes confirmation from the author being added or removed. Requests that are not sent by the corresponding author will be forwarded by the Editor in Chief to the corresponding author, who must follow the procedure as described above. The publication of such manuscript on the journal issue shall be suspended until authorship has been agreed.
 
Fees and Charges:
Authors are not required to pay any handling or processing fee to get their article processed.

Copyright Notice

In submitting an article to Journal of Science and Sustainable Development published by Ambo University I certify that:

  1. I am authorized by my co-authors to enter into these arrangements.
  2. I warrant, on behalf of myself and my co-authors, that:
    • the article is original, has not been formally published in any other peer-reviewed journal, is not under consideration by any other journal and does not infringe any existing copyright or any other third party rights;
    • I am/we are the sole author(s) of the article and have full authority to enter into this agreement and in granting rights to Ambo University are not in breach of any other obligation;
    • the article contains nothing that is unlawful, libellous, or which would, if published, constitute a breach of contract or of confidence or of commitment given to secrecy;
    • I/we have taken due care to ensure the integrity of the article. To my/our - and currently accepted scientific - knowledge all statements contained in it purporting to be facts are true and any formula or instruction contained in the article will not, if followed accurately, cause any injury, illness or damage to the user.
  3. I, and all co-authors, agree that the article, if editorially accepted for publication, shall be licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0.

 

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