Instructions for Authors

Shortcuts

• Manuscript Submission Overview
• Manuscript Preparation
• Conflict of Interests
• Research and Publication Ethics
• Authorship
• Reviewer Suggestions
• Editorial Procedures and Peer-Review
• Privacy Statement

There is no fee to publish an article in the journal.

Submission Checklist

Please:

1. read the Aims & Scope to gain an overview and assess if your manuscript is suitable for this journal;
2. make sure that issues about publication ethics, research ethics, authorship have been appropriately considered;
3. Ensure that all authors have approved the content of the submitted manuscript.

Manuscript Submission Overview

Types of Publications

Limnology and Freshwater Biology has no restrictions on the length of manuscripts, provided that the text is concise and comprehensive.

Manuscripts submitted to Limnology and Freshwater Biology should neither be published previously nor be under consideration for publication in another journal. The main article types are as follows:

• Articles: Original research manuscripts. The journal considers all original research manuscripts provided that the work reports scientifically sound experiments and provides a substantial amount of new information.
• Reviews: These provide concise and precise updates on the latest progress made in a given area of research.
• Short communications: Original research manuscripts which do not exceed 4 pages.

Submission Process

Manuscripts for Limnology and Freshwater Biology should be submitted online at limnolfwbiol.com. The submitting author, who is generally the corresponding author, is responsible for the manuscript during the submission and peer-review process. The submitting author must ensure that all eligible co-authors have been included in the author list (read the criteria to qualify for authorship) and that they have all read and approved the submitted version of the manuscript.

Accepted File Formats

Accepted file formats are:

• Manuscript: Manuscripts (.doc, .pdf or .rtf) must be converted into a single file before submission. Please insert your graphics (schemes, figures, etc.) and tables in the main text after the paragraph of its first citation.
• Supplementary files: May be any format, but it is recommended that you use common, non-proprietary formats where possible (.tiff, .png, .bmp, .pdf, etc.).

General Structure of the Manuscript

• The text of the manuscript should be divided into sections: Abstract, Introduction, Materials and methods, Results, Discussion, Conclusions, Acknowledgments, Conflict of interests and References.
• If necessary, you can merge the sections as Results and discussion or Discussion and сonclusions.
• Abstract and keywords are mandatory elements of the manuscript.
• Manuscripts should be written in English.

Manuscript Preparation

The body of the text should be organized as follows: title of the manuscript, author names and affiliations, abstract, keywords, text of the article, figure captions, figures (each in a new page with a caption) and tables. All figures should be also downloaded separately as TIFF or JPG files (with a minimum resolution of 300 dpi) and supplied with a caption in the appropriate fields of the online system. Additionally, the manuscript should be supplied with the approval of all co-authors for publication. Authors are welcome to suggest 2-3 potential reviewers for the manuscript (names and e-mail addresses).

Example of a correct article structure:

• Title of the manuscript
• Surname and name of each author
• Authors' affiliations (full postal address of each affiliation)
• Corresponding author

Lake Baikal's response to remote earthquakes: Lake-level fluctuations and near-bottom water layer temperature change

Granin N.G.^1*, Radziminovich N.A.², De Batist M.³, Makarov M.M.¹, Chechelnitcky V.V.⁴, Blinov V.V.¹, Aslamov I.A.¹, Gnatovsky R.Yu.¹, Poort J.⁵, Psakhie S.G.⁶

¹ Limnological Institute, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Ulan-Batorskaya Str., 3, Irkutsk, 664033, Russia
² Institute of the Earth's Crust, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Lermontov Str., 128, Irkutsk, 664033, Russia
³ Renard Centre of Marine Geology, Department of Geology, Ghent University, Krijgslaan 281 S8, B-9000 Gent, Belgium
⁴ Baikal Division of the Geophysical Survey, Federal Research Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Lermontov Str., 128, Irkutsk, 664033, Russia
⁵ Institut des Sciences de la Terre de Paris (ISTeP), Université Pierre et Marie Curie (UPMC/CNRS), Case Courrier 129 - 4, Place Jussieu, 75252, Paris Cedex 05, France
⁶ Institute of Strength Physics and Materials Science, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, pr. Akademicheskii, 2/4, Tomsk, 634055, Russia

^*Corresponding author. E-mail address: nick@lin.irk.ru (N.G. Granin)

Abstract

The abstract should preferably contain 150 – 300 words briefly reflecting the aim, main results and conclusions of the study. Non-standard or uncommon abbreviations (except for generally accepted abbreviations of measures, physical and mathematical values and terms), as well as references, figures and tables should be avoided.

Keywords

Provide 5-6 words or short word combinations, which can be used for indexing purposes.

Text formatting

Times New Roman 12 pt, single spacing, automatic numbering of pages and lines, indentation 1 cm.

Headings

The numbering of the headings begins with the Introduction section (for example: 1. Introduction, 2. Materials and methods, 3. Results, 3.1. Material composition, 3.2. Distribution, 4. Discussion, 5. Conclusions).

Sections Abstract, Acknowledgements, Conflict of interests, and References must not be numbered.

Each heading should be in bold and begin with a new line without indentation.

Acknowledgments

Place the Acknowledgments section at the end of the article before Conflict of interests section. List in this section individuals, grants, funds, etc. assisting in the research. If necessary, you can fully specify the sponsoring and funding organizations.

Conflict of interests

All authors must disclose all relationships or interests that could inappropriately influence or bias their work. Examples of potential conflicts of interest include but are not limited to financial interests (such as membership, employment, consultancies, stocks/shares ownership, honoraria, grants or other funding, paid expert testimonies and patent-licensing arrangements) and non-financial interests (such as personal or professional relationships, affiliations, personal beliefs).

The corresponding author must include a summary statement in the manuscript in a separate section “Conflicts of Interest” placed just before the reference list. The statement should reflect all the collected potential conflict of interest disclosures in the form.

See below for examples of disclosures:

Conflicts of Interest: Author A has received research grants from Company A. Author B has received a speaker honorarium from Company X and owns stocks in Company Y. Author C has been involved as a consultant and expert witness in Company Z. Author D is the inventor of patent X.

If no conflicts exist, the authors should state:

Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

References

1. References cited in the text must be given in parentheses with the name of the author and comma-separated year of publication. Several references should be ordered chronologically and semicolons-separated. References to the same author published in the same year should be cited with addition of small letters to the year of publication in alphabetical order.

For example:

• The research spans many disciplines (Smith, 1995).
• This result was later supported by Goldman and Petrov (1999).
• We used the method of Zhou et al. (2016) to estimate the timing of the onset of the HO.
• This effect has been widely studied (Jewson et al., 2000a; 2000b; Karlson and Smith, 2005; Firsov et al., 2010).

2. There should be no references to unpublished works, since all works cited must be listed in the References section.

3. References should be arranged in alphabetical order by the name of the first author. Several publications by the same author should be arranged in chronological order. If there are more than three authors, give the names of only the first three followed by ‘et al.’.

4. Titles of non-English publications must be translated, and the original language should be given in parentheses. The names of editions in non-Latin characters without English versions should be transliterated using Latin alphabet and supplied with the translation in brackets. The non-English names of editions in Latin characters should be translated in brackets. Those editions having English version should be cited according to this version.

For example:

Articles (Cite DOI, when available. The name of the journal must be written in full.)

• Koene J.M. 2017. Sex determination and gender expression: reproductive investment in snails. Molecular Reproduction and Development 84: 132-143. DOI: 1002/mrd.22662
• Timoshkin O.A., Moore M.V., Kulikova N.N. et al. 2018. Groundwater contamination by sewage causes benthic algal outbreaks in the littoral zone of Lake Baikal (East Siberia). Journal of Great Lakes Research 44: 230-244. DOI: 10.1016/j.jglr.2018.01.008
• Kenny N., Plese J.B., Riesgo A. et al. 2019. Symbiosis, selection, and novelty: freshwater adaptation in the unique sponges of Lake Baikal. Molecular Biology and Evolution 36(11): 2462-2480. DOI: 10.1093/molbev/msz151
• Kuznetsov S.I. 1951. Comparative characteristics of the biomass of bacteria and phytoplankton in the surface water layer of the Central Baikal. Trudy Baikalskoi limnologicheskoi stantsii AN SSSR [Proceedings of the Baikal Limnological Station of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR] 13: 217-225. (in Russian)
• Cholodny N. 1929. Methodology of quantitative research of bacterial plankton. Zentralblatt fur Bakteriologie, Parasitenkunde, Infektionskrankheiten und Hygiene A [Central Journal of Bacteriology, Parasite, Infectious Diseases and Hygiene A] 77: 179-193. (in German)

Books

• Atlas of Lake Baikal. 1993. In: Galazy G.I. (Ed.). Moscow: Roskartografia. (in Russian)
• Watson R., Noble I., Bolin B. et al. 2000. Land use, land-use change, and forestry. A special report to IPCC. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Book chapters

• Erbaeva E.A., Safronov G.P. 2009. Diptera, Chironomindae in Angara River and its reservoirs. In: Timoshkin O.A. (Ed.), Index of animal species inhabiting Lake Baikal and its catchment area. Novosibirsk, pp. 348-396. (in Russian)
• Kaufman L., Rousseeuw P. 1987. Clustering by means of medoids. In: Dodge Y. (Ed.), Statistical data analysis based on the l1-norm and related methods. North-Holland, pp. 405-416.

Synopsis of a thesis

• Moustakas N. 1990. Relationships of morphological and physicochemical properties of Vertisols under Greek climate conditions. PhD Thesis, Agricultural University of Athens, Greece.
• Sizova L.N. 2017. The effect of large-scale atmospheric circulation on the elements of ice-thermal and water regime of Lake Baikal. Cand. Sc. Dissertation, Institute of Geography RAS, Moscow, Russia. (in Russian)
• Zemskaya T.I. 2007. Microbial processes of carbon cycle in bottom sediments of Lake Baikal: the structure and functioning of microbial communities. Dr. Sc. Dissertation, Buryat State University, Ulan-Ude, Russia.

Abstracts

• Egorov A.V., Nigmatulin R.I., Rimskii-Korsakov N.A. et al. 2010. Gas hydrate hills on the bottom of Lake Baikal. In: 10th International Conference on Gas in Marine Sediments, pp. 102.

Figures and tables

All figures should be downloaded separately as TIFF or JPG files (with a minimum resolution of 300 dpi) and supplied with a caption in the appropriate fields of the online system.

Number the figures and tables, as follows: Fig. 1 or Table 1. For citing them in the text, use parentheses.

Table should have a title at the top. The note should be placed below the table.

Research and Publication Ethics

Research Ethics

Ethical Guidelines for the Use of Animals in Research

The editors will require that the benefits potentially derived from any research causing harm to animals are significant in relation to any cost endured by animals, and that procedures followed are unlikely to cause offense to the majority of readers. Authors should particularly ensure that their research complies with the commonly-accepted '3Rs':

Replacement of animals by alternatives wherever possible,
Reduction in number of animals used, and
Refinement of experimental conditions and procedures to minimize the harm to animals.

Research Involving Cell Lines
Methods sections for submissions reporting on research with cell lines should state the origin of any cell lines. For established cell lines the provenance should be stated and references must also be given to either a published paper or to a commercial source. If previously unpublished de novo cell lines were used, including those gifted from another laboratory, details of institutional review board or ethics committee approval must be given.

An example of Ethical Statements:

The HCT116 cell line was obtained from XXXX. The MLH1+ cell line was provided by XXXXX, Ltd. The DLD-1 cell line was obtained from Dr. XXXX. The DR-GFP and SA-GFP reporter plasmids were obtained from Dr. XXX and the Rad51K133A expression vector was obtained from Dr. XXXX.

Publication Ethics Statement

Authors wishing to publish their papers in Limnology and Freshwater Biology must abide to the following:

• Any facts that might be perceived as a possible conflict of interest of the author(s) must be disclosed in the paper prior to submission.
• Authors should accurately present their research findings and include an objective discussion of the significance of their findings.
• Data and methods used in the research need to be presented in sufficient detail in the paper, so that other researchers can replicate the work.
• Raw data should preferably be publicly deposited by the authors before submission of their manuscript. Authors need to at least have the raw data readily available for presentation to the referees and the editors of the journal, if requested. Authors need to ensure appropriate measures are taken so that raw data is retained in full for a reasonable time after publication.
• Simultaneous submission of manuscripts to more than one journal is not tolerated.
• Republishing content that is not novel is not tolerated (for example, an English translation of a paper that is already published in another language will not be accepted).
• If errors and inaccuracies are found by the authors after publication of their paper, they need to be promptly communicated to the editors of this journal so that appropriate actions can be taken.
• Your manuscript should not contain any information that has already been published.
• Plagiarism, data fabrication and image manipulation are not tolerated.

Plagiarism includes copying text, ideas, images, or data from another source, even from your own publications, without giving any credit to the original source.

Reuse of text that is copied from another source must be between quotes and the original source must be cited. If a study's design or the manuscript's structure or language has been inspired by previous works, these works must be explicitly cited.

If plagiarism is detected during the peer review process, the manuscript may be rejected. If plagiarism is detected after publication, we may publish a correction or retract the paper.

• Image files must not be manipulated or adjusted in any way that could lead to misinterpretation of the information provided by the original image.

Irregular manipulation includes: 1) introduction, enhancement, moving, or removing features from the original image; 2) grouping of images that should obviously be presented separately (e.g., from different parts of the same gel, or from different gels); or 3) modifying the contrast, brightness or color balance to obscure, eliminate or enhance some information.

If irregular image manipulation is identified and confirmed during the peer review process, we may reject the manuscript. If irregular image manipulation is identified and confirmed after publication, we may correct or retract the paper.

Our editors will investigate any allegations of publication misconduct and may contact the authors' institutions or funders if necessary. If evidence of misconduct is found, appropriate action will be taken to correct or retract the publication. Authors are expected to comply with the best ethical publication practices.

Citation Policy

Authors should ensure that where material is taken from other sources (including their own published writing) the source is clearly cited and that where appropriate permission is obtained.

Authors should not engage in excessive self-citation of their own work.
Authors should not copy references from other publications if they have not read the cited work.
Authors should not preferentially cite their own or their friends’, peers’, or institution’s publications.

Authorship

The following criteria should be observed:

• Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work;
• Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content;
• Final approval of the version to be published;
• 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.

Those who contributed to the work but do not qualify for authorship should be listed in the acknowledgments.

Any change to the author list should be approved by all authors including any who have been removed from the list. The corresponding author should act as a point of contact between the editor and the other authors and should keep co-authors informed and involve them in major decisions about the publication. We reserve the right to request confirmation that all authors meet the authorship conditions.

Reviewer Suggestions

During the submission process, authors are welcome to suggest one-three potential reviewers with the appropriate expertise to review the manuscript. The editors will not necessarily approach these referees. Please provide e-mail address. The proposed referees should not be current collaborators of the co-authors.

Editorial Procedures and Peer-Review

Initial Checks

All submitted manuscripts received by the Editorial Office will be checked by the Assistant Editor to determine whether they are properly prepared and whether they follow the ethical policies of the journal, including those for human and animal experimentation. Manuscripts that do not fit the journal's ethics policy or do not meet the standards of the journal will be rejected before peer-review. Manuscripts that are not properly prepared will be returned to the authors for revision and resubmission. After these checks, the Assistant Editor will consult the journals’ Editor-in-Chief to determine whether the manuscript fits the scope of the journal and whether it is scientifically sound. No judgment on the potential impact of the work will be made at this stage. Reject decisions at this stage will be verified by the Editor-in-Chief.

Peer-Review

Once a manuscript passes the initial checks, it will be assigned to at least one independent expert for peer-review. A single-blind review is applied, where authors' identities are known to reviewers. Peer review comments are confidential and will only be disclosed with the express agreement of the reviewer.

Potential reviewers suggested by the authors may also be considered.

Editorial Decision and Revision

All the articles, reviews and short communications published in Limnology and Freshwater Biology journal go through the peer-review process and receive at least one review. The final decision is made by Editor-in-Chief, which will be one of the following:

• Accept after Minor Revisions:
  The paper is in principle accepted after revision based on the reviewer’s comments. Authors are given five days for minor revisions.
• Reconsider after Major Revisions:
  The acceptance of the manuscript would depend on the revisions. The author needs to provide a point by point response or provide a rebuttal if some of the reviewer’s comments cannot be revised. Usually, only one round of major revisions is allowed. Authors will be asked to resubmit the revised paper within a suitable time frame, and the revised version will be returned to the reviewer for further comments.
• Reject and Encourage Resubmission:
  If additional experiments are needed to support the conclusions, the manuscript will be rejected and the authors will be encouraged to re-submit the paper once further experiments have been conducted.
• Reject:
  The article has serious flaws, and/or makes no original significant contribution. No offer of resubmission to the journal is provided.

All reviewer comments should be responded to in a point-by-point fashion. Where the authors disagree with a reviewer, they must provide a clear response.

Author Appeals

Authors may appeal a rejection by sending an e-mail to the Editorial Office of the journal. The appeal must provide a detailed justification, including point-by-point responses to the reviewers' and/or Editor's comments. The Assistant Editor of the journal will forward the manuscript and related information (including the identities of the referees) to the Editor-in-Chief. At least two editorial board members being consulted will be asked to give an advisory recommendation on the manuscript and may recommend acceptance, further peer-review, or uphold the original rejection decision. A reject decision at this stage is final and cannot be reversed.

In the case of a special issue, the Assistant Editor of the journal will forward the manuscript and related information (including the identities of the referees) to the Editor-in-Chief who will be asked to give an advisory recommendation on the manuscript and may recommend acceptance, further peer-review, or uphold the original rejection decision. A reject decision at this stage will be final and cannot be reversed.

Production and Publication

Once accepted, the manuscript will undergo professional copy-editing, English editing, proofreading by the authors, final corrections, pagination, and, publication on the www.limnolfwbiol.com website.