13280_Ambio Instructions for Authors_September 2024
13280_Ambio Instructions for Authors_September 2024
13280_Ambio Instructions for Authors_September 2024
Ambio
A Journal of Environment and Society
Supplementary Information 8
Online submission 9
Reviewer suggestions 9
Invitations to revise the manuscript 9
Accepted papers 10
Special Issues 13
Useful links 14
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AIMS
Ambio is owned by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and was founded in 1972,
following the first UN conference on the environment.
ARTICLE CATEGORIES
Original contributions can be submitted to Ambio as Research Articles, Reviews, Perspectives,
News or Comments. Regardless of article category, your submission should concern linkeages
between the environment and society. If you are uncertain whether your manuscript is suitable
for publication in Ambio, please send an e-mail with the abstract to the editor-in-chief
bo.soderstrom@kva.se
Research Article
Includes original research devoted to new findings and results of topical environmental
research. The study should be introduced with non-specialists in mind. A Research Article
should be organised as follows: Abstract, Keywords, Introduction, Materials and Methods,
Results, Discussion, Conclusion, Acknowledgements, References and Author Biographies.
For an alternative organisation, see section multi-, inter-, or transdisciplinary manuscripts
below.
Perspective
Provides a forum for authors to discuss topical environmental issues, ideas or models from a
personal viewpoint. Perspectives typically are argument driven and arguments need to be
solidly anchored in published research and relevant theoretical/analytical frameworks.
Perspective papers do not need the empirical sections of a Research Article, although the
methodology should be described if analyses have been undertaken. They should be more
forward looking than Reviews. They may be opinionated but should remain balanced and
based on scientific argumentation. Papers that aim at bridging the gap between solutions
proposed from scientific research and its implementation are particularly welcome. Perspective
articles are intended to evoke new ideas and stimulate debate, or new experimental approaches
and practices.
Review
A Review should be the result of a defined search criteria or method. The language should be
simple and directed towards a non-specialist readership, novel concepts defined and specialist
terminology explained. It should not be focused on the authors' own work. We recommend
authors of systematic reviews and meta-analyses to consult standards, such as ROSES or
PRISMA, and in each case relate to relevant literature on systematic reviews for work in that
vein. All Reviews should, in addition to the main text, include Abstract, Keywords and Author
Biographies.
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News
News provides a brief, high-quality study on a topical matter that matches Ambio's scope. For a
submission to qualify as News it needs to clearly demonstrate the timeliness and urgency of the
matter that you want to present, for instance, by presenting evidence or insights that inform a
contentious or urgent topic in public debate. Topics that have been debated in the public media
recently would be a priority. News is expected to have no more than 3000 words (including abstract,
references, and author biographies), up to 4 figures/tables, and can be accompanied by
Supplementary Information. News articles will be published fast and are therefore prioritised in the
handling of submissions. The peer review is handled by Associate Editors and members of the
Advisory Board. If the urgency criteria are not fulfilled, but the manuscript is within Ambio’s scope
we may encourage authors to develop the submission into a Research Article, Review or Perspective.
Comment
Reflections on recently published papers in Ambio may be submitted as Comments.
Abstract, Keywords or Author Biographies are not included. Authors of the original article
will be invited to submit a response to your Comment.
Regardless of article category, the associate editors will secure reports from at least two external
reviewers (for manuscripts sent to external review, see page 11).
Max number of words, references, figures and tables in each article category. The
word limit includes references (in-text and reference list) but excludes figures and tables.
News
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PREPARATION OF THE MANUSCRIPT
Text in red indicates the most common reasons why manuscripts are sent back to authors.
Editors and reviewers should be focusing on the quality of science and not the format. To make
the submission process easier, we invite you to submit your manuscript as a single file
including all key sections in the different article categories, but without any particular format
requirements. Only when your manuscript is at the revision stage will you be requested to
format according to Ambio’s style. This way you will not have to spend valuable research time
formatting your manuscript prior to first submission. Naturally, you are welcome to format
already the first submission according to the below guidelines. However, we always request that
you submit the title page, acknowledgements, and author biographies separately so that we can
ensure that your manuscript is anonymised to allow double-blind peer review.
Cover letter
Submission of a manuscript must be accompanied by a cover letter that includes a short
paragraph that describes the main findings of your submission. Please do not copy and paste
from the abstract. The cover letter should also include the category of the paper.
Please describe:
• how the research is relevant to an international readership with very wide interests in
environmental sciences,
• how it explores the link between society and the environment,
• how it addresses multi-, inter- or transdisciplinary aspects,
• the most important management or policy recommendations as a result of your
submission.
Language
Both American or British English are accepted as long as it is used consistently.
Manuscript
Use double-spacing throughout the text. The article should be submitted as Word, LaTex, PDF,
RTF, or TXT file for text. All manuscript files should be formatted to contain continuous line
numbers. The manuscript should include:
Title Page,
Acknowledgements,
Author Biographies,
Abstract,
Keywords,
Main text of article,
References,
Figures, Tables and Illustrations.
Title Page
The title page, acknowledgements and author biographies must be submitted as a separate
document in Editorial Manager. This will not be sent to reviewers to allow the review process to
be double-blind. In addition to manuscript title and word count, the title page must contain the
full names, positions and institutional mailing addresses of all authors as well as telephone
number and e-mail address of the corresponding author. If your institution has a transformative
agreement (TA), you may publish your article Open Access with your fees covered. Note that
the TA is valid for the corresponding author only. Please keep the title short since such articles
often are downloaded and cited more.
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Acknowledgements
Keep them brief.
Author Biographies
Author Biographies should be included for Research Articles, Reviews and Perspectives.
Abstract
A short abstract, consisting of not more than 150 words, should indicate the scope, methods
used, main results and the significance of the research to allow readers from different scientific
disciplines and backgrounds to understand why your paper is important. Abstracts of a Review
or a Perspective should indicate the scope and the main points of the article. A Comment does
not have an abstract.
Keywords
Provide max 6 keywords or keyword phrases in alphabetical order.
Reporting of data
When experiments have been performed, or in other situations where applicable, mean effect
size, sample size and some measure of variability (e.g., standard deviation, standard error,
coefficient of variation) must be explicitly given.
Number conventions
Do not use excessive numbers of digits when writing a decimal number to represent the mean of
a set of measurements. The level of significance should be given with a maximum of three
figures (e.g., p < 0.001). Do not use three figures for non-significant tests (e.g., show p > 0.7 and
not p > 0.700). Be consistent in the use of number of digits when writing a decimal number and
how to show significance levels throughout the manuscript.
Species names
At first mention in the text, common species names must be followed by an italicised scientific
name within parentheses, for example, bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops aduncus). Do not capitalise
common names of animal or plant species. Scientific (Latin) names are italicised for genus and
species, but not for classes, orders and families. Varieties may also be italicised.
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References in the main article
You are requested to use the author/year format of referencing in the text. If there are three or
more authors use the name of the first author followed by "et al.". Add a, b, c etc. to distinguish
between two or more references with the same author name and year. Always list a string of
references in chronological order, e.g. (Black 1985; Smith and Baker 1995a, b; Carruthers et al.
1999). Use ";" to separate references.
Personal communications (Carruthers, pers. comm.) and other unpublished data (Carruthers,
unpubl.) should be referred to in the running text and not given as notes or in the reference list.
Manuscripts which are unpublished or in press should be cited only if formally accepted for
publication. Avoid references to grey literature, to non-scientific publications and to
publications that are not immediately accessible to the reader.
Reference lists
For references starting with the same surname and initials, firstly list single-author works in
chronological order, secondly list two-author works in alphabetical order of the second author,
and thirdly list multi-author works arranged only chronologically.
All authors’ names up to 8 should be given. The abbreviation et al. should be used for papers
with more than 8 authors, and following the first 8 names. Names of journals should be written
in full. Please provide first and last pages for excerpts from journals, books, etc. In references
to books, bulletins and reports, give number of pages, the city and the publisher.
If a paper is written in a foreign language, give the title in English and indicate at the end of
the reference the language in which the paper is written as follows: (In Swedish). If the paper
has an English summary add (English summary). You are more than welcome to provide URL
links to the doi of articles.
Examples with reference type in italics given at the end of each reference:
Aarset, B., S. Beckman, E. Bigne, M. Beveridge, T. Bjorndal, J. Bunting, P. McDonagh, C.
Mariojouls, et al. 2004. European consumers’ understanding and perceptions of
the‘‘organic’’ food regime. The case of aquaculture. British Food Journal 106: 93–105.
(Journal article)
Asmala, E., and L. Saikku. 2010. Closing a loop: Substance flow analysis of nitrogen and
phosphorus in the rainbow trout production and domestic consumption system in Finland.
Ambio 39: 126–135. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13280-010-0024-5 (Journal article)
Bertills, U., J. Fölster, and H. Lager. 2007. Natural acidification only—report on in-depth
evaluation of the environmental quality objective work. Swedish Environmental Protection
Agency, Report 5766, Stockholm, Sweden (in Swedish, English summary). (Report)
Connell, J.J., and R. Hardy. 1982. Trends in fish utilisation. Oxford: Fishing News Books.
(Book)
Gren, I.-M. 2000. Cost-effective nutrient reductions to the Baltic Sea. In Managing a Sea,
eds. I.-M. Gren, K. Turner, and F. Wulff, 152–158. London: Earthscan. (Book chapter)
Growcock, A.J. 2005. Impacts of Camping and Trampling on Australian Alpine and
Subalpine Vegetation. PhD Thesis. Gold Coast, Australia: Griffith University. (Thesis)
Haqq-Misra, J. Introduction: Detectability of Future Earth. Preprint at arXiv: 1902.08035
[physics.gen-ph] (Preprint)
Molau, U., and P. Mølgaard. 1996. International Tundra Experiment (ITEX). Retrieved 1
November, 2010, from http://ibis.geog.ubc.ca/itex/library/ (Web material)
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Figures, tables, or other illustrations
Figures should be submitted on separate pages and numbered consecutively. Figure legends
should be fully explanatory.
FFigures should be prepared in a form that allows for reduction/increase in size: for
example, vector EPS (Encapsulated PostScript) for figures containing both text and line
drawings. Please note that raster format figures are not accepted since they loose quality when
scaled up. This will speed up the post-acceptance process considerably.
Please illustrate your article with high-quality colour photographs as these are often very
informative (and free of charge to authors). Photos and figures should be of high quality (a
minimum resolution of 300 dpi in one of the formats TIFF, JPG, PPT for photos). Copyright
permission must be obtained for material copied from other publications.
Please consult a recent issue of Ambio when preparing your manuscript. Free access articles
can be downloaded here.
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SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION
Ambio encourages the use of Supplementary Information. A hyperlink from the online PDF
will redirect the reader directly to the online material. Supplementary Information offers
authors the opportunity to publish material that forms the basis for an article. The
Supplementary Information is therefore directly relevant to the article, however, the paper must
be able to stand alone without it. Examples of typical supplementary information include
questionnaires, specifications of methodology, background data sets, multimedia files, and
additional illustrations. We can also publish videos as Supplementary Information.
Supplementary Information should not include any preliminary data or analyses.
Supplementary Information will be made available to reviewers, but they are not requested to
evaluate it.
In the main article and in the Supplementary Information, all material should be denoted by a
"S" preceding the number (Table S1, Fig. S1, Appendix S1 etc.. Do not cross-reference
between article and Supplementary Information; instead include a separate list of references in
the Supplementary Information.
Please remember:
• to submit all Supplementary Information in one (1) document;
• to include a title page according to the example below;
• to provide the final version as a PDF, there will be no further copy-editing by the
publisher;
Ambio
Supplementary Information
This supplementary information has not been peer reviewed.
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ETHICS & LANGUAGE SUPPORT (required reading)
Ethical responsibilities
Authors should carefully take notice of the Ethical Responsibilities of Authors in the
Submission. Topics include:
• Integrity rules of good scientific practice
• Information on plagiarism software
• Fundamental errors
• Suggesting /excluding reviewers
Authorship principles
Authors should adhere to the guidelines that describe Authorship principles. Topics include:
• Authorship clarified
• Disclosures and declarations
• Data transparency
• Role of the Corresponding Author
• Author contributions
• Examples of statements that can be used
• Affiliations of authors
• Changes to authorship
• Author identification
• Deceased or incapacitated authors
• Authorship issues or disputes
• Confidentiality
Declarations
Authors should make sure to include any required declarations (if applicable). Information on
this can be found in the Authorship principles under ‘Disclosures and declarations’.
ONLINE SUBMISSION
You can only submit your manuscript online using this link: www.editorialmanager.com/ambi/
All correspondence, including notification of the editor-in-chief’s decisions and requests for
revision, takes place by e-mail.
Under the heading "Additional Information", authors need to answer "yes" to a number of
statements regarding the manuscript. This is required information to be able to proceed with the
online submission. All manuscripts submitted to Ambio are accepted for consideration with the
understanding that they have not been published elsewhere and are not under consideration by
any other journal.
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Posting of preprints is not considered prior publication and will not jeopardise consideration
at all Springer journals. Springer encourages posting of preprints of primary research
manuscripts on preprint servers, authors’ or institutional websites, and open communications
between researchers whether on community preprint servers or preprint commenting platforms.
Read more about preprints here.
When your manuscript is at the revision stage all co-authors will be asked for verification:
"Could you please verify that you are affiliated with this submission?". Please respond to this e-
mail as soon as possible to avoid unnecessary delay in the review process of your revised
manuscript.
REVIEWER SUGGESTIONS
The author(s) should suggest three to five potential reviewers who are qualified to evaluate the
quality of the manuscript, providing full names, institutions, and current e-mail addresses. Please
ensure that reviewers represent broad international coverage. There should be no conflicting
interests between authors and potential reviewers, which could interfere with reviewer
objectivity (e.g., collaborating/co-authoring a paper within the past five years; author's advisor
or student within the past five years; working at the same place as the authors; professional/
private/business relationship with the authors). Please note that Ambio employs a double-blind
peer review process (both authors and reviewers are anonymous).
ACCEPTED PAPERS
Upon acceptance of your article you will receive an e-mail from Springer Author Services with
the title: "Your article in Ambio: Information Required" with a link to the website
MyPublication. Please check your spam folder if this e-mail does not come within a few days.
There you will have the option to order Open Access (Open Choice) of your accepted article and
paper offprints (you will receive a free electronic PDF-offprint). Once this information has been
given, your article will be processed and you will receive a first proof of your article, normally
within three weeks.
Open Access
More than half of all articles in Ambio are published Open Access. More information what Open
Access means and about different ways to cover the publication fees can be found here. Please
also check whether your institution is part of the Springer Transformatory Agreement. Even if
you do not publish Open Access you may, free of charge, distribute a link for downloading a
read-only version of your article through the SharedIt-initiative. Finally, all Ambio articles are
freely available for downloading via PubMed Central after a 12-month embargo period.
Publication of color illustrations is free of charge in the print and online version of Ambio, and
there are no page charges.
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Proof reading
The purpose of the proof is to check for copy-editing, typesetting or conversion errors and the
completeness and accuracy of the text, tables and figures. Substantial changes in content, e.g.,
new results, corrected values, title and authorship, are not allowed without the approval of the
editor-in-chief. After online publication (Online First), no further changes can be made.
Online First
The article will be published online after receipt of the corrected proofs. This is the official first
publication citable with the doi (digital object identifier). After release of the printed version, the
paper can also be cited by issue and page numbers.
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60 days. The manuscript will be treated as a new submission subject to review from at least two
external reviewers. The editors will decide whether to forward your revised version to the same
reviewers as for your original submission or to altogether new reviewers. Reject after review
Rejection is a final decision.
Confidential comments to the editor are optional and can include concerns about ethical
standards, data integrity or conflicts of interest. Here the reviewer can also indicate if he/she has
limitations in expertise (e.g. concerning specific methods, statistical analyses) and advise us to
invite additional experts for these fields. Reviews covering only some parts of a manuscript are
welcome, but the reviewer’s limitations should be stated. To be as transparent as possible all
other comments should be placed in the Comments to Author. Structure your comments
according to general comments, specific comments and minor edits. The Comments can be
written or pasted directly into the respective fields or can be submitted as attachments.
GENERAL COMMENTS: Write a short summary of the manuscript and include its advantages
and drawbacks. SPECIFIC COMMENTS: Please help the author identify where the content to
which you are referring is located by giving page and line numbers, indicate which comments
are essential for the authors to revise. MINOR EDITS: Language, formatting issues etc.
1. Does the subject of the manuscript fall within the scope of Ambio? (exploring the
relationships between society and environment; especially encouraged are multi-,
inter- or transdisciplinary submissions with explicit management or policy
recommendations).
2. Is it comprehensible not only to specialists but also to scientists in other fields and
interested laypersons?
3. Is this a new and original contribution?
4. Are the results of sufficiently high impact and global relevance for publication in
Ambio?
5. Is the manuscript set in an international context and does it demonstrate how it builds
on previous work on the subject?
General repositories, for all types of research data, such as figshare and Dryad may also be used.
Datasets that are assigned digital object identifiers (DOIs) by a data repository may be cited in
the reference list. Data citations should include the minimum information recommended by
DataCite: authors, title, publisher (repository name), identifier.
Springer Nature provides a research data policy support service for authors and editors, which
can be contacted at researchdata@springernature.com. This service provides advice on research
data policy compliance and on finding research data repositories. It is independent of journal,
book and conference proceedings editorial offices and does not advise on specific manuscripts.
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SPECIAL ISSUES
Each year Ambio publishes special issues on topical research themes. Articles published in
special issues are widely appreciated by our readership and belong to the most highly cited
papers in Ambio. A special issue normally contains between 10 and 16 articles. If you are
interested in publishing a "special section" of 4 to 6 thematic articles in a regular issue, please
contact the editor-in-chief directly.
What we offer
The highest level of editorial support is given to these high-priority articles throughout the
review and publication processes. Open access is not mandatory for articles published in special
issues, thus there can be a mix of articles published open access and non-open access in each
special issue. Articles published behind a pay-wall can still be widely disseminated via the
SharedIt initiative where authors can post links to read-only full-texts free of charge. All Ambio
articles are freely available via PubMed Central after an embargo period of 12 months.
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USEFUL LINKS
Ambio Submission guidelines (Instructions for Authors)
Ambio Home page
Ambio’s Open Access articles
Ambio’s Special Issues
Ambio Volumes and Issues
Author principles
DataCite
English Language Support services
Ethical Responsibilities of Authors
How to publish Open Access in Ambio
How to publish an article
List of Repositories
Mistakes to avoid during manuscript preparation
My Publication FAQs
Preprints
Publishing Ethics - COPE
Research Data Policy
Research Data Help desk
Utilization of plants, algae, fungi