Next journals publish a number of article formats: Original Research Articles, Reviews, Communications, there are no formal length or formatting requirements. Authors are welcome to structure articles in the manner they need to best convey their research.
This Guide for Authors contains information on suggested article structures and lengths, but it is in not necessary for Authors to adhere to this guidance.
Corresponding authors, on behalf of all the authors of a submission, must disclose any financial and personal relationships with other people or organizations that could inappropriately influence (bias) their work. Examples of potential conflicts of interest include employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, paid expert testimony, patent applications/registrations, and grants or other funding. All authors, including those without competing interests to declare, should provide the relevant information to the corresponding author (which, where relevant, may specify they have nothing to declare). During the submission process, corresponding authors must navigate to the declaration section of the submission portal and select "Yes" or "No." If they choose "Yes," they must download a Word file, complete the necessary fields, and reupload it. Please do not convert the .docx template to another file type. Author signatures are not required.
Submission of an article implies that the work described has not been published previously (except in the form of an abstract, a published lecture or academic thesis), that it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, that its publication is approved by all authors and tacitly or explicitly by the responsible authorities where the work was carried out, and that, if accepted, it will not be published elsewhere in the same form, in English or in any other language, including electronically without the written consent of the copyright-holder. To verify compliance, your article may be checked and other originality or duplicate checking software.
Inclusive language acknowledges diversity, conveys respect to all people, is sensitive to differences, and promotes equal opportunities. Content should make no assumptions about the beliefs or commitments of any reader; contain nothing which might imply that one individual is superior to another on the grounds of age, gender, race, ethnicity, culture, sexual orientation, disability or health condition; and use inclusive language throughout. Authors should ensure that writing is free from bias, stereotypes, slang, reference to dominant culture and/or cultural assumptions. We advise to seek gender neutrality by using plural nouns ("clinicians, patients/clients") as default/wherever possible to avoid using "he, she," or "he/she." We recommend avoiding the use of descriptors that refer to personal attributes such as age, gender, race, ethnicity, culture, sexual orientation, disability or health condition unless they are relevant and valid. When coding terminology is used, we recommend to avoid offensive or exclusionary terms such as "master", "slave", "blacklist" and "whitelist". We suggest using alternatives that are more appropriate and (self-) explanatory such as "primary", "secondary", "blocklist" and "allowlist". These guidelines are meant as a point of reference to help identify appropriate language but are by no means exhaustive or definitive.
For research involving or pertaining to humans and animals, we recommend that authors address sex and gender dimensions in the paper whenever appropriate, and use the terms "sex" and "gender" carefully in order to avoid confusing both terms. While sex refers to a set of biological attributes in humans and animals that are associated with physical and physiological features, gender refers to the socially constructed roles, behaviors, and identities of women, men and gender-diverse people which occur in a historical and cultural context, and may vary across societies and over time. Gender influences how people view themselves and each other, how they behave and interact and how power is distributed in society. Gender is often incorrectly portrayed as a binary (female/ male) factor. In reality, there is a variety of gender identities and expressions that inform how individuals identify themselves and express their gender.
For transparency, we encourage authors to submit an author statement file outlining their individual contributions to the paper using the relevant CRediT roles: Conceptualization; Data curation; Formal analysis; Funding acquisition; Investigation; Methodology; Project administration; Resources; Software; Supervision; Validation; Visualization; Roles/Writing - original draft; Writing - review & editing. Authorship statements should be formatted with the names of authors first and CRediT role(s) following.
Authors are expected to consider carefully the list and order of authors before submitting their manuscript and provide the definitive list of authors at the time of the original submission. Any addition, deletion or rearrangement of author names in the authorship list should be made only before the manuscript has been accepted and only if approved by the journal Editor. To request such a change, the Editor must receive the following from the corresponding author: (a) the reason for the change in author list and (b) written confirmation (e-mail, letter) from all authors that they agree with the addition, removal or rearrangement. In the case of addition or removal of authors, this includes confirmation from the author being added or removed. Only in exceptional circumstances will the Editor consider the addition, deletion or rearrangement of authors after the manuscript has been accepted. While the Editor considers the request, publication of the manuscript will be suspended. If the manuscript has already been published in an online issue, any requests approved by the Editor will result in a corrigendum.
The journal publishes open access articles under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) License which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Copyright on any research article in the journal is retained by the author(s). Authors grant the Department of Aquatic Biology and Fisheries, University of Kerala a license to publish the article and identify itself as the original publisher.
You are requested to identify who provided financial support for the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the article and to briefly describe the role of the sponsor(s), if any, in study design; in the collection, analysis and interpretation of data; in the writing of the report; and in the decision to submit the article for publication. If the funding source(s) had no such involvement, it is recommended to state this.
Please write your text in good English (American or British usage is accepted, but not a mixture of these).
Our online submission system guides you stepwise through the process of entering your article details and uploading your files. The system converts your article files to a single PDF file used in the peer-review process. Editable files (e.g., Word) are required to typeset your article for final publication. All correspondence, including notification of the Editor's decision and requests for revision, is sent by e-mail and to your dashboard
Please submit the names and institutional e-mail addresses of several potential reviewers. You should not suggest reviewers who are colleagues, or who have co-authored or collaborated with you during the last three years. Editors do not invite reviewers who have potential competing interests with the authors. Further, in order to provide a broad and balanced assessment of the work, and ensure scientific rigor, please suggest diverse candidate reviewers who are located in different countries/regions from the author group. Also consider other diversity attributes e.g. gender, race and ethnicity, career stage, etc. Finally, you should not include existing members of the journal's editorial team, of whom the journal are already aware.
Note: the editor decides whether or not to invite your suggested reviewers.
Submission to Next journals proceed totally online and you will be guided stepwise through the creation and uploading of your files. The system automatically converts your files to a single PDF file, which is used in the peer-review process. As part of the Your Paper Your Way service, you may choose to submit your manuscript as a single file to be used in the refereeing process. This can be a Word document.
List funding sources in this standard way to facilitate compliance to funder's requirements:
Please submit math equations as editable text and not as images. Present simple formulae in line with normal text where possible and use the solidus (/) instead of a horizontal line for small fractional terms, e.g., X/Y. In principle, variables are to be presented in italics. Powers of e are often more conveniently denoted by exp. Number consecutively any equations that have to be displayed separately from the text (if referred to explicitly in the text).
Citations may be made directly (or parenthetically). Groups of references should be listed first alphabetically, then chronologically.
Examples: 'as demonstrated (Nair, 1999, 2000a, b; Nair and Thampy, 1999). Wafar et al. (2010) have recently shown ....'
References must be listed alphabetically by first author and then chronologically at the end of the paper, in the following format:
All manuscripts must have 1.5-line spacing, and must contain both page numbers and consecutive line numbering. Articles must be divided into clearly numbered sections. The submission should be in MS WORD and the text should be in single column. Use Times New Roman, with font size 12. Aside from this, there are no strict formatting requirements, but all manuscripts must contain the essential elements needed to convey the details of the study, including Abstract, Keywords, Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, Discussion, Conclusions, and References. The Figures/Tables with Captions should be placed in appropriate places within the text. The submission of MS should be as a single file. If your article includes any Videos and/or other Supplementary material, this should be included in your initial submission for peer review purposes.
Divide your article into clearly defined and numbered sections. Subsections should be numbered 1.1 (then 1.1.1, 1.1.2, ...), 1.2, etc. (the abstract is not included in section numbering). Use this numbering also for internal cross-referencing: do not just refer to 'the text'. Any subsection may be given a brief heading. Each heading should appear on its own separate line.
These journals operate a single anonymized review process. All contributions will be initially assessed by the desk editor for suitability for the journal. Papers deemed suitable are then typically sent to a minimum of two independent expert reviewers to assess the scientific quality of the paper. The Editor is responsible for the final decision regarding acceptance or rejection of articles. The Editor's decision is final. Editors are not involved in decisions about papers which they have written themselves or have been written by family members or colleagues or which relate to products or services in which the editor has an interest. Any such submission is subject to all of the journal's usual procedures, with peer review handled independently of the relevant editor and their research groups.
It is important that the file be saved in the native format of the word processor used. The text should be in single-column format. Keep the layout of the text as simple as possible. Most formatting codes will be removed and replaced on processing the article. In particular, do not use the word processor's options to justify text or to hyphenate words. However, do use bold face, italics, subscripts, superscripts etc. When preparing tables, if you are using a table grid, use only one grid for each individual table and not a grid for each row. If no grid is used, use tabs, not spaces, to align columns. To avoid unnecessary errors, you are strongly advised to use the 'spell-check' and 'grammar-check' functions of your word processor.
Regardless of the application used, when your electronic artwork is finalized, please 'save as' or convert the images to one of the following formats (note the resolution requirements for line drawings, halftones, and line/halftone combinations given below): EPS (or PDF): Vector drawings. Embed the font or save the text as 'graphics'.
Ensure that each illustration has a caption. A caption should comprise a brief title (not on the figure itself) and a description of the illustration. Keep text in the illustrations themselves to a minimum but explain all symbols and abbreviations used.
Please submit tables as editable text and not as images. Tables can be placed either next to the relevant text in the article, or on separate page(s) at the end. Number tables consecutively in accordance with their appearance in the text and place any table notes below the table body. Be sparing in the use of tables and ensure that the data presented in them do not duplicate results described elsewhere in the article. Please avoid using vertical rules and shading in table cells.
Supplementary material such as applications, images and sound clips, can be published with your article to enhance it. Submitted supplementary items are published exactly as they are received (Excel or PowerPoint files will appear as such online). Please submit your material together with the article and supply a concise, descriptive caption for each supplementary file.
There is no page charges or processing fee for the journal.
The corresponding author will be notified and receive, at no cost, a PDF file of the article via e-mail and a link to the published version of the open access article on email. This link is in the form of an article link which can be shared via email and social networks.
All author enquiries should be through email only and no telephonic call will be entertained. The minimum time requirement for review is three months since submission of the manuscript.
Any request for publication of special issues should be addressed to the Editor-in-Chief. The cost for printing and layout of the special issue should be met by the event organisers in advance and papers will undergo normal peer-review process of the journal.
