General requirements
The journal publishes original articles which contain the results of fundamental and applied research in the field of structure and functioning of land and aquatic ecosystems; ecosystems dynamics; estimation of biodiversity and its role in structural and functional ecosystem organization; historical ecology; ecology and nature protection; ecosystem exploitation; modeling in ecology, and other issues generally connected with ecosystems ecology.
The journal doesn’t take into consideration articles with medical, veterinary, municipal, social and political focus, as well as classification and description of taxons with comprehensive summary tables. It is not recommended to send in articles of applied, narrow regional character, which are of no interest for a wide range of researchers.
The submitted articles must contain new facts which have not been published before. Apart from complying with the remit of the journal, the article must have relevance, newness and importance substantiation for being published.
The manuscript must meet all the requirements to the article typography.
Publishing of the article is free.
The editorial office has the right to make editorial changes of the manuscript which are agreed with the corresponding author on the stage of the article proofreading.
Requirements to text typography
The manuscripts must be completed in MS Word for Windows (*.doc): only Times New Roman font, font size 14, line spacing 1.5, page margins 20 mm from each side, paragraph indention 1 cm. Allowable size of the article manuscript (including tables and pictures) in the given format is 18-25 pages; of invited and review articles – no more than 30 pages. To increase the size of the manuscript is possible on agreement with the editorial board.
UDC (УДК) (Universal Decimal Classification index) is identified by the authors themselves with the help of the UDC All-Union Institute of Scientific and Technical Information, Russian Academy of Sciences tables (УДК ВИНИТИ РАН).
Title of the article
The title is given in Russian and English; it should be as clear and informative as possible. It is desirable to avoid contractions and abbreviations.
Information about the authors:
The author’s initials and last name, the organization’s postal address, the author’s e-mail address. If there are several authors, information is provided about each co-author with the use of superscripts with Arabic numerals.
Abstract
The abstract represents the source of information about the content of the article and results of work. It must provide the reader with opportunity to find out the relevance of the document and to decide if it is worth reading the full text of the article; it will also be used for searching the document in information systems.
The abstract must be submitted in Russian and in English. It should be clearly structured and contain the following sections: relevance and objectives, materials and methods, outcomes, and conclusions. The size of the abstract is 100-250 words. The text should be neat and concise, free from minor details.
Download the sample of a structured abstract
Key words
It is necessary to give from 5 to 10 key words in Russian and in English. The key words should reflect the information presented in the article and provide effective recognition of the topic by search systems.
Typography of the main body of the article
The text of the article should have an inner rubrication. A standard structure of an article includes: Introduction, Material and methods, Outcomes, Discussion, and Conclusions. Review articles, short reports and some other types may have a different structure.
Introduction
It is essential to point relevance and objectives of research, clear description of scientific problems with explanations of reasons why it is necessary to solve them in the existing conditions. It is important to show scientific newness and advantages of the proposed approach.
Materials and methods
This section should present information about the research objects, procedures, methods of measuring and data processing. It is not necessary to describe common research methods; it is preferable to emphasize the author’s methods, which have been designed individually and haven’t been published before.
Outcomes
This section should present experimental or theoretical data obtained in the course of work. The outcomes are provided in the processed variant: in the form of tables, charts, organizational or structural diagrams, equations, photos, pictures with brief summarizing comments, comparisons, and statistical assessment.
Discussion
This section gives comparison of the original data presented in the article with the existing ideas in the given subject area.
Conclusion
It is necessary to clearly state the main conclusions of the research, corresponding to the aims and objectives of the article, and also to give explanation of their relevance and importance.
List of abbreviations
When using abbreviations in the text of the article it is necessary to give their interpretation when they are mentioned for the first time, after that the list of abbreviations can be presented in the form of a list at the end of the main body of the article.
Download the sample of an article
Image typography
Images (in colour or in gray gradations, font Times New Roman) are placed in the text of the article in the order of references to them. Image numbering is consecutive. Graph axes have the notes which reflect their meaning.
Images should have image-related texts under them in the centre.
The word “image” is written in a usual font, without highlighting. Shortening of words in pictures is not allowed (except the common ones). After the picture number there is a full point. For example:
Image 1. Results of classifying communities according to species composition
All images should be presented in separate files (raster images in formats JPG, TIFF, GIF, PNG, BMP, with resolution 600 DPI; vector drawings in formats Coral Draw, Excel, Adobe Illustrator with the minimal width of the line 0,75 pt).
The images should have the least number of letter and digital symbols with explanation in image-related texts or in the main text. Image publication on the journal site is made in the original colour, in the printed edition – in gray gradations.
Table typography
Drawing and formatting tables is done automatically (font Times New Roman, font size 14, for volume tables 12). Tables are placed in the text of the article and are numbered in the order in which they are mentioned in the text, the numbering is consecutive. Word shortening in tables is not allowed (except common ones).
The word “table” is written in full in the usual font and is right justified, after the table number there is no full point. The table title is placed lower in the centre. For example:
Table 1
Species composition, species relative abundance and integral characteristics of land communities
Formulae and equations
Equations are numbered in the order they are placed in the text, numbering is consecutive. Formulae are numbered only in the case if the author refers to them further in the text. Formulae in the text of the article are written in the formula editor Microsoft Equation of the word processor Microsoft Word or in the programme Math Type (Times New Roman, font size 14). All the variables should have interpretation.
Mathematical symbols like sin, cos, tg, ctg, min, max, log, extr are in upright type. Indices and figures of the same magnitude should be leveled in each line of the formula. Russian and Latin subscripts should be in upright type, if they are shortenings of some words, and in italics – in all other cases.
Symbols of Greek and Russian alphabets should be upright, not in bold; Latin – in italics, not bold (it is possible to use bold italics in the names of syntaxons); digits – upright, not bold. Names of chemical elements are upright, not bold. The same requirements should be met in images.
When giving units of measurement it is necessary to use common international system of units and abbreviations. When writing numerals in Russian the symbol “,” is used (e.g. 1,21) while in English the symbol “.” is used (e.g. 1.21).
Bibliography and references typography
The authors are responsible for accuracy and completeness of the given references to literary sources as well as for accuracy and precision of quotes presented in the text. All the references are given in the language of the original. In bibliography numbering of sources should correspond to the order of references to them in the text. The source number is given in square brackets.
The bibliography includes:
For books – the author’s last name and initials, title, city, publishing house, year of publishing, number of pages;
For journal articles, collected papers – author’s last name and initials, title of the article, full name of the journal, series, year, volume, number, issue, pages;
For conference proceedings – author’s last name and initials, title of the article, full name of the issue, time and place of the conference, city, publishing house, year, pages.
For electronic resources – name of the document (article, etc.), author (if any), name and type of the site, location bar (which opens the particular document).
Download the sample of typography of references to the sources