Submissions

Author Guidelines

Instructions for Authors

• Please make sure your title page contains the following information.
• The title should be concise and informative.
• Include the name(s) of the author(s), the affiliation(s) of the author(s): (department), institution, city, (state), country.
• Footnotes to the list of authors should be indicated by superscript lower-case italicized letters.
• A clear indication and an active e-mail address of all authors.
• If available, the 16-digit ORCID of the author(s); use the following format: Shuaiqi Li(https://orcid.org/0000-0006-3034-6315) and Xiaoxu Han (https://orcid.org/0000-0004-30166317).
• Please do not include address information.
• Please provide an abstract of 150 to 250 words. The abstract should not contain any undefined abbreviations or unspecified references. Please provide 4 to 6 keywords which can be used for indexing purposes. 

Text Formatting

• Use only standard fonts: 12-point Times New Roman for text, Symbol for Greek symbols, MathematicalPi2 for handwritten and gothic symbols.
• Use tab stops or other commands for indents, not the space bar.Do not end a line by pressing Enter unless this is the end of a paragraph.
• Make full use of your text editor functions: creation of footnotes, enabling and disabling automatic hyphenation, list formatting, indents, etc. Do not use field functions.
• Use the table function, not spreadsheets, to make tables. Avoid creating tables by hand using multiple spaces or tabs and containing no cells.
• Use the International System of Units (SI) for physical quantities and units of measure, and IUPAC nomenclature for chemical compounds.
• Use periods rather than commas in decimals (correct: 0.25, incorrect: 0,25).
• Symbols *, ‘, ±, single Greek letters, single italic or boldface characters, single variables or variables with either superscript or subscript letters, unites of measure, numbers, and simple mathematical or chemical formulas (e.g., a2 + b2 = c2; H2SO4) should be typeset as text rather than embedded objects. Do not use Equation, MathType or other tools.
• Dates should be rendered in the following format: January 27, 2014.
• There should not be periods after manuscript title, list of authors, affiliations, keywords, section headings and subheadings, table titles and most of the units of measure.
• Italicize variables and physical quantities, but not abbreviations of words in superscripts and subscripts.
• Save your file in docx format (Word 2007 or higher) or doc format (older Word versions). 

Headings

Please use no more than three levels of displayed headings:

• First-Level Heading (centered)
• Second-Level Heading (centered)
• Third-level heading. (Beginning of a paragraph)

Formulas

• Mathematical formulas created using MathType should be in one frame. Do not compose a single formula of several MathType objects or a MathType object and text, table, or embedded frame.
• For MathType formulas, standard font settings should be used. Do not change these settings for any element of a formula.
• Please put a formula that do not fit ordinary lines to a separate line or use format that is most suitable, e.g., a/b and a × b–1 is better than a common fraction with a numerator displayed above the line and a denominator displayed below the line.

 Contractions and Abbreviations

Avoid word contractions altogether and word abbreviations whenever possible. They should be defined at first mention and used consistently thereafter.

 Units of Measure

• Use the International System of Units (SI) for physical quantities and units of measurement.
• Separate units of measure from numbers by a space. Exceptions are: 90°, 20°C, 50%, 10‰.
• Use units of measure consistently throughout the manuscript.
• In ranges and series, retain only the final unit of measure (10–12 mg; 5, 10, and 20 kV; 25– 30%; 30, 60, and 90°C). The degree when it indicates angles sign is an exception.
• Units of measure for quantities under the log sign should be given in square brackets: ln t [min]. 

Statements and Declarations

• Acknowledgements. Any information about any assistance received when carrying out the work and preparing the manuscript.
• Funding. Information on grants and other sources of financial support.

Compliance with Ethical Standards

• Conflict of Interest. Disclose possible conflicts of interest (competing interests) for each author.
• Open Access. This section is included if the article is published in open access mode. In that case, the Creative Commons license should be indicated.
• Author Distributions. This section is optional and describes the contribution of each author to the study.
• Supplementary Information. This section notifies of the availability of supplementary materials.
• Additional Information. Everything that should be stated but is not suitable for other sections.
• The reference should be done using the 7th Edition of APA Guide

 Tables

• All tables are to be numbered using Arabic numerals.
• Tables should always be cited in text in consecutive numerical order.
• For each table, please supply a table caption (title) explaining the components of the table.
• Identify any previously published material by giving the original source in the form of a reference at the end of the table caption.
• Footnotes to tables should be indicated by superscript lower-case letters (or asterisks for significance values and other statistical data) and included beneath the table body.
• Use the table function, not spreadsheets, to make tables. Avoid creating tables by hand using multiple spaces or tabs and containing no cells.

 Figure Numbering

• All figures are to be numbered using Arabic numerals.
• Figures should always be cited in text in consecutive numerical order.
• Figure parts should be denoted by lowercase letters (a, b, c, etc.).
• If an appendix appears in your article and it contains one or more figures, continue the consecutive numbering of the main text. Do not number the appendix figures,"A1, A2, A3, etc." Figures in online appendices [Supplementary Information (SI)] should, however, be numbered separately.

 Figure Captions

• Each figure should have a concise caption describing accurately what the figure depicts. Include the captions in the text file of the manuscript, not in the figure file.
• Figure captions begin with the term Fig. in bold type, followed by the figure number, also in bold type.
• No punctuation is to be included after the number, nor is any punctuation to be placed at the end of the caption.
• Identify all elements found in the figure in the figure caption; and use boxes, circles, etc., as coordinate points in graphs.
• Identify previously published material by giving the original source in the form of a reference citation at the end of the figure caption.