Instructions for the Preparation of Manuscript for Agropedology

Prospective authors(s) is/are advised to consult the latest issue of the Journal to get acquainted with details of its format and style.

General :

Papers, communicated by the members of the society, will be considered for publication if they make an original contribution to the knowledge in any branch of soil science, notably soil genesis, soil morphology and classification; soil physics and hydrology; soil chemistry and mineralogy; soil and water management and conservation. The journal particularly welcomes papers that promote understanding of soil in the Indian sub-continent.
Full-length articles, short communications and invited review articles that indicate fruitful areas of further research and innovative are published in the Journal. Reviews may be restricted to 25 printed pages in length (50 pages A4 double-spaced type).
All papers are reviewed. No free prints are provided; pdf of papers will be supplied on request.
At the initial stage, the manuscripts may be submitted in hard copy format. When the manuscript is returned to the authors with the referee’s reports for revision, the editor will make notes on presentation, layout and general matters concerning style, and these should be incorporated into the revised paper. A disc will be requested once the paper is accepted in principle. The version on the disk should be identical to the one in the hard copy. Please ive the name of the file and the word-processing package used. While returning the revised manuscript, a DISCUSSION SHEET quoting each question raised by the Reviewers followed by the answers may be provided. Authors may also indicate where (page Nos. in the revised manuscript) and how the revision has been done. Authors may also indicate the reasons, if they do not agree to the reviewer’s comments.
Original illustrations will be returned after publication if a request to this effect is made at the time of submission.
Submission of a paper means that the results reported by the author in that paper have not been published and are not being considered for publication elsewhere.
The Journal assumes that all authors of a multi-authored paper agree to its submission. It takes no responsibility for fraud or inaccuracy on the part of the contributors.

Manuscript :

The work should be presented in concise and clear English. Generally, the length of a Fulllength article should not exceed 3000 words and that of Short communication should be within 750 words.
A full length article comprises the following sections.

  1. Short title
  2. Title
  3. Author (s)
  4. Institution and address with PIN code
  5. Abstract (along with keywords)
  6. Introduction
  7. Materials and Methods
  8. Results and Discussion
  9. Conclusion
  10. Acknowledgements (if any)
  11. References
  12. Table and figures (if any)

Guidelines for each section are as follows:
All the aforementioned headings should start from left hand side of the margin, without any indent.

Short Title : A shortened title (approximately of 50 characters) set in capital letters should convey the main theme of the paper.

Title : This should be concise and appropriately informative and should contain all keywords necessary to facilitate retrieval by searching techniques.

Author/Authors : The name(s) of author(s) should be typed in capital letters a little below the title starting from the left margin.

Institutional address : The matter will come below the name (s) of the author(s). Complete postal address with PIN code should be furnished. In case, any author has left the above address, this could be indicated as a footnote.

Abstract : The abstract (preferably less than 200 words) should not just recapitulate the results but should state concisely the scope of the work and give the principal findings. It should be complete enough for direct use by abstracting services. Acronyms and references should be avoided.

Additional keywords : Up to six keywords not contained in the title may be listed beneath the abstract to assist searching techniques.

Introduction : This section is meant to introduce the subject of the paper. The introduction should be short and concise and should not exceed what is necessary to indicate the reasons for the work and its essential background.

Materials and Methods : Geographical position of soil-site or soil used in the experiment or site of field-trial should be mentioned with the help of coordinates (latitude and longitude).
Sufficient experimental details, such as, the materials used in the investigation, methods of experiment and analysis adopted should be given to enable repetition of the work. Proper classification of soils must invariably be indicated at the level of Order/ Suborder/ Greatgroup/ Subgroup as per Soil Taxonomy (USDA).

Results and Discussion :The Results should be reported in the form of salient points of observation and critical interpretation thereof whereas the Discussion should explain the significance of the results rather than recapitulate them.

Conclusion : This is an extremely important section which the author(s) should articulate in the form of a clearly crystallized summary of the results obtained alongwith their implications in solution of the practical problems or contributions to the advancement of the scientific knowledge.

References : it should be cited chronologically in the text. All references in the text must be listed at the end of the paper, with the names of authors arranged alphabetically; all entries in this list must correspond to references in the text. In the text, the names of two co-authors are linked by ‘and’; for three or more, the first author’s name is followed by ‘et al’. No editorial responsibility can be taken for the accuracy of the references; authors are requested to check these with special care. Titles must be included for all the references. Papers that have not been accepted for publication may not be included in the list of references and must be cited as ‘unpublished data’ or as ‘personal communication’; the use of such citations are discouraged.
Provide titles of books and journals in full. The journal title should be in the italics.

Examples :
Journal article
Buyanovsky, G. A., Aslam, M. and Wagner, G. H. (1994). Carbon turnover in soil physical fractions. Soil Science Society of America Journal 58, 1167-1173.
Chapter in book
Oades, J. M. (1998). An introduction to organic matter in mineral soils. In ‘Minerals in Soil Environments’. (Eds. J. B. Dixon and S. B. Weed) pp.92-159. (Soil Science Society of America : Wisconsin).
Book
Soil Survey Staff (2010). ‘Keys to Soil Taxonomy’, Eleventh Edition. (U.S.D.A.: Washington, D.C.).
Report/Bulletin
Sehgal, J., Mandal, D. K., Mandal, C. and Vadivelu, S. (1990). Agro-ecological regions of India. National Bureau of Soil Survey and Land Use Planning, Technical Publication No. 24, Nagpur.

Units : Authors are requested to follow the International System of Units for exact measurements of physical quantities. For complex groupings of units the form such as kgha-1year-1 may be used.
For exchangeable ions and ion exchange capacity, the recommended unit is cmol(+) or (-)kg-1 , where (+) or (-) refers to unit charge. In tables where reference is being made to both positive and negative charge e.g. cation and anion exchange capacity, the heading cmol(+)kg-1 can be used with sign made evident by the context. This recommended unit has the advantage of being numerically equivalent to the non-SI but still widely used milliequivalents per 100g.
For electrical conductivity, the recommended unit is dSm-1.

Soil classification nomenclature : Owing to theinternational scope of the journal, as well as the most appropriate local classification and soil description methodology, authors should also use internationally recognised soil classification nomenclature such as U.S. Soil Taxonomy or FAO UNESCO.

Statistical evaluation of results : The design and conduct of experiments must be sufficiently explained so that readers can judge for themselves the validity of the results. Authors should describe how measurements were made and indicate how treatments were assigned to units or blocks, and the number of replicates.
The experimental design dictates the proper method of statistical analysis and the basis of assessing the precision of treatment means. The precision achieved should be reported by a standard error of the treatment mean or a coefficient of variation. Treatment comparisons such as the least significant difference (lsd) may be made when the variance ratio (F value) is significant. Brief analysis of variance (ANOVA) tables with mean squares and degrees of freedommay be published.

Tables : it must be numbered with arabic numerals and each must be accompanied by a title. Tables should be arranged with regard to the dimensions of the printed page (12.5 by 20 cm) and the number of columns kept to a minimum. Excessive sub-division of column headings is undesirable and long headings should be avoided. The first letter only of headings to rows and vertical columns should be capitalised. The symbol for the unit of measurement should be placed in parentheses beneath the column heading. Footnotes should be reserved for specific items in columns. Horizontal rules should be inserted only above and below column headings and at the foot of the table. Vertical rules must not be used. Each table must be referred in the text. Short tables may be incorporated into the text as a sentence or as a brief untitled tabulation.

Illustrations :
Authors should submit lettered line drawings and lettered and mounted photographs which comply with the instructions below. Unsatisfactory figures will be returned for correction.
Line drawings :
Original line drawings may be produced using computer graphics with laser printing, or drawn with black ink on white board or on drawing or tracing paper, and with regard to the size of the printed page (12.5 by 20 cm). Explanations of symbols used should be given in the caption to the figure. Lettering of the graphs should be kept to a minimum. Grid marks should point inwards; legends to axes should state the quantity being measured and be followed by the appropriate SI units in parentheses.
Photographs :
Photographs must be of the highest quality with a full range of tones and of good contrast. Lettering should be in contrast with its background. The size should be such that the final height after reduction is 1.5 – 2 mm. A scale bar must be inserted on each photomicrograph and electron micrograph. Important features to which attention has been drawn in the text should be indicated. Colour photographs will be accepted if they are essential but the cost of production must be borne by the authors.

Short Communication : The style of presenting a Short communication is less formal as compared with the ‘full-length article’. The sections on Abstract, Materials and Methods, Results and Discussion and Conclusion are omitted but the material is put concisely in the same sequence but without formal sections.

Checklist for preparation of manuscripts :

  1. Type of manuscript double-spaced throughout, including references, figure captions and tables
  2. Type the title and all headings aligned left, with only the first letter of the first word and of any proper name capitalised.
  3. Main headings (Introduction, Materials and methods, Results and discussion, Acknowledgements, References) are set in bold roman (not italic) type. Minor headings are set in the light italic type.
  4. Use the conventions ‘from … to , ‘between …. and’, ‘range x-y’.
  5. Check that all references mentioned in the text are in the References, and vice-versa.
  6. List references in the text in chronological order, separated by semi-colons. Do not use a comma between the author’s name and the date. List references in the References in alphabetical order.
  7. Give full journal and book titles in the References. The journal names should be in italics.
  8. Use Arabic numerals in the text but in headings spell out numbers less than 10. Type a space between a numeral and its unit (e.g. 3 mm).
  9. Check that the stippling and/or symbols are legible at the size likely to be used in the published article.
  10. Type tables with the title as a separate paragraph.
  11. Indicate approximate positions of figures and tables on the manuscript.
  12. Check that figures are numbered in the order in which they are discussed in the text.
  13. Suggest a ‘short title’ for the paper of not more than 50 characters (including spaces).
  14. Return the requested number of revised manuscripts; also, return the original manuscript annotated by the editor.
  15. Provide email and postal address for the corresponding author.

Correspondence : When you submit a manuscript, please provide us with your telephone number, email address as well as your postal address; we may need to contact you urgently.

Address for submissions :
The Honorary Secretary,
Indian Society of Soil Survey and Land Use Planning,
NBSS&LUP, Amravati Road, Nagpur-440 033, INDIA