In cases where the reviewers or an Editorial Board Member have requested amendments, the manuscript is sent to the authors with remarks by the reviewers and/or the Scientific Editor. The authors are requested to indicate all sites in the manuscript where revisions are made. In case of dissent from a reviewer or the Editor, the author(s) should substantiate his/her opinion.
A manuscript sent by the Editor after review and revised in accordance with reviewer’s remarks should be returned to the Editor within 21 days after its receipt by the author(s). An article returned after the expiration of this term will be assigned a new date of submission.
The journal does not provide authors with hard copies of proofs. The article is sent to its authors in the form of a *.pdf file. No revisions of the text, figures, or tables are allowed at the proofreading step. If corrections are made, the proofs should be returned to the Editor together with a separate file with a detailed list of the corrections.
The journal reserves the right to reject articles out of the journal scope or breaching the instructions to authors without reviewing.
Electronic mail is used by editors and reviewers for communication with authors at all steps of work with manuscripts; therefore, authors are requested to indicate carefully their email addresses.
Copyright notice
Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:
- Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work licensed 6 months after publication under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work’s authorship and initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).
I. Before submission
The submission of a paper to Letters to the Vavilov Journal of Genetics and Breeding implies that
- the paper has not been published in other media;
- the paper is not being reviewed in another media outlet; and
- all co-authors agree with the publication of the current version of the paper.
Prior to the submission, make sure that the file(s) contain(s) all the necessary information in Russian and English; references to the sources of information presented in figures and tables are indicated; and all quotations are checked and provided with pages of the source.
Authors are encouraged to indicate their Open Researcher and Contributor IDs (ORCIDs). If an author has none, he/she can register at https://orcid.org/. ORCID ID is a nonprofitable project aimed at the assignment of a unique code to each author of scientific articles. Absence of an ORCID ID does not preclude the publication.
The Editorial Board of Letters to the Vavilov Journal of Genetics and Breeding recommends authors to adhere the following materials:
In preparing systematic reviews: “PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses)“;
In preparing articles presenting the results of qualitative studies: “SRQR (Standards for reporting qualitative research).
II. How to submit
Manuscripts are submitted to the Editorial Board by e-mail: pismavavilov@bionet.nsc.ru.
The manuscript should be attached as a Microsoft Word file: *.doc, *.docx, or *.rtf.
III. Editorial communication and peer reviewing
All articles received by the editors for publication in Letters to the Vavilov Journal of Genetics and Breeding undergo a mandatory single-blind review, i.e., the authors are not informed of the identity and contact details of the reviewers.
Internal reviewing
All the manuscripts submitted to the journal must comply with the formal requirements. At this stage, a manuscript can be returned to the authors for revision with a request to correct errors and/or add missing data. An article may be rejected due to inconsistency with the goals of the journal and the authors’ failure to adhere the registration rules.
Manuscript reviewers are appointed by the Scientific Editor. After the preliminary check, a manuscript is sent to the reviewer with indicating the terms of review and notifying the Corresponding Author. The editors correspond with the Corresponding Author with the copies being sent to all authors whose e-mail address is indicated in the manuscript.
External reviewing
Manuscripts are reviewed by Editorial Board members as well as invited experts in the field of genetics and breeding. The authors have the right to propose at least three reviewers, the proposed reviewers should not have joint scientific publications with any of the authors of the manuscript in question for two years preceding the date of submission of the manuscript to the journal or be employed by the same organization where the authors of the manuscript work. The Editorial Board reserves the right to reject the proposed reviewers. The proposed reviewers are to be renown experts in the peer-reviewed field of knowledge and have publications on the subject of peer-reviewed manuscript over the past 3 years. The review period is 3 weeks and can be extended at the reviewer’s request.
Reviewers should inform the Scientific Editor about any conflict of interest that may affect their opinion about the manuscript under consideration and have the right to refuse to review the proposed manuscript. The unpublished data obtained from peer-reviewed manuscripts may not be used for personal purposes and own research as well as disclosed to third parties.
Reviews are stored in the Editorial Office for five years. The editors may send their copies the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation upon receipt of a corresponding request.
Manuscript correction
If reviewers have a positive opinion of a manuscript, the Eitor sends the last to the Technical Editorial Office to have it prepared for publication. In case the reviewers insist to revise the manuscript, their remarks and comments are sent to the author, who has three weeks to improve the paper. If during this period the revised version of the manuscript is not received by the editors, the paper is removed from the publication queue, and the authors are notified accordingly.
The changes must be made by the authors in the electronic version of the manuscript and returned to the editors. If the authors disagree with the reviewer and/or editor, they should justify their position. The Corresponding Author receives the final version of the manuscript accepted for publication for approval that should be given within 48 hours. If no approval is received, the manuscript layout is considered approved.
Refusal to publication
A decision not to publish a submitted manuscript is made by the members of the Editorial Board and the Scientific Editor based on reviewers’ recommendations. A manuscript not recommended for publication is not to be reconsidered. When refusing a manuscript, a reasoned refusal is sent to the authors. If the authors disagree with the conclusions made by the reviewers and/or editor or some of their individual comments, they can dispute them with reason.
In disputable cases, the editor may involve additional experts in this field of knowledge in the review process. In conflict situations, the decision is made by the Editor-in-Chief at a meeting of the Editorial Board.
IV. Revision of decisions of the Editor/Reviewer
In case of dissent from a reviewer or the Editor, the author(s) should clearly detail and substantiate his/her opinion.
V. Scenario for detection of plagiarism, data falsification, or hoax
If plagiarism, data falsification, or hoax are identified, the COPE guidelines on plagiarism will be followed.
VI. Correction of errors and article retraction
In case of detection of errors in an article that affect its perception but not distort the presented results of the study, the errors can be corrected by replacing the pdf file with the article and indicating the error in the file itself and on the page of the article on the website of the journal.
In case of detection of errors distorting the results of the study, the article may be retracted. The retraction procedure can be initialized by the Editorial Board, author, institution, or a private person.
A retracted article is labeled “Article retracted”, and the information on the reasons for the retraction is placed on the webpage of the article. Information on article retraction is sent to databases where the journal is indexed.
Preparation of manuscript
1. Article title
The article title is presented in Russian and English
2. Authors’ names and initials
In the Russian text, initials should be first, followed by the last name.
In English, names should follow the format “First name, Patronym (second name) initial, Last name”. Last names should be spelt according to the transliteration rules in force in the Russian Federation.
The name of the corresponding author is followed by his/her e-mail address.
3. Affiliations
An affiliation includes the full formal name of the institution and its full postal address (including postal code, city, and country). Authors are requested to indicate all places of employment relevant to the study.
In case when authors are employed at different institutions, the employment at a certain institution is indicated with a superscript.
In the English information block, formal English names of all institutions are indicated.
4. Abstract
The abstract is presented in Russian and English. It should concisely outline the topicality of the study, its main goal, approaches used, results, and main conclusions. The recommended volume of an abstract is 200–250 words. Annotations should not contain first coined terms, abbreviations (except for generally accepted ones), or references.
5. Keywords
The number of keywords is recommended to be no more than ten. It is desirable that the keywords supplement the abstract and title.
6. Body of the article
The following section headings are recommended for experimental articles: Introduction; Materials and methods; Results; Discussion, Conclusions; References.
Review articles may be of arbitrary structure, but an abstract is mandatory. Section headings in such articles are at authors’ discretion.
Latin names of the objects of studies should be written in the title and the body text according to common rules of taxonomic notation. Binary names of species are typed in italic (Drosophila melanogaster), and taxa of higher ranks, in Roman. When mentioned first, the generic and specific names are typed in full, and then the generic name is indicated with its uppercase first letter and the specific name is indicated in full (D. melanogaster).
The names and symbols of genes are typed in italic, and the names of their products, in Roman with appropriate capitalization accepted for the species in question. Examples of genes: fos, c-myc, ATM. Proteins: Fos, c-Myc, ATM. Italicized are also designations of mobile elements, such as hobo, and the first three letters of a restriction site, e.g., HindIII. Names of phages and viruses are typed in Roman according to their Latin spelling.
Commonly accepted abbreviations are preferable. Unusual units or abbreviations should be spelled out in full or defined in the text. Authors are requested to use the International System of Units (Système International d’Unités).
Mathematical formulae should be typed in MS WinWord (6.0 or newer) or in MathType. Equations are centered and enumerated with Arabic numerals in parentheses in textual order. Numbers of equations are aligned right. Blank lines should be inserted before and after each equation. Several consecutive equations should also be separated by blank lines.
All copyrighted figures should be supplemented with written licenses to publish from the copyright holders.
- Figures
Figures should be printable
Figures should be supplied with captions and their English translations
Figures are enumerated with Arabic numerals in textual order. If there is only one figure in a paper, it is not enumerated.
Figures are referred to in the text as “It follows from Figure 3 that…” or “It is shown that… (Fig. 3)”.
A caption includes the running number and title of the figure. It is center aligned.
No period is put after a caption.
A caption in Russian is followed by its English translation.
- Tables
Tables should be printable and of good quality. Editable tables are preferable to scanned or drawn.
All tables should have headings.
The headings should be translated into English
Tables are enumerated with Arabic numerals in textual order. If there is only one table in the paper, it is not enumerated.
No word clipping should be used in tables. All acronyms should be expanded in table footnotes.
Tables are referred to in the text as “Table 3 indicates that…” or “It is indicated that… (Table 3)”.
A heading includes the running number and title of the table. No period is put after a caption.
A heading is center aligned. A caption in Russian is followed by its English translation:
Таблица 2. Описание жизненно важных процессов
Table 2. Description of vital processes
- Screenshots and photographs
Screenshots, photographs, and other raster images should be submitted as separate *.jpeg, *.bmp, *.gif files (*.doc or *docx if the image contains additional remarks) in the specialized item of the form for article submission. The resolution should be no less than 300 dpi. The files should be named in accordance with the running numbers of the figures. The description of such a file should contain a caption corresponding to the title of the image in the body file.
- Footnotes
Footnotes are enumerated with Arabic numerals and placed pagewise. They may include references to anonymous sources in Internet, references to textbooks, GOSTs, statistical reports, articles in mass media, synopses, and dissertations (unless articles based on dissertation research can be referred to), as well as author’s comments.
7. Acknowledgments
All funding sources are indicated. Expressions of gratitude to people that contributed to the study without being its authors are included.
8. Conflicts of interest
If there are no conflicts of interests, the authors should state it in the article. Example: “The authors declare no conflict of interest”. Otherwise they shall inform the Editorial Board on actual or potential conflicts of interest by mentioning them in the corresponding sections of the article.
9. References
The journal adheres to the Harvard quotation style. References should appear in text in parentheses. The last name of a cited author is indicated without initials, followed by the year of publication, e.g., (Ivanov, 1999). If two authors with the same last name are cited, initials are indicated, e.g., (Ivanov I.P., 1999; Ivanov M.Yu., 2009) In case of two authors, both last names are indicated with the year of publication, e.g., (Gihr, Smith, 2001). Works by three or more authors are referred to as follows: (Gatsby et al., 1998).
When several publications are cited, the references in parentheses are arranged in chronological order, e.g. “In several papers (Smirnov, 1978; Smith, Gatsby, 1998; Pavlova et al., 2001)…”. In sequences of papers of one year, references are arranged alphabetically. Two or more references by the same author(s) with the same year of publication should be designated by Roman lowercase letters, e.g., (Smirnov et al., 2005a, b; Smith 2007, a, c; Ulrich et al., 2008b). The order of alphabetical indexing is determined by the positions of sources in the References section.
Only reviewed sources (articles from scientific journals and monographs) mentioned in the text body are included in References. It is not advisable to include synopses, dissertations, textbooks, GOSTs, information from Web sites, statistical reports, articles in newspapers, or blogs. If it is necessary to refer to such sources, the references should be placed into footnotes.
The cited sources are arranged into alphabetical lists indicating last names and initials of all authors of each publication. Works of a certain author are arranged in chronological order. All authors of an article, monograph, etc. should be indicated.
References to articles from journals should indicate the year of publication, journal volume and issue, page numbers, DOI, and Web hyperlink.
References to articles accepted for publication but not yet published should be indicated “in press”. The author(s) should provide written permission for reference to such papers and the warranty of their acceptance. Information from unpublished sources should be indicated “unpublished data/documents”. The author(s) should provide written permission for using such materials.
References should be verified, and the publication data should be checked on the official websites of the journals and/or editorials.
The list of references should be translated into English. A reference to a Russian-language source ends in the indication of the language: (In Russ.)
Names of authors and journals are transliterated according to the BSI standard.
Examples of references
References to non-Russian sources
1Lastname Initials, 2Lastname Initials. Article Title. Journal Name. Year; Volume(No.):00–00. DOI: 10.13655/1.6.1234567.
References to non-Russian monographs
- With 1–3 authors:
1Lastname Initials, 2Lastname Initials. Book Title. Edition No. City: Editorial; Year.
- Indicating the editor or compiler
1Lastname Initials, 2Lastname Initials. 3Lastname Initials, eds. Title. Edition No. City: Editorial; Year.
- Chapter from a monograph or collection of articles
1Lastname Initials, 2Lastname Initials, (Ed.) Title. Edition No. City: Editorial; Year.
Names of journals and monograph titles are italicized. Initials are followed by periods. No comma is set between a last name and initials.
References to translated articles or monographs
Article. Authors (transliteration) [English translation of the article title in brackets]. Title of the Russian-language source (transliteration). Publication data with designations in English or purely numerical. Indication of the language (in Russ.)
Monograph. [English translation of the monograph title in brackets]. Publication data: editorial name in English, if it is an institution, and transliteration, if it is a publishing house (this should be indicated). Number of pages.
1Familiya I.O., 2Familiya I.O. [Translation of the article title]. Transliteration of the journal name = Formal English name. Year; Volume(No.): 00–00. DOI: 0000-0000 (In Russ.)
1Familiya I.O. [Translation of the monograph title]. City: Izdatel’stvo; 2000 (In Russ.)
References to Internet sources
Note: It is preferable to refer to the website mentioned in the article.
Publication title [site]. Site name; 2016 [version of October 19, 2016; accessed October30, 2016]. Available at http://www.example.ru.