Manuscript Preparation
Language
Manuscripts should be in English. We suggest that authors whose first language is not English have their manuscripts checked by a native English speaker before submission. This is optional, but will help to ensure that any submissions that reach peer review can be judged exclusively on academic merit. We offer a Cambridge service which you can find out more about here, and suggest that authors contact as appropriate. Please note that use of language editing services is voluntary, and at the author’s own expense. Use of these services does not guarantee that the manuscript will be accepted for publication, nor does it restrict the author to submitting to a Cambridge-published journal.
Manuscript Content
Manuscripts should be prepared according to the following structure:
• The text, divided under the following section headings, Abstract, Introduction, Materials and methods, Results, Discussion, Acknowledgements, Conflict of interest, References. Do not number section and subsection headings. Section headings in bold. Subheadings in italics.
• Acknowledgements (if any)
• Conflicts of interest declaration (for further information about what this declaration should look like please see below)
• References (for further information about presenting references please see below)
• Tables, either at the end of the manuscript or as separate files. Tables should be numbered consecutively with Arabic numerals and every table should be mentioned at least once in the text.
• Illustrations should be submitted as separate files in TIF or EPS format but captions to illustrations should be supplied on a separate sheet at the end of the main manuscript.
Research Papers should not exceed 8,000 words, while Reviews may be up to 10,000 words in length.
Manuscripts that do not follow the BER style will be returned to the submitting author with the request to correctly format the submission
Abstract
Each paper must commence with an accurate, informative abstract in one paragraph that is complete in itself and intelligible without reference to text or figures. It should not exceed 250 words. A short title should also be provided for use as a running head, and authors should specify keywords for the article.
Policy on prior publication
When authors submit manuscripts to this journal, these manuscripts should not be under consideration, accepted for publication or in press within a different journal, book or similar entity, unless explicit permission or agreement has been sought from all entities involved. However, deposition of a preprint on the author’s personal website, in an institutional repository, or in a preprint archive shall not be viewed as prior or duplicate publication. Authors should follow the Cambridge University Press Preprint Policy regarding preprint archives and maintaining the version of record.
References
References must be based on the name and year system, give full journal titles and conform to the following styles:
Follett, P.A. and Roderick, G.K. (1996) Genetic estimates of dispersal ability in the leucaena psyllid predator Curinus coeruleus (Coleoptera: Coccinellidae): implications for biological control. Bulletin of Entomological Research 86, 355-361.
Nevill, E.M., Kappmeier, K. & Venter, G.J. (1993) Tsetse fly research in Zululand. p. 81 in Proceedings of the ninth Entomological Congress organized by the Entomological Society of Southern Africa, Johannesburg, 28 June-1 July 1993 Pretoria, Entomological Society of South Africa.
Wilson, M.D. and Post, R.J. (1994) Integration of morphometric, cytogenetic and molecular techniques: a case study of Simulium damnosum pp. 215-224 in Hawksworth, D.L. (Ed.) The identification and characterization of pest organisms. Wallingford, CAB International.
Please list papers by more than two authors, but with the same first author, by year sequence and alphabetically within each year. Citation of authors in the text should appear in the form: Polaszek (1996) or (Polaszek, 1996). Authors should be cited in chronological order as: (Blackman et al., 1994; Roberts and Kumar, 1995).
For references cited in the text. Sole author - Smith, 2020; two authors - Smith and Jones, 2020 ; three of more authors – Smith et al., 2020. Authors should be cited in chronological order e.g. (Smith et al. 1994; Jones et al. 2000).
Tables
Tables should be in a simple form. They should not be used if text or illustrations give the same information. They can either be submitted as separate files (Microsoft Word or Excel) or embedded within the main manuscript text file. Each table must be accompanied by a clear and concise caption.
Illustrations
Illustrations should be submitted in TIF or EPS format at approximate final publication size. Resolution of artwork should be at the following minimum resolutions: Line artwork (black & White), 1200dpi; Combination, i.e. line/tone (greyscale), 800dpi; Black & White halftone (greyscale), 300dpi; and colour halftone, 300dpi. Comprehensive guidance on creating suitable electronic figures is available here.
Captions should be listed at the end of the manuscript text. Please:
• ensure text figures, line drawings, computer-generated figures and graphs are of sufficient size and quality to allow for reduction
• avoid the use of grey tints or complex hatching
• use halftone images where they make a real contribution to the text, and ensure they are of good quality at the intended final size with any required lettering or numbering inserted by the author
• type figure captions and numbers on a separate page at the end of the body text of the manuscript
• inform the Editorial Office at the earliest opportunity if you wish to use colour figures (we will ask authors to pay in advance for the use of colour, but we can advise on how this can be kept to a minimum if we know your plans).
Submission
Please follow the following instructions to supply supplementary material to accompany the online version of your article:
1. Each supplementary file must be supplied as a separate file. Do not supply this material as part of the file destined for publication in the print journal.
2. Each supplementary file must have a clear title (e.g. Supplementary Figure 1).
3. Provide a text summary for each file of no more than 50 words. The summary should describe the contents of the file. Descriptions of individual figures or tables should be provided if these items are submitted as separate files. If a group of figures is submitted together in one file, the description should indicate how many figures are contained within the file and provide a general description of what the figures collectively show.
4. The file type and file size in parentheses.
5. Ensure that each piece of supplementary material is clearly referred to at least once in the print version of the paper at an appropriate point in the text, and is also listed at the end of the paper before the reference section.
Format and file size
• File sizes should be as small as possible in order to ensure that users can download them quickly.
• Images should be a maximum size of 640 x 480 pixels at a resolution of 72 pixels per inch.
• Authors should limit the number of files to under ten, with a total size not normally exceeding 3 MB. Sound/movie files may be up to 10 MB per file; colour PDFs/PowerPoint may be up to 5 MB per file; all other general file types may be up to 2 MB per file but most files should be much smaller.
• We accept files in any of the following formats (if in doubt please enquire first):
MS Word document (.doc) , Adobe Acrobat (.pdf), Plain ASCII text (.txt), Rich Text Format (.rtf), WordPerfect document (.wpd), HTML document (.htm), MS Excel spreadsheet (.xls), GIF image (.gif), JPEG image (.jpg), TIFF image (.tif), MS PowerPoint slide (.ppt), QuickTime movie (.mov), Audio file (.wav), Audio file (.mp3), MPEG/MPG animation (.mpg)
If your file sizes exceed these limits or if you cannot submit in these formats, please seek advice from the editor handling your manuscript.
Technical and Nomenclature Standards
All work should use SI units as standard.
Anatomical terms can be a mixture of the English vernacular and Latin, depending on current usage. When a Latin term is selected for use, it should correspond with the Nomina Anatomica Veterinaria. Where doubts could arise, then the first time a vernacular term is used, the Latin should be provided in parentheses; thereafter the vernacular can be used alone.
Manuscript Preparation
We kindly ask that you follow the instructions below for the final manuscript. This will minimize the risk of errors being introduced during the publishing process.
• Use double line spacing and ample margins (at least 2.5 cm) on each side
• Do not underline anything
• Number each line consecutively across the pages of the manuscript, rather than within pages
• Do not indent the start of the first paragraph in section, indent the start of all other paragraphs in the section.
• Species names are to be provided in full the first time it is used and followed by (Order: Family) e.g. Anastrepha fraterculus (Diptera: Tephritidae)
• Number every page (preferably the top right corner)
• Use italics for taxonomic nomenclature and bold for headings
• Use standard abbreviations (e.g. Fig. and Figs) and SI units
• Use British rather than American spellings, and 'z' rather than 's' spellings in words with 'ize'
Voucher Specimens
The deposition of voucher specimens should be considered where appropriate.
Supplementary materials
Material that is not essential to understanding or supporting a manuscript, but which may nonetheless be relevant or interesting to readers, may be submitted as supplementary material. Supplementary material will be published online alongside your article, but will not be published in the pages of the journal. Types of supplementary material may include, but are not limited to, appendices, additional tables or figures, datasets, videos, and sound files.
Supplementary materials will not be typeset or copyedited, so should be supplied exactly as they are to appear online. Please see our general guidance on supplementary materials for further information.
Where relevant we encourage authors to publish additional qualitative or quantitative research outputs in an appropriate repository, and cite these in manuscripts.
English language editing services
Authors, particularly those whose first language is not English, may wish to have their English-language manuscripts checked by a native speaker before submission. This step is optional, but may help to ensure that the academic content of the paper is fully understood by the Editor and any reviewers.
In order to help prospective authors to prepare for submission and to reach their publication goals, Cambridge University Press offers a range of high-quality manuscript preparation services – including language editing – delivered in partnership with American Journal Experts. You can find out more on our Language Services page.
Please note that the use of any of these services is voluntary, and at the author's own expense. Use of these services does not guarantee that the manuscript will be accepted for publication, nor does it restrict the author to submitting to a Cambridge-published journal.
Competing Interests
All authors must include a competing interest declaration in their main manuscript file. This declaration will be subject to editorial review and may be published in the article.
Competing interests are situations that could be perceived to exert an undue influence on the content or publication of an author’s work. They may include, but are not limited to, financial, professional, contractual or personal relationships or situations.
If the manuscript has multiple authors, the author submitting must include competing interest declarations relevant to all contributing authors.
Example wording for a declaration is as follows: “Competing interests: Author 1 is employed at organisation A, Author 2 is on the Board of company B and is a member of organisation C. Author 3 has received grants from company D.” If no competing interests exist, the declaration should state “Competing interests: The author(s) declare none”.
Authorship and contributorship
All authors listed on any papers submitted to this journal must be in agreement that the authors listed would all be considered authors according to disciplinary norms, and that no authors who would reasonably be considered an author have been excluded. For further details on this journal’s authorship policy, please see this journal's publishing ethics policies.
Author affiliations
Author affiliations should represent the institution(s) at which the research presented was conducted and/or supported and/or approved. For non-research content, any affiliations should represent the institution(s) with which each author is currently affiliated.
For more information, please see our author affiliation policy and author affiliation FAQs.
Author Hub
You can find guides for many aspects of publishing with Cambridge at Author Hub, our suite of resources for Cambridge authors.
Use of artificial intelligence (AI) tools
We acknowledge the increasing use of artificial intelligence (AI) tools in the research and writing processes. To ensure transparency, we expect any such use to be declared and described fully to readers, and to comply with our plagiarism policy and best practices regarding citation and acknowledgements. We do not consider artificial intelligence (AI) tools to meet the accountability requirements of authorship, and therefore generative AI tools such as ChatGPT and similar should not be listed as an author on any submitted content.
In particular, any use of an AI tool:
- to generate images within the manuscript should be accompanied by a full description of the process used, and declared clearly in the image caption(s)
- to generate text within the manuscript should be accompanied by a full description of the process used, include appropriate and valid references and citations, and be declared in the manuscript’s Acknowledgements.
- to analyse or extract insights from data or other materials, for example through the use of text and data mining, should be accompanied by a full description of the process used, including details and appropriate citation of any dataset(s) or other material analysed in all relevant and appropriate areas of the manuscript
- must not present ideas, words, data, or other material produced by third parties without appropriate acknowledgement or permission
Descriptions of AI processes used should include at minimum the version of the tool/algorithm used, where it can be accessed, any proprietary information relevant to the use of the tool/algorithm, any modifications of the tool made by the researchers (such as the addition of data to a tool’s public corpus), and the date(s) it was used for the purpose(s) described. Any relevant competing interests or potential bias arising as a consequence of the tool/algorithm’s use should be transparently declared and may be discussed in the article.
ORCID
We require all corresponding authors to identify themselves using ORCID when submitting a manuscript to this journal. ORCID provides a unique identifier for researchers and, through integration with key research workflows such as manuscript submission and grant applications, provides the following benefits:
- Discoverability: ORCID increases the discoverability of your publications, by enabling smarter publisher systems and by helping readers to reliably find work that you have authored.
- Convenience: As more organisations use ORCID, providing your iD or using it to register for services will automatically link activities to your ORCID record, and will enable you to share this information with other systems and platforms you use, saving you re-keying information multiple times.
- Keeping track: Your ORCID record is a neat place to store and (if you choose) share validated information about your research activities and affiliations.
See our ORCID FAQs for more information.
If you don’t already have an iD, you will need to create one if you decide to submit a manuscript to this journal. You can register for one directly from your user account on Editorial Manager, or alternatively via https://ORCID.org/register.
If you already have an iD, please use this when submitting your manuscript, either by linking it to your Editorial Manager account, or by supplying it during submission.
ORCIDs can also be used if authors wish to communicate to readers up-to-date information about how they wish to be addressed or referred to (for example, they wish to include pronouns, additional titles, honorifics, name variations, etc.) alongside their published articles. We encourage authors to make use of the ORCID profile’s “Published Name” field for this purpose. This is entirely optional for authors who wish to communicate such information in connection with their article. Please note that this method is not currently recommended for author name changes: see Cambridge’s author name change policy if you want to change your name on an already published article. See our ORCID FAQs for more information.