Instructions to Authors

Declarations to be made regarding preprints

If a manuscript is published in a preprint repository, authors need to declare this at the time of submission. If the manuscript is accepted, authors need to assure that the DOI of the manuscript published in the preprint repository will be linked to the DOI of the paper published in chetana.

Declarations to be made regarding ethical issues

Manuscripts that deal with clinical findings should be enclosed with a statement on informed consent of the patients under study.

If humans and animals are the subject of a clinical study, it is essential for the study to have been carried out in accordance with the ethical standards of the country/countries where the research described in the article has been conducted. A declaration to that effect must accompany the manuscript.

Supplementary material

Detailed tables can be submitted as supplementary material, which will be published online. If tables with huge data are not submitted as supplementary material and are found suitable for online publishing only, the discretion to use these as supplementary material lies with the journal. The authors will be informed about this during the processing of their manuscripts.

Any details and queries regarding supplementary material should be addressed to the corresponding author of the paper. The published material cannot be reproduced without permission from the author.

Author conflict of interest statement

Authors must acknowledge the organizations that have provided financial support for their work. Any other conflict of interest must be declared while submitting the manuscripts.

Article: An Article is a substantial, in-depth, novel research study of interest to the readership of the journal. The structure an Article should follow is detailed below. Specifications: Unstructured abstract max. 200 words; Main body of text (excluding abstract, tables/figures, and references) not to exceed 4,500 words; Max 8 tables or figures; Max 80 references

Review Article: A Review Article is an authoritative, balanced survey of recent developments in a research field. Review Articles should incorporate a) a review of previously published literature from the past 5-10 years, describing the pros and cons of these studies, b) the authors opinion on how to approach the issue/situation being discussed, c) the authors thoughts on what is necessary to move the field forward in the future. Review Articles are regularly commissioned; however, pre-submission enquiries are also welcome
Specifications: Unstructured abstract max. 300 words; Main body of text (excluding abstract, tables/figures, and references) not to exceed 6,000 words; Max 8 tables or figures; Max 100 references

Brief Communication: A brief communication is a concise, independent report representing a significant and timely contribution to the field of science. A short communication is not intended to publish preliminary results. The results must be of exceptional interest and relevant to be considered for publication. Specifications: Unstructured abstract max. 200 words; Main body of text (excluding abstract, tables/figures, and references) not to exceed 2,500 words; Max 4 tables or figures; Max 40 references

Manuscript Preparation

  • Manuscripts should be typed in Arial font 10 pt and double-spaced.
  • The pages should be numbered consecutively, starting with the title page and through the text, reference list, tables and figure legends.
  • The manuscript should be ordered as follows: Title page, abstract, key words, text, acknowledgements, references, tables, figure legends (on separate page preceding the first figure), figures (one figure per page; the figures should be labelled).
  • The title page should contain Title, Authors, Affiliations, and Corresponding author and address.
  • The title should be brief, specific and amenable to indexing.
  • Not more than five keywords should be indicated separately; these should be chosen carefully and must not be phrases of several words.
  • Abstract and summary should be limited to 200 words and convey the main points of the paper, outline the results and conclusions, and explain the significance of the results.

Text: All papers should have a brief introduction. The text should be intelligible to readers in different disciplines and technical terms should be defined. Tables and figures should be referred to in numerical order. All symbols and abbreviations must be defined, and used only when necessary. Superscripts, subscripts and ambiguous characters should be clearly indicated. Units of measure should be metric or, preferably, SI.

Figures: Line drawings should be roughly twice the final printed size. Photomicrographs and other photographs that require, it must have a scale bar, which should be defined clearly in the legend. Primary data should be submitted as far as possible (e.g. actual photographs of electrophoretic gels rather than idealized diagrams). The map of India, if forming a part of the article, must conform to official maps released by the Survey of India, giving reference to the source map. Lettering should be sufficiently large to be clear after reduction to print size.

References: should be numbered in superscript, serially in the order in which they appear, first through the text and then through table and figure legends. References should not include unpublished source materials. The list of References at the end of the text should be in the following format.

  1. Lindley, S. T., Estimation of population growth and extinction parameters from noisy data. Ecol. Appl., 2003, 13, 806-813.
  2. Martin, H., The Archaean grey gnesisses and the genesis of continental crust. In Archaean Crustal Evolution (ed. Condie, K. C.), Elsevier, Amsterdam, 1994, pp. 205-259.
  3. Rao, K. N. and Vaidyanadhan, R., Geomorphic features in Krishna Delta and its evolution. In Proceedings of the National Symposium on Morphology and Evolution of Landforms, Department of Geology, Delhi University, New Delhi, 1978.

Acknowledgements: should be as brief as possible. Footnotes are not normally allowed except to identify the author for correspondence.

Cover photographs: Good colour photographs that pertain to a submitted paper will be considered for use on the cover. Good prints and a legend should be submitted with the manuscript.

Jurisdiction:. The jurisdiction for all disputes concerning submitted articles, published material, advertisement, subscription and sale will be at courts/tribunals situated in Kerala only.