Instructions for Authors [1])  Download as pdf-file

1. General Policy

Chemistry & Biodiversity is an international journal published by Verlag Helvetica Chimica Acta, Zurich, Switzerland – a member of the Wiley group – in close association with the Center for the Study of Biological Complexity (Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, USA). The journal publishes full-length articles, short communications, reviews, and commen­taries on all aspects of biologically relevant chemistry (cf. Table 1).

Table 1. Coverage of Chemistry & Biodiversity by Means of Target Keywords (not restrictive) 

A strong chemical focus and proper manuscript preparation (see below) are absolute prerequisites for publication. Articles should be written to meet the interests of readers of both the chemistry and the life-science communities.

2. Types of Contributions

Chemistry & Biodiversity publishes field-specific and interdisciplinary high-quality contributions on all research fields that straddle the border between the chemical and the biological sciences, with the ultimate goal of broadening our understanding of how nature works at a molecular level. Considered for publication will be submissions on all aspects of biologically relevant chemistry in the form of full-length original papers, reviews, short communications, and commentaries.

Original research papers should contain the results of experimental and/or theoretical studies that have not been previously published elsewhere.

Communications, like original research papers, should also contain original results, but must be narrowly focused, brief descriptions of research that is sufficiently time-sensitive to warrant rapid communication.

Reviews may be either invited or unsolicited, and should contain a critically written discussion of results from studies under a particular topic or group of related topics. Reviews may also provide the readers with an insightful introduction to new and ground-breaking areas of research.

Commentaries may contain opinions and/or views covering topics, including controversial ones, that fall under the purview of the journal.

3. Submission of Manuscripts

Manuscripts, including full electronic material, are to be submitted in triplicate,with a cover letter to the Editor, Dr. M. Volkan Kisakürek, to:

Chemistry & Biodiversity
Verlag Helvetica Chimica Acta
Hofwiesenstrasse 26
Postfach
CH-8042 Zurich
Switzerland

Phone:             +41 44 360 24 34
Fax:                  +41 44 360 24 35
e-Mail:               editor@chembiodiv.ch

Contributions from the USA and Canada can, alternatively, be submitted to the Associate Editor of the Journal:

Prof. Lemont Kier
Virginia Commonwealth University
Center for the Study of Biological Complexity
1000 West Cary Street
P.O. Box 842030
Richmond, VA 23284-2030, USA
e-Mail:               kier@mail2.vcu.edu

Initial manuscript submissions by e-mail should be followed up with the original copies as soon as possible. Important: electronic and printed versions must be absolutely identical!

The receipt of the manuscript for consideration will be acknowledged by the Editorial Office, preferably via e-mail, and a manuscript reference number will be provided. The reference number must be quoted in all subsequent correspondence. Carefully prepared manuscripts are peer-reviewed and, once accepted, thoroughly edited by professional scientific editors.

Authors should be aware that copyright is automatically transferred to Verlag Helvetica Chimica Acta when the manuscript has been accepted, and that subsequent reproduction of text and/or figures requires the agreement of the Editorial Office.

4. Preparation of Manuscripts

General. – Manuscripts must be written in concise, grammatically correct English. The text (including references and legends) must be typed double-spaced (for manual editing) and printed on white paper. Please leave enough space for corrections (left margin: 4 cm = 1.6''). Please use Times 12 pt for text, and Arial or Helvetica fonts in graphical files (see Table 2). Do not insert any illustrations or tables into the text, but attach them on separate pages at the end of the manuscript. All manuscript pages, including title page and illustrations, have to be numbered conse­cutively in the following order:

Title Page. – The first page includes the manuscript title, the authors’ names, affiliations and addresses, and dedications (optional). For layout, please consult a current issue of Helvetica Chimica Acta.

The titles should be as informative and short as possible. Do not use abbreviations, chemical formulae, symbols, or references. Use series titles and numbers, if applicable, and footnotes ¹), ²), ³), etc. to refer to previous papers in the series. State full author names (including full first name and middle initial), using ^a), ^b), ^c), etc. to refer to different affiliations, and asterisks (*) to denote the corre­sponding author(s). Provide full addresses (street, p.o. box, city, zip code, country), as well as phone/fax number(s) and e-mail addresses.

Abstract. –On the second page, the purpose, results, and conclusions of your work should be summarized (80 – 200 words). The abstract should be placed between two horizon­tal lines as upper and lower boundaries. Do not include literature references or illustrations. Reference to structural formulae, Tables, Schemes, and/or Figures is allowed. No abstract is necessary for reviews or commentaries.

Introduction. – Here, the status of the latest re­search of the topic to be discussed should be briefly presented with leading references. The objective of the present work must be pointed out clearly in this context.

Results and Discussion. – Present your work in a form that is as interesting and concise as possible. Avoid irrelevant information, technical details, and repetition. You may choose subtitles (e.g., ‘Isolation’, ‘Characterization’, ‘Syn­thesis’, etc.). Specify where to place chemical formulae, Schemes, Figures, and Tables, but do not insert them into the text.

Acknowledgement. – This section should be kept as brief as possible. Example: ‘W.H. thanks the Swiss National Science Foundation (Grant No. 2100-063567.011) for generous financial support’.

Experimental Part [2]).– Exper. Part starts with a General section, describing abbreviations, reagents, solvents, equipment, techniques, and conditions used.

Specific information concerning structural aspects (e.g., X-ray diffraction or computational methods), purification (affinity chromatography, centrifugation, extraction, etc.), or special analytical techniques (bio-assays, staining, blotting, etc.) may be described in separate sections.

Compounds that have not yet been described in the literature should be named systematically according to the IUPAC rules or the Index Guides of Chemical Abstracts. The use of ACD/Name (version 11.0) is recommended. Synthesis and/or isolation procedures should be concise, but sufficiently detailed to allow others to reproduce the work (amount of reagents, solvents, temperature, reaction time, purification, yield, etc.). Quantities should always be given in parentheses rather than in the running text, e.g.:

 ‘Compound 10 (9.05 g, 25.0 mmol) and SOCl₂ (1.9 ml, 26.1 mmol) were dissolved in CH₂Cl₂ (20 ml) and refluxed for 1 h. After evaporation in vacuo, the residue was purified by distillation (100°/10^–2 mbar) to afford pure 11 (8.40 g, 90%)’.

New compounds must be thoroughly character­ized by at least one of the following methods: multiple NMR (¹H, ¹³C, ³¹P, 2D, NOE, DEPT, etc.), high-resolution mass spectroscopy, elemental analysis, or X-ray diffraction. The ana­lytical data are presented after the corresponding synthetic procedure in the following order:

SI Units are to be used. For exceptions, see Appendix IV in the Instructions for Authors of Helvetica Chimica Acta[1]).

References. – References must be typed double-spaced and numbered sequentially in the order they appear in the text. The numbers should be set in brackets, i.e., [1], [2], [3 – 5], etc., and must be collected in numerical order after the Exper. Part.

The names of all authors must be cited; the use of et al. or ibid. is not allowed. The full last name, preceded by only the initials of the first and middle name(s), of each author is given, followed by the abbreviated journal title (Chemical Abstracts convention) in italics, the year (bold), the volume number (italics), the issue, if required, in parentheses, and the starting page. Books, patents, personal communications, programs, and Ph.D. theses are cited as exemplified below.

Composite references are welcome. The parts are separated by semicolons and indexed only when reference is made to a specific subreference. In the latter case, a), b) c), etc., are used for the assignment. Multiple references in the text are grouped together, e.g., [1] [3–5] [8] (without comma).

Important: Descriptions and commentaries, such as ‘for a review, see...’, should not be included in the references, but are restricted to the text or to footnotes.

Examples:

        Journals:       

[1]    D. Lexa, J. M. Savéant, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 1976, 98, 2652.

        Composite references:

[2]    D. Lexa, J. M. Savéant, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 1976, 98, 2652; K. Kernbauer, O. Müller, G. Müller, Biochem. Z. 1962, 336, 102.

        Books and book chapters:

[3]    J. M. Pratt, ‘Inorganic Chemistry of Vitamin B12’, Academic Press, New York, London, 1972; C. Kratky, B. Kräutler, in ‘Chemistry and Biochemistry of B12’, Ed. R. B. Banerjee, John Wiley & Sons, New York, 1999, p. 9.

        Patents:

[4]    W. S. Struve, to DuPont de Nemours, US Pat. 2821529 (Chem. Abstr. 1958, 52, 10215d).

        Personal communications:

[5]    F. Diederich (Laboratory of Organic Chemistry, ETH Zurich), personal communication, June 2003.

        Computer programs:

[6]    G. M. Sheldrick, SHELXL97, Program for the Refinement of Crystal Structures, University of Göttingen, Germany, 1997.

        Ph.D. Theses:

[7]    B. R. Peterson, Ph.D. Thesis, University of California at Los Angeles, 1994.

Tables. – Tables should complement and not repeat text or figures. They should be prepared with a table-editing function (Word, Excel), consist of at least two columns and three rows (or vice versa), and contain a short, capitalized title in italics. Units, separated by slash (/) or put in brackets ([...]) must always be defined, either in parentheses in the title, in a table footnote by means of ^a), ^b), ^c), etc., or in the respective column headings. Each table must be printed out double-spaced on a separate page and must not be included in the text. Always specify where to insert each table into the running text. For layout, please consult a current issue of Helvetica Chimica Acta.

Legends. – Titles to Schemes (optional) or Figures (mandatory), as well as legends to Schemes (e.g., reaction conditions), should be printed out double-spaced on a separate page. Do not include titles for Tables here (see above).

Illustrations. – All graphical material (ChemDraw, ISIS/Draw, ACD/ChemSketch, Photoshop, Illustrator, CorelDraw, etc.) should be provided both electronically (in the original file format; minimum resolution: 300 dpi) and as high-quality laser printouts (triplicate). Slides and sharp photographs are also accepted, but no Xerox copies. Essential color figures are reproduced free of charge. In all other cases, additional costs for color reproductions will be charged to the authors.

For optimal reproduction, illustrations should be provided 140% of the final size, with a maximum width of 18.0 cm (7.2''). We strongly recommend the use of ChemDraw, or, if this program is not available, the free version of Isis/Draw[3] (download at www.mdli.com/download/idraw.html), or the free version of ACD/ChemSketch[3] (download at http://www.acdlabs.com/products/chem_dsn_lab/chemsketch/) . In Table 2, optimal preference settings to create chemical structures in ChemDraw are listed. For style files and drawing settings, please visit this page: chemicaldrawing.

Structure blocks, Schemes, Figures, and the Graphical Abstract must be provided, in this sequence, each on a separately numbered and labeled white sheet. Depicted compounds should be assigned a bold key number (e.g., 17) or referred to by their systematic or a trivial name. Please note that chemical-structure blocks are not counted as Figures. They will be inserted into the text without title or legend.

Table 2. Settings for Chemical Structures

Italicize symbols of physical quantities, but not their units (e.g., T/° or J [Hz]). Minus signs (–) must be as long as the crossbar of plus signs (+). Use superscripts (R¹ , R² ; R, R', etc.) to indicate varying substituents, and X, Y, Z to denote varying atoms or internal groups in a parent structure. Use subscripts (R ₂ , R₃ ,etc.) only as multiplying indices. Use Me, Et, Pr, Bu, t-Bu (or ^tBu), i-Pr (or ⁱPr), etc. Stereodescriptors such as (R), (S), (E), (Z), cis, trans, syn, anti, endo, exo are always in italics. For more assistance on scientific writing, please consult the ACS Style Guide, 2nd edn., Ed. J. S. Dodd,   American Chemical Society, Washington, D.C., 1997.

Footnotes. – Footnotes should be kept to a minimum. They are marked with ¹), ²), ³), etc., and numbered sequentially throughout the manuscript. Important: never include footnotes or comments in the Reference section.

Equations. – Chemical, physical, or mathematical equations or expressions should be numbered sequentially on the right-hand side by (1), (2), (3), etc.

Example:              ‘..., as shown in Eqn. 1’.

                                K = k_–1 / k₁                   (1)

Selected Abbreviations. – The following common abbreviations should be used. For additional ones, see Appendix III of the ‘Instructions for Authors’ of Helvetica Chimica Acta¹).

l, ml, ml, nl:       liter, milliliter, microliter, nanoliter, resp.

g, mg, kg:        gram, milligram, kilogram, resp.

M, mM ,m M:     molar, millimolar, micromolar, resp.

s, min, h, d:     second, minute, hour, day, resp.

s, d, t, q:           singlet, doublet, triplet, quadruplet, resp.

w, m, s:             weak, medium, strong (IR), resp.

Atom numbering:  C(2), H–C(3), CH₂(6), etc.

X-Ray Crystal Structures. – Prior to manuscript submission, full crystallographic data[4]) must be deposited electronically, either with the  Cambridge Crystallographic Data Centre in the case of organic compounds (cf. www.ccdc.cam.ac.uk), or macro­mol­ecular biological structures with the Protein Data Bank (cf. www.rcsb.org/pdb/). CCDC Reference numbers and PDB ID  numbers must be cited in the Exper. Part. Solved structures are best depicted with displacement ellipsoids. A brief description of the structure (bond lengths, bond angles, conformational preferences, unusual features, etc.) can be given in the text. Additional crystallographic information is best provided in the form of a table (cf. ‘Instructions for Authors’ of Helvetica Chimica Acta at www.helvchimacta.ch/instru.htm).

5. Proofs and Corrections

Corresponding authors will be provided with two sets of galley proofs, one of which must be returned together with the original, edited manuscript to Verlag Helvetica Chimica Acta within the deadline cited on the title page. Please use standard correction marks, and return the Keyword Form (for the annual subject index). Authors are solely responsible for making corrections. Changes to the proofs of errors not generated during editing will be charged to the corresponding author(s). A total of 30 reprints will be provided free of charge. Additional reprints may be requested with the order form on the title page of the galley proof.

[Home]

Send mail to webmaster@chembiodiv.ch with questions or comments about this web site.
Last modified: 04/18/08