Author Guidelines

Thank you for choosing to submit your paper to us. These instructions will ensure we have everything required so your paper can move through peer review, production and publication smoothly. Please take the time to read and follow them as closely as possible, as doing so will ensure your paper matches the journal's requirements.

Turkish Journal of Biodiversity is an international, double blind peer-reviewed journal publishing original research. Please see the journal's Aim and Scope for information about its focus and peer-review policy.

Authors can prepare and submit their manuscripts for the review process in Turkish or English. The manuscript should be written with clear and simple sentences. Manuscripts should be prepared in accordance with the sample article format. 

Review process: When a manuscript is received by the Editor, he/she will have it reviewed by at least two peers qualified to evaluate the manuscript. The editor normally asks the reviewers to complete the review within 15 days. However, the reviewing process may take longer, depending on the length of the manuscript and reviewers' responses.

Page charge: There is no mandatory page charge for submission, publishing and processing in Turk J Biod.

Submission Process

All manuscripts must be submitted electronically via the Internet to the Turkish Journal of Biodiversity through the online system for Dergipark journals. You will be guided stepwise through the creation and uploading of the various files.

Papers are accepted for publication on the understanding that they have not been published and are not going to be considered for publication elsewhere. Authors should certify that neither the manuscript nor its main contents have already been published or submitted for publication in another journal. The copyright release form must be signed by the corresponding author on behalf of all authors and must accompany all papers submitted. Please see the form for additional copyright details. After a manuscript has been submitted, it is not possible for authors to be added or removed or for the order of authors to be changed. If authors do so, their submission will be cancelled. Manuscripts may be rejected without peer review by the editor-in-chief if they do not comply with the instructions for authors or if they are beyond the scope of the journal. After a manuscript has been accepted for publication, i.e. after referee-recommended revisions are complete, the author will not be permitted to make changes that constitute departures from the manuscript that was accepted by the editor. Before publication, the galley proofs are always sent to the authors for corrections. Mistakes or omissions that occur due to some negligence on our part during final printing will be rectified in an errata section in a later issue. This does not include those errors left uncorrected by the author in the galley proof. The use of someone else’s ideas or words in their original form or slightly changed without a proper citation is considered plagiarism and will not be tolerated. Even if a citation is given, if quotation marks are not placed around words taken directly from another author’s work, the author is still guilty of plagiarism. Reuse of the author’s own previously published words, with or without a citation, is regarded as self-plagiarism. All manuscripts received are submitted to iThenticate®, a plagiarism checking system, which compares the content of the manuscript with a vast database of web pages and academic publications. Manuscripts judged to be plagiarised or self-plagiarised, based on the iThenticate® report or any other source of information, will not be considered for publication.

Preparation of Manuscript

Style and format: Manuscripts should be double-spaced with 3-cm margins on all sides of the page, in Times New Roman font. Every page of the manuscript, including the title page, references, tables, etc., should be numbered. All copies of the manuscript should also have line numbers starting with 1 on each consecutive page. Manuscripts must be written in English or Turkish. Contributors who are not native English or Turkish speakers are strongly advised to ensure that a colleague fluent in the language or a professional language editor has reviewed their manuscript. Concise English should be used. Repetitive use of long sentences and passive voice should be avoided. It is strongly recommended that the text be run through computer spelling and grammar programs. Either British or American spelling is acceptable but must be consistent throughout. To speed up processing, authors are strongly recommended to use the manuscript template file provided.

Symbols, units, and abbreviations: In general, the journal follows the conventions of Scientific Style and Format, The CSE Manual for Authors, Editors, and Publishers, Council of Science Editors, Reston, VA, USA (7th ed.). If symbols such as ×, µ, η, or ν are used, they should be added using the Symbols menu of Word. Degree symbols (°) must be used from the Symbol menu, not superscripted letter o or number 0. Multiplication symbols must be used (×), not the letter x. Spaces must be inserted between numbers and units (e.g., 3 kg) and between numbers and mathematical symbols (+, –, ×, =, <, >), but not between numbers and percent symbols (e.g., 45%). Please use SI units. All abbreviations and acronyms should be defined at first mention. Latin terms such as et al., in vitro, or in situ should not be italicised.

Italicisation: Generic names and all ranks below are italicised. Book and journal titles are also in italics, as well as diagnoses in Latin and Latin abbreviations (such as sp. nov., comb. nov., nom. illeg., et al.). “subsp.”, “ser.”, “var.”, “cv.” and “f.” (for forma or filius) are not italicised, nor are names above the rank of genus. The abbreviation “ssp.” should be avoided and replaced by “subsp.” (for subspecies) to prevent confusion with the abbreviation spp. (= species in plural). As a general rule abbreviations are discouraged.

Deposition of voucher specimens and GenBank numbers: Authors of new taxa are required to deposit type specimens in national or international public museums or collections, preferably ones listed in the Index Herbariorum that are provided with a corresponding acronym. Authors are also advised to request registration numbers of deposited sequences in GenBank in advance of the submission of papers to avoid unnecessary delay of publication. Descriptions of species can also be linked to other sources such as the Encyclopedia of Life. For fungi MycoBank numbers need to be provided.

Manuscript content: Research articles should be divided into the following sections. Principal sections should be numbered consecutively (1. Introduction, 2. Materials and methods, etc.) and subsections should be numbered 1.1., 1.2., etc. Do not number the Acknowledgements or References sections. The total number of double-spaced pages of the Abstract, Introduction, Materials and methods, Results, and Discussion must not exceed 20.

Title and contact information: The first page should contain the full title in sentence case not exceeding 15 words, the full names (last names fully capitalised) and affiliations (in English or Turkish) of all authors (Department, Faculty, University, City, Country), and the contact e-mail address for the clearly identified corresponding author.

Turkish and English Abstract: The abstract should provide clear information about the research and the results obtained, and should not exceed 300 words. The abstract should not contain citations.

Key words: Please provide no more than 6 key words or phrases to enable retrieval and indexing. Acronyms should be avoided. Introduction This should argue the case for your study, outlining only essential background, and should not include the findings or the conclusions. It should not be a review of the subject area, but should finish with a clear statement of the question being addressed.

Materials and methods: Please provide concise but complete information about the materials and the analytical and statistical procedures used. This part should be as clear as possible to enable other scientists to repeat the research presented. Brand names and company locations should be supplied for all mentioned equipment, instruments, chemicals, etc. 

Results: The same data or information given in a Table must not be repeated in a Figure and vice versa. It is not acceptable to repeat extensively the numbers from Tables in the text or to give lengthy explanations of Tables or Figures.

Discussion: Statements from the Introduction and Results sections should not be repeated here. The final paragraph should highlight the main conclusions of the study. The Results and Discussion sections may be combined.

Acknowledgements and/or disclaimers, if any Names of funding organisations should be written in full.

References: References should be cited in the text by the last name(s) of the author(s) and year of publication with a comma between them: for example, (Eminağaoğlu, 2018) or (Eminağaoğlu & Yüksel, 2017). If the citation is the subject of the sentence, only the date should be given in parentheses: “According to Eminağaoğlu (2018)…or Eminağaoğlu and Yüksel (2018)” For citation of references with 3 or more authors, only the first author’s name followed by et al. (not italicised) should be used: (Eminağaoğlu et al., 2012), (Eminağaoğlu, Yuksel et al. 2015) or (Eminağaoğlu, Yuksel, Beğen et al., 2015) . If there is more than one reference in the same year for the same author, please add the letters a, b, etc. to the year: (Eminağaoğlu et al., 2015a, 2015b). References should be listed in the text chronologically, separated by semicolons: (Eminağaoğlu, 2018; Eminağaoğlu et al., 2012; Eminağaoğlu et al., 2015a, 2015b). Do not include personal communications, unpublished data or other unpublished materials as references, although such material may be inserted (in parentheses) in the text. In the case of publications in languages other than English, the published English title should be provided if one exists, with an annotation such as “(article in Turkish with an abstract in English)”. If the publication was not published with an English title, provide the original title only; do not provide a self-translation. References should be listed alphabetically at the end of the text without numbering. All authors should be included in reference lists unless there are 10 or more, in which case only the first 10 should be given, followed by ‘et al.’. The manuscript should be checked carefully to ensure that the spellings of the authors’ names and the years are exactly the same in the text as given in the reference list.

References should be formatted as follows (please note the punctuation and capitalisation):

Journal articles

Erenler R, Meral B, Sen O, Elmastas M, Aydin A, Eminagaoglu O, Topcu G (2017). Bioassay-guided isolation, identification of compounds from Origanum rotundifolium and investigation of their antiproliferative and antioxidant activities. Pharmaceutical Biology 55(1): 1646–1653. DOI:10.1080/13880209.2017.1310906.

Eminagaoglu O, Ozcan M (2018). Morphological and anatomical studies of the newly recorded Rhus chinensis Mill. (Anacardiaceae) from Turkey. Bangladesh Journal of Plant Taxonomy 25(1): 71-78. DOI:10.3329/bjpt.v25i1.37183.

Books

Güner A, Aslan S, Ekim T, Vural M, Babaç MT (eds) (2012). Türkiye Bitkileri Listesi (Damarlı Bitkiler). İstanbul: Nezahat Gökyiğit Botanik Bahçesi ve Flora Araştırmaları Derneği Yayını, 1290p.

Eminağaoğlu Ö (ed) (2015). Artvin'in Doğal Bitkileri. İstanbul: Promat, 456p. 

Chapters in boks

Davis PH, Mill RR, Tan K (1988). Scorzonera L. In: Davis PH, Mill RR, Tan K (eds). Flora of Turkey and the East Aegean Islands (Supplement 1), Vol. 10. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, pp. 169-170. 

Ekim T, Terzioğlu S, Eminağaoğlu Ö, Coşkunçelebi K (2014). Turkey. In: Solomon J, Schulkina T, Schatz GE (eds). Red List of the Endemic Plants of Caucasus: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Iran, Russia, and Turkey. Monographs in Systematic Botany from the Missouri Botanical Garden (MSB), Saint Louis : 125. Missouri Botanical Garden Press.

Conference proceedings

Eminağaoğlu Ö, Akyıldırım Beğen H (2017). A research on medicinal and aromatic plants of Kılıçkaya (Yusufelı, Artvın) village and its surroundings. In: Şekercioğlu N,Gezici S (eds). Proceedings of The Second Japan – Turkey International Symposium on Pharmaceutical and Biomedical Sciences, 11–12 September 2017, Artvin, Turkey, pp.26.

Theses

Yüksel E (2016). Kalimet Vadisi (Arhavi) Flora ve Vejetasyonu. Phd, Artvin Çoruh University, Artvin, Turkey.

Çelik A (2017). Artvin İli Hatila Vadisi ve Çevresindeki Caradidae Familyası Üzerine Çalışmalar. MSc, Artvin Çoruh University, Artvin, Turkey.

Web sites (no print version):

IPNI (2015). International Plant Name Index. Published on the internet. https://www.ipni.org/. Downloaded on 12 January 2018.

IUCN (2018). The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2018-2. http://www.iucnredlist.org. Downloaded on 14 December 2018.

PL (2013). The Plant List. Version 1.1. http://www.theplantlist.org. Downloaded on 10 December 2018.

Tables and Figures: All illustrations (photographs, drawings, graphs, etc.), not including tables, must be labelled “Figure.” Figures must be submitted both in the manuscript and as separate files. All tables and figures must have a caption and/or legend and be numbered (e.g., Table 1, Figure 2), unless there is only one table or figure, in which case it should be labelled “Table” or “Figure” with no numbering. Captions must be written in sentence case (e.g., Macroscopic appearance of the samples.). The font used in the figures should be Times New Roman. If symbols such as ×, µ, η, or ν are used, they should be added using the Symbols menu of Word. All tables and figures must be numbered consecutively as they are referred to in the text. Please refer to tables and figures with capitalisation and unabbreviated (e.g., “As shown in Figure 2…”, and not “Fig. 2” or “figure 2”). The tables and figures themselves should be given at the end of the text only, after the references, not in the running text. The resolution of images should not be less than 118 pixels/cm when width is set to 16 cm. Images must be scanned at 1200 dpi resolution and submitted in jpeg or tiff format.

Graphs and diagrams must be drawn with a line weight between 0.5 and 1 point. Graphs and diagrams with a line weight of less than 0.5 point or more than 1 point are not accepted. Scanned or photocopied graphs and diagrams are not accepted. Charts must be prepared in 2 dimensions unless required by the data used. Charts unnecessarily prepared in 3 dimensions are not accepted. Figures that are charts, diagrams, or drawings must be submitted in a modifiable format, i.e. our graphics personnel should be able to modify them. Therefore, if the program with which the figure is drawn has a “save as” option, it must be saved as *.ai or *.pdf. If the “save as” option does not include these extensions, the figure must be copied and pasted into a blank Microsoft Word document as an editable object. It must not be pasted as an image file (tiff, jpeg, or eps) unless it is a photograph.  Tables and figures, including caption, title, column heads, and footnotes, must not exceed 16 × 20 cm and should be no smaller than 8 cm in width. For all tables, please use Word’s “Create Table” feature, with no tabbed text or tables created with spaces and drawn lines. Please do not duplicate information that is already presented in the figures. Tables must be clearly typed, each on a separate sheet, and double-spaced. Tables may be continued on another sheet if necessary, but the dimensions stated above still apply.

Correspondence Address: Manuscripts can only be submitted through our online system. Other correspondence may be directed to: E-mail: turkbiod@artvin.edu.tr or Turkish Journal of Biodiversity, Artvin Çoruh Üniversitesi, Seyitler Yerleşkesi, 08000, Artvin, Turkey.

Bu eser Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License ile lisanslanmıştır.

PUBLICATION ETHICS & MALPRACTICE STATEMENT

Publication ethics are kept in the course of publication processes in Turkish Journal of Biodiversity (e-ISSN: 2667-4386) to assure the best practice guidelines and hence it is crucial for the journal’s editors, authors, and peer reviewers to abide by the ethical policies.

Turkish Journal of Biodiversity conforms to the principles below that are described by COPE’s Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors (https://publicationethics.org/resources/code-conduct) and not only transparency principles, but also best practice in scholarly publishing pointed out by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).

Duties of Editor-in-Chief & Section Editors

Objectivity: Editor-in-chief & section editors of the journal are account for deciding which of the manuscripts submitted to the journal ought to be published. In this process, the authors of the manuscript are not distinguished based on his/her race, ethnicity, gender, religion and citizenship by the editors. Editors´ decision to accept, revise or reject a manuscript for publication should be based merely on the importance, originality and clarity of the manuscript, and also convenience of the study performed in manuscript to the coverage of the journal.

Confidentiality: Editor-in-chief and section editors staff must not reveal any information about a submitted manuscript to anyone but the corresponding author, reviewers/potential reviewers and the publishing personnel. Editors will assure that all material submitted by authors remains confidential during the review process.

Conflicts of interest & Disclosure: Unpublished materials disclosed in a submitted manuscript must not be utilized in any reviewers’ own studies without expressing written permission of the author. Exclusive information or opinions attained from peer review process must be maintained confidential and not used for personal benefit. Reviewers ought not to take into account manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest deriving from competitive, collaborative or other relationships/connections with any of the authors, companies or institutions linked to the articles.

Peer review process: The editor-in-chief/section editors must assure that a double-blind peer review process is effectively performed for each manuscript submitted to journal system.

Management of unethical behavior(s): The editors, together with the publisher(s), should take rationally responsive measures when ethical complaints have been presented regarding a submitted manuscript or published article.

Duties of Author(s)

Authorship of the paper: Authorship should be narrowed to those who have made a vital contribution to the reported study including conception, execution, design and interpretation. All authors made significant contributions to the submitted manuscript should be listed as co-authors.

Originality and plagiarism: The authors are responsible for the content, language and originality of the manuscript they submitted. The authors should assure that they have composed their original works entirely, and if the authors have used the study and/or words of other authors, that this has been conveniently cited or quoted. Plagiarism takes many forms varying from “passing off” someone´s paper as the authors’ own paper to copying or paraphrasing important parts of someone´s paper (without attribution), to claiming results from research performed by others. Plagiarism in all its forms comprises unethical publishing behavior and is inadmissible. Before being sent a manuscript to reviewers, it is checked in terms of similarity by iThenticate to explore the plagiarism.

Acknowledgement of funding sources: All funding sources for the research reported in the manuscript should be acknowledged thoroughly at the end of the manuscript before references.

Disclosure and conflicts of interest: All authors should reveal in their manuscript any financial or other substantive conflict of interest which may be construed to affect the findings or interpretation of their manuscript. All financial support sources for the project should be disclosed as well. Disclosed examples of potential conflicts of interest include employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, paid expert testimony, patent applications/registrations, and grants or other funding. Potential conflicts of interest should be declared at the earliest stage possible.

Reporting standards: Authors of manuscript should present an accurate explanation of the study conducted and an objective discussion of its importance. Underlying data should be accurately given in the manuscript. A paper should include sufficient detail and references to allow other researchers to repeat the study. Tricky or knowingly imprecise statements form unethical behavior and are unacceptable. Review and professional publication articles should also be precise, original and objective, and editorial opinion works should be described overtly as such.

Data access & retention: Authors might be asked to ensure the raw data in connection with a paper for editorial review process, and should in any event be prepared to keep in such data for a moderate time after publication.

Multiple, redundant or concurrent publication: Submitted manuscripts must not be under consideration of any other journal. Submitting the same manuscript to more than one journal concurrently comprises unethical publishing behavior. The authors must also assure that the article has not been published elsewhere before.

Principal errors in published studies: When an author corresponds to a significant error or inaccuracy in his/her own published work, it is the author´s obligation to notify swiftly the journal editor or publisher and cooperate with the editor to withdraw or correct the paper.

Duties of Reviewers

Reviewers should review and send the review comments in due time period. If the manuscript is not in the reviewer’s field of interest, then the manuscript must be sent back to editor so that the other reviewers can be assigned without losing time.

Contribution: Reviewers are the main members contributing to the quality of the journal being a peer reviewed one. The reviewers who feel unqualified to review the received manuscript must swiftly notify the editor and reject to review that manuscript.

Confidentiality: Any manuscripts received for review must be treated as confidential documents. They must not be shown to or discussed with others except as authorized by the editor.

Objectivity standards: Reviews should be objectively performed. Personal criticism of the author is unsuitable. Referees should frankly express their aspects with supporting arguments.

Acknowledgement of sources: Reviewers should describe relating published study which has not been cited by the authors. Any statement that an observation, derivation, or argument had been previously reported should be accompanied by the relevant citation. A reviewer should also point out to the editor’s attention any vital resemblance or coincide between the manuscript under consideration and any other published paper of which they have personal information.

Disclosure & conflict of interest: Reviewers should not take into account the manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest derived from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships/connections with any of the authors, companies or institutions linked to the manuscripts.