PREPARATION

    A manuscript should state explicitly the objectives and novelty, and must be complied with ethical standards. The manuscript should be written logically, in good English, and be easily understandable by a broad readership. Please visit the Instructions & Forms at the JOL submission site for all the templates and requirements specified for the structure of manuscript, the fonts of text and equation, styles of citation and references, and artwork of figure-drawing, etc.

    The International System of Units (SI) must be used.

    Abstract shall outline the research background, objective, method, main results, and conclusion; and the significance and novelty shall be stated explicitly; <300 words in length.

    Keyword list shall include 3–6 words or phrases.

In-text citations should appear chronologically and the reference list alphabetically. Internet materials shall be listed with an accessible URL and the date accessed.

    Tables and figures shall be inserted in the context in order and clearly labeled with self-explanatory captions. Color printing is encouraged.

SUBMISSION

    Please visit http://mc03.manuscriptcentral.com/c-jol for submission, and follow all the templates and guidance available in the Instructions & Forms. Files for submission include but not limited to the following items:

    1. The manuscript file (designated as Main Document). All tables and figures shall be embedded at the appropriate position in the Main Document, and all the figure files shall also be provided separately (see No. 4 below).

    2. The Title Page (showing meta information of manuscript and authorship)

    3. The Copyright Transfer Statement (must be signed by all the authors and submitted as an image file).

   4. The image files of all figures shall be saved in the original format in which they are created and zipped into one compressed file for submission.

    5. Other files that may be needed.

PLAGIARISM

All submitted manuscript will be checked by CrossCheck at least twice before peer-reviewing and before publishing to prevent any plagiarism or scientific misconduct. Any proven fraud or duplicated submission will result in rejection, and the author(s) will be blacklisted.

ENGLISH PROFICIENCY

    Manuscripts of poor English will be disqualified from peer-review. At the time of submission, authors of non-native English shall provide proofs indicative of the English proficiency, such as certificate/diploma/document of education/working in English-speaking countries/companies, or language polishing by recognized companies or native-speaking professionals.

    Upon the manuscript acceptance, it will have English refined to correct language problems occurred during peer-review and revision of the manuscript at the JOL Office’s cost.

ONLINE FIRST PUBLICATION

    With Springer’s OnlineFirst, articles can be published in electronic form weeks before distribution of the print journal—even before the issue and page numbers have been assigned.

    Publication of an article in a print journal usually takes several months. Even when peer-reviewing, revisions, final acceptance, typesetting and proof-reading have been completed; the paper cannot be printed immediately, but must wait until the “next available issue”. For technical reasons, a printed journal has to have a minimum number of pages, and issues are also published according to an annual schedule.

    Online First articles will be published within the LINK service in a temporary directory hosted by Springer. For the publication in the printed version, only the final volume/issue/page numbers, the citation line and the online publication date will be added.

    This is not a preprint service; the publications are in their final form. Authors will have been informed that after electronic publication they cannot change the contents of an article and that the articles cannot be withdrawn.

    Each article will be announced in LINK Alert. Access to the full papers is restricted to subscribers of the printed version.

    Online First publications certainly benefit authors and readers. Online First articles are searchable and citable by the “Digital Object Identifier”, or DOI, a unique and persistent identification code, included in both the print and electronic versions. The DOI can also be used to create hyperlinks to Online First articles; and users can therefore access peer reviewed articles well before print publication.

    Although files are moved to another location on our server after print publication, the DOI is never changed. The corresponding URL is listed in the abstracts of Online First papers. With Online First Publications, users expand their research process and significantly reduce the time it takes for critical discoveries to reach the research community.