Molecular Ecology

Edited by:
Loren Rieseberg

Print ISSN: 0962-1083
Online ISSN: 1365-294X
Frequency: Twice Monthly
Current Volume: 19 / 2010
ISI Journal Citation Reports® Ranking: 2008: 46/276 Biochemistry & Molecular Biology; 6/124 Ecology; 5/39 Evolutionary Biology
Impact Factor: 5.325

TopAuthor Guidelines

General Information
Molecular Ecology publishes papers that utilise molecular genetic techniques to address consequential questions in ecology, evolution, behaviour and conservation. We discourage papers that are primarily descriptive and relevant only to the taxon being studied, or those that employ RAPD markers (except in certain cases: see below for details). Studies may employ neutral markers for inference about ecological and evolutionary processes or examine ecologically important genes and their products directly. Molecular Ecology concentrates on primary research articles (i.e. Original Articles) but operates a flexible policy regarding other submissions, including Reviews, Opinion Articles and Comments. We also publish Technical, Computer and Primer notes in our companion publication, Molecular Ecology Resources. We recommend that papers with a strongly applied focus be directed to Evolutionary Applications. We aim for primary editorial decision times of 2-3 months and publication times after receipt of final accepted manuscripts similarly of 2-3 months.

Editorial Office
Managing Editor Dr Tim Vines
email: managing.editor@molecol.com

Molecular Ecology Editorial Office
6270 University Blvd
Vancouver, BC
V6T 1Z4
Canada
email: editorial.office@molecol.com

Types of articles published
Molecular Ecology will consider several types of articles. Papers in all categories may, where appropriate, present supplementary material for web-only publication.

Original Articles
Our principal function is to publish primary research papers. Such papers are reports of research projects that are complete to the extent that they yield valuable insights into topics within our coverage. About 90% of all papers we publish are in this category. Original Articles have limits of 8000 words per paper (all text excluding tables and figure legends).

Fast-Track Papers
Fast-Track is a special category of submission, introduced in 2004, reserved for manuscripts of exceptional interest to a wide audience and that address significant questions in ecology, evolution, behaviour or conservation. We aim for receipt-to-decision times of a month or less, and accepted papers will have priority for publication in the next available issue of Molecular Ecology. Upon receipt, the Fast Track Editor will immediately review submissions for content and impact. Submissions that do not meet stringent standards will be returned at that stage without review, or they will be invited for resubmission as regular full papers. Fast-Track manuscripts must be brief and focused, in 4000 words or less, with up to 5 display items (tables and figures). Two colour figures will be allowed free of charge.

Opinion Articles
We will occasionally publish articles presenting points of view that are relevant and potentially controversial as a means of encouraging debate. Such manuscripts may present speculative and provocative viewpoints, although they must be conditioned by the normal standards of scientific objectivity and will be subject to peer review. Opinion Articles should not present new data.

Comments
Comments on published papers, principally those published in Molecular Ecology, will be considered by the editors and published after consultation and possible rebuttal by the original authors(s). Such manuscripts should be as brief as possible.

Review Articles
The editors occasionally invite commissioned reviews from individuals who have major contributions to make to the field of molecular ecology. All colour figures in review articles are published free of charge. We will consider unsolicited reviews, but authors wishing to present such papers should contact the Managing Editor in advance.
NOTE: Molecular Ecology no longer accepts Short Communications for publication.

Guidelines for Manuscript Submission
Molecular Ecology now accepts manuscripts via Scholar One Manuscripts, an online submission system. This system streamlines the submission process and ensures all authors' work is processed quickly and efficiently. If an author cannot submit the MS using the electronic procedures outlined below, they should contact the Managing Editor by email to ascertain whether or not an exception can be made.

Submission Procedure
To submit your article, first create an account on Scholar One Manuscripts. This can be done at http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/mec. Access the 'Author Centre', click on the 'submit new manuscript' link, and follow the instructions to submit your manuscript. The procedure consists of seven simple steps, which you are guided through by our online system. The help function is always available for any questions
you might have. If you have any questions that cannot be addressed by the online help, please direct them to the Editorial Office at editorial.office@molecol.com.

Preparing Manuscripts for Submission
Questions: If you have any questions that cannot be addressed by the online help, please contact the Editorial Office at editorial.office@molecol.com.

Covering Letter
A brief message addressed to the Managing Editor should indicate you wish to submit your manuscript for consideration, along with any relevant information you wish to convey to the subject editor. If the MS is a resubmission of a previous manuscript, details of the changes made should be placed in the 'response to reviewers' box in step 1 of the resubmission process.

Manuscript File
The standard procedure is for you to prepare the MS using Microsoft Word. Except for the situation outlined below, manuscripts submitted in PDF form will not be accepted, as our typesetting programs cannot access data in PDF files.
If your MS contains complex mathematical symbols not covered by standard versions of Word, (e.g., if the MS has been prepared in LaTeX) please ensure that you upload all additional files required to read your document, as well as providing a PDF proof for our typesetters to use as reference. Authors can upload their LaTeX and EPS (figure) source files to MS Central, designating them "LaTeX support files". These will be used for typesetting purposes and must be re-uploaded with each version of a paper. A single .zip file containing all source files should be uploaded. The accompanying PDF should be designated as the "main document" during the file submission stage.
Keep the file as small as possible to facilitate information transmission (max 50 MB). Do not use any form of compression or zipping, excepting with LaTeX support files as outlined above, as these can interfere with our uploading process.

Format
To facilitate viewing on screen, please format your manuscript with 2.5 cm side margins, 3 cm top and bottom margins, and clear paragraph delimitations. All manuscripts must be double-spaced with page numbers and continuous line numbers.

Text
The first text page should contain: 1. Title; 2. Author's names with initials; 3. Full postal address(es); 4. Four to six keywords for indexing purposes; 5. Name, address, fax number and electronic mail address of corresponding author, to whom proofs will be sent; 6. Running title of no more than 45 characters, including spaces.

The second page should contain the Abstract, which should be less than 250 words for Full Papers and 100 Words for Fast-Track articles and Opinion articles. Note that these word limits are within, not additional to, the total limit for the MS category. Comments should not have abstracts. Each MS should normally comprise: Title, Abstract, Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results, Discussion, References, Acknowledgements, Figure Legends, Tables and Figures, in this order.

Tables and Figures
Tables and figures can be submitted separately, and they will appear after the main document. Colour images are welcome, but authors are charged for colour production (see Final MS Preparation). In the full-text online edition of the journal, figure legends may be truncated in abbreviated links to the full screen version. Therefore, the first 100 characters of any legend should inform the reader of key aspects of the figure. Table captions should be integral with and appear above the data tables. Footnotes for tables should be given below the table.

Preparation of Figures
Please ensure that electronic artwork is prepared such that, after reduction to fit across one column, two-thirds page width, or two columns (80 mm, 112 mm, or 169 mm, respectively) as required, all lettering and symbols will be clear and easy to read, i.e. no axes labels should be too large or too small. Figure files should be supplied as follows. Photographic figures should be saved in tif format at 300 d.p.i. (or failing that in jpg format with low compression). Line figures should be saved as vector graphics (i.e. composed of lines, curves, points and fonts; not pixels) in eps or pdf format, or embedded as such in Word, as this enhances their display when published online. Combination figures (those composed of vector and pixel/raster elements) should also be saved in eps or pdf format where possible (or embedded as such in Word). If line figures and combination figures cannot be saved in vector graphics format, they should be saved in tif format at high resolution (i.e. 600 d.p.i.). Do not save them in jpg format. If you are unsure about the resolution of your tif files, please zoom in and check that fonts, curves and diagonal lines are smooth-edged and do not appear blocky when viewed at high magnification. Note that line and combination figures supplied in tif format are downsampled for online publication and so authors should preferentially opt for vector graphic formats for these figure types (full resolution tif files are used for print publication). Further details are available at http://authorservices.wiley.com/bauthor/illustration.asp.

Supporting Information
Supporting Information give authors the opportunity to present data in different formats than traditional print media. Large datasets can be submitted as separate files for on-line publication as Supporting Data. Supporting Data must be submitted during the review process. Please note that supporting data should be uploaded in a separate file and given the file designation "Supporting Information for online publication only".
For more information on preparing supporting data, please see: http://authorservices.wiley.com/bauthor/suppmat.asp

References
Authors should use the Harvard system. When there is a single author, references should be indicated in the text by the surname of the author with the year of publication, for example (Healy 1998). References to more than one publication by an author in the same year should be distinguished with lower-case letters, for example (King 1990a,b). The reference should be placed in parentheses unless the name forms part of the text, for example "Cowles (1982) has demonstrated that…" If no person is named as author, the name of the appropriate body should be used, for example (Genetical Society 1977). When there are two authors, use both names and the year, for example (Ribble & Ballew 1997). When there are more than two authors, use the first author followed by et al. Unpublished studies and personal communications should be referred to in the text only using the author's initials, surname, institution and city.

Journal titles should not be abbreviated in the References. The full list of references should be typed in alphabetical order, formatted with a hanging intent, and double-spaced at the end of the article, as shown in the following examples. Where there are six or more authors, only the first three should be listed, followed by et al.

Gray IC (1991) Polymorphictandemly repeated sequences in human DNA.PhD thesis, University of Leicester.
Milligan B (1992) Plant DNA isolation. In: Molecular Genetic Analysis of Populations: a Practical Approach (ed. Hoelzel AR), pp. 59-88. IRL Press, Oxford.
Saito I, Stark GR (1986) Charomids: cosmid vectors for the efficient cloning and mapping of large or small restriction fragments. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA, 83, 8664-8668.

Sambrook J, Fritsch EF, Maniatis T (1989) Molecular Cloning a Laboratory Manual, 2nd edn. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, New York.

References in Articles
We recommend the use of a tool such as EndNote or Reference Manager for reference management and formatting. EndNote reference styles can be searched for here:
http://www.endnote.com/support/enstyles.asp
Reference Manager reference styles can be searched for here:
http://www.refman.com/support/rmstyles.asp

Cover Images
Molecular Ecology uses images associated with published papers as covers for the journal. Authors are invited to submit candidate images, either with their manuscript or separately, preferably in electronic form, for consideration for the cover. Images should be no larger than 600 dpi. We prefer images in landscape format as this fills the space on the journal cover most effectively. Images should seek to be aesthetically pleasing and, wherever possible, to present a message related to the specific topic of the paper or the general coverage of the journal. Montages are particularly welcomed. It is Important that authors submit a suitable brief caption to the image together with a photo-credit where appropriate. Images submitted as prints or transparencies will be returned to authors, if requested.

Copyright forms must be signed before your cover image is published. Please provide the cover image copyright release form when submitting a cover image suggestion: download the cover image copyright form. If your image is not selected, your form and image will not be used for any other purpose. Please note that failure to provide a cover image release form may result in your image not being selected to go to press.

Author Information Box
Authors are invited to include a brief Author Information Box, which should appear at the end of the paper. This is not mandatory. The box provides an opportunity to present brief details of the authors and the overall research projects within which the published work has been carried out. The boxes are not intended to replace standard acknowledgments, but rather to provide readers with an outline of the structure and objectives of the research teams, or groups, responsible for the work. It should be a maximum of 100 words in length. Submitting authors should consult a recent issue of the Journal for guidance.

Notes for Accepted Manuscripts
The following items must be provided before your submission can be published. These files can either be uploaded during the revision process, or e-mailed to the editorial office at editorial.office@molecol.com.
1. Copyright Transfer Agreement: www.wiley.com/go/ctaaglobal
2. Colour Work Agreement Form*
*All colour figures are published free of charge online. It is the policy of Molecular Ecology for authors to pay the full cost for print reproduction of colour artwork. This cost is £150 for the first colour figure and £50 per additional figure.
You are therefore required to complete a colour work agreement form before your paper can be published if your manuscript contains any colour images.
In the event that an author is not able to cover the costs of reproducing colour figures in the printed version of the journal, Molecular Ecology offers authors the opportunity to reproduce the figures in colour for free in the online version of the article (but they will still appear in black and white in the print version). If an author wishes to take advantage of this free colour-on-the-web service, they should liaise with the Editorial Office to ensure that the appropriate documentation is completed for the Publisher.
Once these two items have been signed by the corresponding author (or other institutional authority) scan the completed document and upload the image file, designating the file type to correspond with the appropriate form during the uploading stage of the revision process.

Publishing Information

Exclusivity and Copyright
Manuscripts must be submitted exclusively to Molecular Ecology and we will only consider them for publication on the understanding that they have not been, nor will be, published elsewhere. If accepted, the copyright to papers is assigned to the journal. A statement confirming that all authors give formal consent to publication should accompany manuscripts in the covering letter. Permission to use published material elsewhere will be granted on request.

Copyright Transfer Agreement
Authors will be required to sign an Copyright Transfer Agreement (CTA) for all papers accepted for publication. Signature of the CTA is a condition of publication and papers will not be passed to the publisher for production unless a signed form has been received. Please note that signature of the Copyright Transfer Agreement does not affect ownership of copyright in the material. (Government employees need to complete the Author Warranty sections, although copyright in such cases does not need to be assigned).
After submission authors will retain the right to publish their paper in various medium/circumstances (please see the form for further details). To assist authors, an appropriate form will be supplied by the Editorial Office. Correspondence to the journal is accepted on the understanding that the contributing author licences the publisher to publish the letter as part of the journal or separately from it, in the exercise of any subsidiary rights relating to the journal and its contents. Please download the CTA form here.

OnlineOpen
OnlineOpen is a pay-to-publish service from Wiley-Blackwell that offers authors whose papers are accepted for publication the opportunity to pay up-front for their manuscript to become open access (i.e. free for all to view and download) via the Wiley Interscience website. Each OnlineOpen article will be subject to a one-off fee of $3000 US to be met by or on behalf of the author in advance of publication. Upon online publication, the article (both full-text and PDF versions) will be available to all for viewing and download free of charge. The print version of the article will also be branded as OnlineOpen and will draw attention to the fact that the paper can be downloaded for free via the Wiley Interscience service. Papers published OnlineOpen are, by default, sent to PubMed Central.
Any authors wishing to send their paper OnlineOpen will be required to complete the combined payment and copyright licence form.
Once complete this form should be sent to the Editorial Office along with the rest of the manuscript materials at the time of acceptance or as soon as possible after that (preferably within 24 hours to avoid any delays in processing). Do not inform the Editorial Office that you intend to publish your paper OnlineOpen before acceptance. The copyright statement for OnlineOpen authors will read:
© [date] The Author(s) Journal compilation
© [date] Blackwell Publishing Ltd

Early View
Molecular Ecology is covered by Wiley-Blackwell's Early View service. Early View articles are complete full-text articles published online in advance of their publication in a printed issue. Articles are therefore available as soon as they are ready, rather than having to wait for the next scheduled print issue. Early View articles are complete and final. They have been fully reviewed, revised and edited for publication, and the authors' final corrections have been incorporated. Because they are in final form, no changes can be made after online publication. The nature of Early View articles means that they do not yet have volume, issue or page numbers, so Early View articles cannot be cited in the traditional way. They are therefore given a Digital Object Identifier (DOI), which allows the article to be cited and tracked before it is allocated to an issue. After print publication, the DOI remains valid and can continue to be used to cite and access the article. More information about DOIs can be found at: http://www.doi.org/faq.html.

Colour Artwork and Photographs
In the event that an author is not able to cover the costs of reproducing colour figures in the printed version of the journal, Molecular Ecology offers authors the opportunity to reproduce the figures in colour for free in the online version of the article (but they will still appear in black and white in the print version). If an author wishes to take advantage of this free colour-on-the-web service, they should liaise with the Editorial Office to ensure that the appropriate documentation is completed for the Publisher.

NIH-funded authors and Molecular Ecology
From April 2008, the NIH is mandating grant-holders to deposit their published papers in PubMed Central within 12 months of publication. Molecular Ecology complies with the NIH mandate in allowing authors to post the accepted version of their article i.e. the version incorporating any amendments made during peer review, 12 months after publication (please see the 'After acceptance' bullet points on page 1 of the exclusive license form for full details). In doing so authors will be meeting the terms of their grant (http://publicaccess.nih.gov/FAQ.htm#general).
As an alternative, NIH-funded authors may use the Online Open service (http://authorservices.wiley.com/bauthor/onlineopen.asp). This service grants free and immediate availability of the article on publication, and deposition of the final pdf version with PubMed Central.

Wiley-Blackwell Author Services
Wiley-Blackwell Author Services enables authors to track their article - once it has been accepted - through the production process to publication online and in print. Authors can check the status of their articles online and choose to receive automated e-mails at key stages of production so they don't need to contact the production editor to check on progress. Visit http://authorservices.wiley.com/bauthor for more details on online production tracking and for a wealth of resources including FAQs and tips on article preparation, submission and more.

Proofs
Authors will be sent an e-mail alerting them that PDF proofs are available to download from our secure designated author website. Therefore, the corresponding author should supply their email address when they submit their manuscript. Corrections must be returned to the Production Editor within 3 days of receipt; fax should be used to facilitate communication and minor corrections can be advised by e-mail ensuring that journal title, paper reference number and corresponding authors name are given in the body of the message. Authors should note that proof corrections should be marked as clearly as possible, and should be kept to a minimum. If the Editors consider that significant changes have been introduced at the proof stage, the right is reserved either to levy the costs to authors, or to request resubmission of the manuscript. The corresponding author will be sent a form with their proofs to enable copies of offprints to be ordered.

Offprints
A PDF offprint of the online published article will be provided free of charge to the corresponding author, and may be distributed subject to the Publisher's terms and conditions. Paper offprints of the printed published article may be purchased if ordered via the method stipulated on the instructions that will accompany the proofs. Printed offprints are posted to the correspondence address given for the paper unless a different address is specified when ordered. Note that it is not uncommon for printed offprints to take up to eight weeks to arrive after publication of the journal. For order enquiries please email: offprint@cosprinters.com.

Registration of sequences
DNA sequences published in Molecular Ecology should be deposited in the EMBL/GenBank/DDBJ Nucleotide Sequence Databases. An accession number for each sequence must be included in the manuscript before publication.

Policy on the use of RAPD/ISSR markers
The appropriateness of RAPD or ISSR markers for population genetic inference is increasingly questioned by our reviewers and editors because of concerns about reproducibility, dominance, and homology. Given these worries, and the ready availability of other kinds of markers that do not suffer from all of these problems, studies based primarily on RAPD/ISSR rarely pass the scrutiny of peer review in Molecular Ecology. Of course, there may be situations in which these markers are appropriate, such as in genetic mapping studies or in searches for diagnostic markers for a given species or trait. These latter kinds of studies will continue to be reviewed by the journal.

Compliance with International Conventions and Regulations
We strongly recommend that papers submitted to Molecular Ecology comply with the Convention on Biological Diversity and the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CBD and CITES). Within the CBD we ask that authors follow the Access to Benefit Sharing (ABS) guidelines and give credit and equal access to benefits to countries, academic institutions and scientists that participated in the collection and analysis of data. Under the CITES convention, we request that authors observe the need for permits for the import and export of specimens that fall under CITES guidelines.