Submission Guidelines

Eligibility for Publication

In order to be eligible for publication in Kentiana, at least one of the authors should be staff, faculty, an official affiliate/associate, or a student in the Center for Paleontology, the Illinois Natural History Survey, the Illinois State Geological Survey, or any other division, department, or entity within the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Researchers from outside institutions may submit their work for publication in Kentiana if it is based at least in part on specimens from the Center for Paleontology collections on prior agreement with the Editor-in-Chief. Papers that are not authored by University of Illinois researchers, or that do not include specimens from the Center for Paleontology collections, are not eligible for publication.

 

Publication Policies

Review Process: Reviews will be sought from two expert reviewers. In the event that significant disagreement between the two reviewers occurs, a review from a third reviewer will be sought. Although not a strict requirement, authors are encouraged to suggest up to four suitable reviewers at the time of submission. Authors may also indicate any conflicts of interest that exist which may make the selection of other experts inappropriate. The editor(s) will take into consideration these recommendations but retain the right to exercise their judgement in the selection of appropriate reviewers. The editor(s) reserve the right to return a manuscript to the author(s) without review if the work is found to not meet the standards of the journal.

Reviewer Recommendations: In addition to their reviews, reviewers will be asked to make one of four recommendations to the editor. These are: (1) accept without changes; (2) accept with minor revisions; (3) accept with major revisions; and (4) reject. Manuscripts that are recommended for acceptance following major revisions will be sent back to the reviewers for a second review. In the case that a manuscript is rejected, the editor will inform the author(s) as to whether or not a significantly revised resubmission will be considered in the future or if their manuscript would be better submitted elsewhere. The editor(s) have final say regarding the acceptance or otherwise of a manuscript.

Revisions & Acceptance: If a manuscript has been recommended for publication and returned to the author(s) for revisions, it is the author’s responsibility to undertake these revisions within a reasonable period of time, not to exceed three weeks. Authors should return their revised manuscript with all changes made using the track changes tool in MS Word, and should also include a separate document addressing reviewer comments. The editor will then review the revised draft and responses to reviewer comments before reaching a final decision on acceptance, which will be communicated to the author(s) as soon as possible.

Proofs & Publication: If the manuscript is found to be satisfactory, a notice of acceptance will be sent to the corresponding author and the manuscript will be sent for layout. Once layout is complete, the author(s) will be sent proofs to review. Author(s) should review the proofs carefully, checking thoroughly for spelling and grammatical errors, and ensuring that the content is accurate and that no mistakes are present. All authors must review the proofs and agree that they are correct before the manuscript can be published. Once proofs are finalized and approved by the author(s) and editor, the paper will be assigned a number, a DOI, and will be published online immediately.

 

Manuscript Preparation & Submission

Manuscripts must be produced using the MS Word template available for download here. Authors should deviate from the template as little as possible and ideally not at all. Manuscripts that are found to deviate from the template significantly will be returned to the author(s) to be fixed. The template is arranged in such a way as to make the manuscripts easier to process during layout, thereby keeping the costs of production down and avoiding the need to charge authors an article processing charge. The manuscript and figures (either as TIFFs, JPEGs, or PNGs at resolutions of 300 dpi for review purposes) should be sent as separate files to swheads@illinois.edu by the corresponding author. Please include “Kentiana Submission” in the email subject line. The email itself should take the form of a brief cover letter and include the title of the manuscript, the full list of authors, and statements confirming that: (1) all authors have agreed to the submission in its current form; and (2) that the manuscript is not under consideration for publication in another journal. Although not required, authors are encouraged to provide contact details for up to four expert reviewers, and may also indicate any conflicts of interest they feel may be pertinent to the selection of other reviewers.