Aim and Scope of the Journal
Alexandria Journal of Science and Technology (AJST) is a basic and applied sciences journal with interdisciplinary activity. The journal aims to provide rigorous peer review and enable rapid publication of cutting-edge research to educate and inspire the scientific community worldwide. We publish original research from all areas of the natural sciences. The journal aims to make significant contributions to applied research and knowledge across the globe through publication of original, high-quality research articles in the field of Basic Sciences such as: Mathematical Sciences, Statistics, Computer Science, Biological Sciences, Chemistry, Biochemistry, Physics, Geology, Marine Science, Environmental Science and Material Science.
In addition to original research articles, AJST publishes reviews, mini-reviews, case reports, letters to the editor, and commentaries, thereby providing a forum for reports and discussions on cutting edge perspectives in science. All submitted papers are subjected to strict single-blind peer-reviewing process. The Journal is committed to publishing manuscripts via a rapid, impartial, and rigorous review process.
General information
Authors should submit their manuscripts to the editorial office as word files via Editorial Manager. The original manuscript should be formatted with double line spacing using Arial or Times New Roman fonts (12 pt). The text must be in a single-column format with justified margins. Use bold face, italics, subscripts, and superscripts where appropriate. To avoid unnecessary errors, the authors are strongly advised to use the "spell-check" and "grammar-check" functions of their word processing software. Use continuous line numbering throughout the text and all manuscript pages must be numbered at the bottom right corner of each page.
Manuscript Types
AJST seeks to publish experimental and theoretical research results of exceptional impact in the form of original articles, short communications and reviews.
Manuscript Preparation
The manuscript should be performed in the following order:
Title Page should include a brief, and descriptive title. It should not contain any literature references, trade names of drugs, abbreviations or compound numbers. Provide given names, middle initials, and family names of the Authors. Use superscript alphabets to indicate different affiliations, which should include department, faculty/college, University, city with zip code or P.O. Box and country. Corresponding Author should be indicated with an asterisk, and contact details such as Tel. and e-mail address, should be included.
The Manuscript text should include the following:
The abstract should briefly state the aim of the research, the principal results and the conclusions. An abstract is often presented separately from the article, so it should be self-explanatory. In addition, abbreviations should not be used in the abstract, but if essential they must be identified at their first mention in the abstract. The abstract should highlight the new findings of the manuscript.
Keywords: Authors should provide six keywords, separated with semicolons.
Introduction: The introduction should state the significance of the work and its relation to previous published work in the field. The background material should be brief and relevant to the research described.
Results and Discussion: The results should be clear and concise. The results should be presented in a logical sequence in the text. Tables and figures should be designed to present the experimental data in a simple form for the reader. The same data should not be presented in more than one figure or in both a figure and a table in the manuscript. In some cases, it is appropriate to validate the significance of processed data (e.g., a graph), by including the underlying raw data (e.g., a gel or biodistribution) as Supporting Information. In the discussion include the implications of the findings and their limitations, how the findings fit into the context of other relevant work, and advices for future research.
Material and methods: The experimental procedures should be described in adequate detail to enable others to repeat the experiments and guarantee reproducibility. Published methods should be referred to by literature citation of both the original and any published modifications. Names of products and manufacturers should be included in detail, including company, city, and country. For statistical analysis, the appropriate test(s) in addition to hypothesized p-value or significant level (for example 0.05) must be included.
Conclusions: The conclusions of the study should be presented in a short conclusion statement that can stand alone and be linked with the goals of the study. State new hypotheses when acceptable. Include recommendations when appropriate.
Acknowledgements: In this section acknowledge financial support and technical support. In addition, individuals/companies/institutions who have contributed to the study should be acknowledged. A statement of no conflict of interest need to be added at the end of the manuscript, before the references.
(Abbreviations and Units): All measurements and data should follow international system of units (SI), or in other internationally accepted units in parentheses throughout the text. If analytical data are reported, replicate analyses must be carried out and the number of replications must be stated.
The preferred forms for some of the more commonly used abbreviations are mp, bp, °C, K, kDa (for kilodalton), min, h, mL, μL, L, g, mg, cm, mm, nm, mol, mmol, μmol, nmol, M, mM, ppm, HPLC, TLC, GC, 1H NMR, GC-MS, LC-MS, HRMS, FABHRMS, UV, IR, EPR, ESR, DNase, ED50, ID50, IC50, LD50, im, ip, iv, mRNA, RNase, rRNA, tRNA, cpm, Ci, dpm, Vmax, Km, k, t1/2.
All non-standard abbreviations must be identified at their first mention in the manuscript.
Math formulae: Math equations must be submitted as editable text and not as images. Present simple formulae in line with normal text where possible and use the solidus (/) instead of a horizontal line for small fractional terms, e.g., X/Y. Variables should be presented in italics. Powers of e are often more conveniently denoted by exp. Number consecutively any equations that have to be displayed separately from the text (if referred to in the text).
Figures and Tables: Tables and figures such as graphs, photographs, illustrations, diagrams, and other visuals can play a significant role in effectively communicating the results. Figures should be referred to as Figure 1, Figures 2, 3-5, using Arabic numerals. Each Figure must be accompanied by a caption clearly describing it. Tables should include only essential data. All tables, figures, and schemes should be cited in the text in numerical order. All illustrations should be inserted in the manuscript file, after its first citation in the text.
Please make sure that artwork files are in an acceptable format (TIFF, EPS or MS Office files) and of high resolution (300 dpi or more).
Figure captions:
Illustration must be accompanied by a caption. Supply captions separately, not attached to the figure. A caption should comprise a brief title (not on the figure itself) and a description of the illustration. Keep text in the illustrations themselves to a minimum but explain all symbols and abbreviations used.
Color Artwork: Please make sure that artwork files are in an acceptable format (TIFF (or JPEG), EPS (or PDF) or MS Office files) and with high resolution.
References style
Text: Indicate references by number(s) in square brackets in line with the text. The actual authors can be referred to, but the reference number(s) must always be given. Example: ".. as demonstrated [3,6]. Barnaby and Jones [8] obtained a different result"
List: Number the references (numbers in square brackets) in the list in the order in which they appear in the text.
Examples:
For journal article
For Books
2- Strunk, W.; White, E. B. The Elements of Style, third ed., Macmillan, New York, 1979.
For book chapters
3- Neufeld, E. F.; Muenzer, J. The mucopolysaccharidoses. In: Scriver CR, Beaudet AL, Sly WS, et al, eds. The metabolic and molecular bases of inherited diseases. New York: McGraw-Hill; 2001. p. 3421-52.
Submission checklist
These items should be uploaded via Editorial Manager in the following order:
Publication Ethics
Articles submitted to the Alexandria Journal of Science and Technology (AJST) must adhere to the ethical guidelines provided by the COPE (Committee of Publications Ethics (http://publicationethics.org/)).
Roles of Editors: The fairness and independence of editors.
The evaluation of submitted manuscripts by the editors is based only on their relevance to the Alexandria Journal of Science and Technology scope and academic importance, originality, clarity and validity of the study, regardless of the authors’ race, religious belief, nationality, gender, cultural, political viewpoint or institutional affiliation. Editing and publishing decisions are determined only by the editor-in-chief, who has the full authority over the entire editorial content and publishing time.
Confidentiality
Any information about a submitted manuscript is confidential. The editorial board will reveal information only to corresponding authors, reviewers or potential reviewers and the publisher.
Harmful substances and human or animal subjects
Experimental work with humans, animals or harmful substances described in articles must have evidence of the approval of the relevant Ethical Committee and/or Independent Review Board (IRB) of the Faculty/Institution in which the work was done and that the subjects gave informed consent to the work. The use of experimental animals must be performed in accordance with the relevant local or national animal welfare guidelines. The Editors reserve the right to refuse publications where the required ethical approval/patient consent is lacking.
Authors commitments
The author should be aware of the major ethical issues before submitting and publishing the research articles such as duplicate publication, fabricated data, plagiarism (and self-plagiarism), disputes with authorship; breach of copyright and undisclosed conflict of interest.
Articles submitted must not include published contents (except in the form of an abstract or as part of the lecture or thesis) or be currently under consideration for publication in another journal at the time of submission.
Authors must be sure that all data in the submitted article is clear and accurate. The editors of AJST may contact the authors to provide supporting raw data. In case of the explanation being not satisfactory enough, the submission will be immediately rejected, and necessary actions will be taken.
Plagiarism in any form is not accepted and if found, all stakeholders will be notified. During the peer-review process, the editors will check the similarities to other published articles by crosscheck against a giant database of published articles. Corrected articles will be verified once again to ensure that they do not have plagiarism issues. The reuse of your own work (data, words or theories) without proper citation is considered as self-plagiarism.
The corresponding author is responsible for ensuring that the article's publication in the journal has been approved by all the other co-authors. All authors listed in a submitted article should have involved in the conception of the research idea or methodology design or acquisition, analysis and interpretation of data to the work reported. An Author contribution paragraph, outlining their individual contributions to the paper, should be included in the manuscript before the acknowledgment section. Any change to the authors list after submission, such as a change in the order of the authors or the deletion or addition of authors needs the approval of all authors. An acknowledgment from the editorial office officially confirms the date of receipt and the date of acceptance. Further correspondence and proofs will be sent to the corresponding author(s) until publication.
The content of the manuscript must be authors' own, and it has not been copyrighted from other previously published works. Permission should be provided during submission to reuse any figures, tables, and data sets from previously published contents.
All authors in submitted manuscripts must be honest about any conflicts of interest that may exist when the results interpretation are influenced by whether sources of research funding or any form of financial support directly or indirectly by means of supplying equipment or materials from other people or organizations. Statement must declare any potential conflicts of interest in the manuscript, if no conflict exists authors should declare that there is no conflict of interest. The articles may be rejected or retracted if a potential conflict of interest is detected and not declared to the journal during submission.
The Faculty of Science, Alexandria University is committed to ensuring robust peer review and ethical standards in publication and quality of articles. It will promote strict adherence to standards of ethical practices as defined by the Code of Conduct of COPE which is expected from all the parties involved: Editors, Authors, Experts, Reviewers and the Publisher. The Faculty of Science, Alexandria University is committed to supporting stringent peer review processes, and scientific, ethical, and quality standards in publishing.
Role of the funding source
You are requested to list the source(s) of financial support for the study and preparation of the article in the acknowledgments section. Briefly describe the role of the sponsor(s), if any, in technical assistants, writing assistants.
Open access
The Alexandria Journal of Science and Technology is an open-access journal: all articles will be immediately and permanently free for everyone to read and download. To provide open access, this journal has an open access fee of USD 200 (also known as an article publishing charge APC) which needs to be paid by the authors or on their behalf e.g. by their research funder or institution. If accepted for publication in the Journal following peer review, authors will be notified of this decision and at the same time requested to pay the article processing charge.
Language
Manuscripts must be written in English in a clear and concise manner. Any author who is not fluent in idiomatic English is urged to seek assistance with manuscript preparation prior to submission. Reviewers are not expected to correct grammatical errors and any deficiency in this area may detract from the scientific content of the paper and result in acceptance delays or rejection.
Submission
Our online submission system guides you stepwise through the process of entering your article details and uploading your files. The system converts your article files to a single PDF file used in the peer-review process. Editable files (e.g., Word, LaTeX) are required to typeset your article for final publication. All correspondence, including notification of the Editor's decision and requests for revision, is sent by e-mail.
Please note that a Novelty Statement is required for submission. This statement should provide information in one or two sentences as to what is new and novel in the manuscript in relation to prior related work, including the authors' own.
Suggesting reviewers
Please submit the names and institutional e-mail addresses of several potential reviewers. You should not suggest reviewers who are colleagues, or who have co-authored or collaborated with you during the last three years. Editors do not invite reviewers who have potential competing interests with the authors. Further, in order to provide a broad and balanced assessment of the work, and ensure scientific rigor, please suggest diverse candidate reviewers who are located in different countries/regions from the author group. You should not include existing members of the journal's editorial team, of whom the journal are already aware. The editor decides whether or not to invite your suggested reviewers.
Peer Review process
Alexandria Journal of Science and Technology is an interdisciplinary journal. The Journal publishes one Volume divided into two Issues per Year (one in January and the second in July). The Editor-in-Chief and publisher work in tandem to execute the plan that was set for the journal. The publisher provides the editors with tools and training to assist them in their important role. Each main Research Field has a Managing Editor, who is responsible of the corresponding Research Topics.
Manuscripts are evaluated on the basis that they present new insight into the investigated topic and are likely to contribute to research progress. It is understood that all authors listed on a manuscript have agreed to its submission. The signature of the corresponding author on the letter of submission signifies that these conditions have been fulfilled. Received manuscripts will initially be examined by the AJST editorial office and those deemed to have insufficient grounds for publication may be rejected without external evaluation. Manuscripts not prepared in the advised style described will be sent back to authors for correction. The authors will be notified with the reference number once the manuscript has been assigned to an Editor. The assigned manuscripts will be sent to 2-3 independent experts for scientific evaluation. The evaluation process commonly takes an average of 6 weeks.
Peer reviewers may make a recommendation about an article, but it is the editor who has the ultimate responsibility to make a final decision on whether to accept or reject an article for publication in a journal. 3 reviewers are invited for manuscript reviewing. At least 2 reviewers should accept or reject the manuscript in order to make a final decision. In case of having only one acceptance, another reviewer will be invited.
Editors are not involved in decisions about papers which they have written themselves or have been written by family members or colleagues or which relate to products or services in which the editor has an interest. Any such submission is subject to all of the journal's usual procedures, with peer review handled independently of the relevant editor and their research groups.
Revised manuscripts
The authors must submit the revised version of their submissions within one month of receiving the editorial decision. Revision does not mean that the manuscript will be accepted for publication, as the amended submissions could be sent out for reevaluation. In response to reviewer’s comments, the authors must ensure that each comment is followed by their revision and/or response. In instances where an author disagrees with a comment or suggestion of a reviewer, please justify the reason. Any associated changes in the manuscript must be highlighted on the revised form of the manuscript to facilitate the process of reevaluation.
Resubmission of a rejected manuscript
When resubmitting a manuscript previously rejected by AJST, the authors are required to upload the decision letter from the Editor. When requesting submission of the rejected manuscript, the original reviewer comments of the rejected manuscript, the responses to the reviewer comments, and the original manuscript number should be included. The resubmitted manuscript must indicate, in color, where the revisions were made in the paper in response to the reviewer comments.