Instructions to the Authors

Journal of the Black Sea/Mediterranean Environment (short name: J. Black Sea/Medit. Environ.) is published trimesterly (www.blackmeditjournal.org/). The journal publishes original researches, review papers and short communications on marine environment, rivers and atmosphere. The aim and scope of Journal of the Black Sea/Mediterranean Environment is to publish stirring, high-quality science that addresses questions in pollution, marine biology, physical and chemical oceanography, marine geology and geophysics, maritime policy, biological conservation, coastal zone management and engineering. The papers submitted for publication must be unpublished and should contain data that have not previously been published elsewhere as a whole or in part. Review papers must provide a synthesis and critical evaluation of the state of knowledge of the subject. Manuscripts should be written in clear and concise English and conform to general style of the journal. Manuscript may be accepted for publication after the advice of two referees (double blind peer review process).

For all authors; ORCID ID‘s must be placed in the manuscript.*

Manuscript should be typed single spaced with the format of journal as:

Page limit maximum 15 pages (with some exceptions such as review papers)
Page size 23.5×16 cm
Margin bottom-top 2.5 cm, left-right 2.3 cm,
All text characters should be “Times New Roman”
Title (13 pt, Bold) must be as brief and should not to be exceed 10 words.
Author’s name(s) (11 pt, Bold)
Author’s ORCID ID(s)* (9 pt, Normal)
Institutional address (9 pt, Normal)
E mail address of the corresponding author
Abstract (9 pt, Normal) briefly describe the results and conclusion, less than 200 words.
Keywords (9 pt, Normal) maximum 6 words
Introduction, Materials and Methods, Result and Discussion, References (10 pt, Normal)
Acknowledgement (9 pt, Normal)
Competing interest (9 pt, Normal) (Example / No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.)
Ethics committee approval (9 pt, Normal) (Example / There is no necessity for ethical approval for this research.)
Financial disclosure (9 pt, Normal) (Example / This research did not receive any specific grant.)
Author contributions (9 pt, Normal) (Example / A.T. and R.B. planned the study. A.T., I.D. and A.A.Ö. collected the samples. K.K., and R.B. performed the laboratory work and conducted data analysis. A.T. and R.B. wrote the initial manuscript draft with input from all the authors. All authors contributed to the article and approved the submitted version.)
Turkish title, summary, keywords for Turkish writers only (9 pt, Normal)
Tables and Figures in Arabic numerals must be saved within the text.They should be adjusted to fit the printed page size.
Tables should be sent as a word document (not tiff or jpeg).
Figures should be 300 dpi resolution as tiff or jpeg format.
References in text should be cited as …. (Polikarpov 2007 or Polikarpov and Zaitsev 2000 or Polikarpov et al. 2007). (10pt, Normal)
References with 21 or more authors: the first 20 authors’ names, et al. (year) …

The title of the references should be in English but original language to be indicated.For example: Öztürk, B. (2006) Climate change – an ecological approach for Turkish Seas. Science and Utopia 139: 28-32 (in Turkish).

References to a journal publication

Author(s) name, year (in parenthesis), title of paper, journal name (full name and italic), volume number, first and last page number of the paper.
Example
Ehrhardt, G.M., Burns, K.A. (1993) Hydrocarbons and related photo-oxidation products in Saudi Arabian Gulf coastal waters and hydrocarbons in underlying sediments and bioindicator bivalves. Marine Pollution Bulletin 27: 187-197.

References to a book

Names and initial of all authors, year, title of the book, publisher, location of publisher.
Example
Golani, D., Öztürk, B., Başusta, N. (2006) The Fishes of the Eastern Mediterranean. Turkish Marine Research Foundation, Istanbul, Turkey.

References to a chapter in book

Names and initial of all authors, year, title of paper, title of the book (name of editor(s) in parenthesis), publisher, location of publisher, number of page.
Example
Galil, B.S. (2006) The Marine Caravan – The Suez Canal and the Erythrean Invasion. In: Bridging Divides Maritime Canals as Invasion Corridors, (eds., Gollasch, S., Galil, B.S., Cohen, A.N.), Springer, Netherlands, pp. 207-300.

References to a website

Names and initial of all authors, year, title of website, URL, the date when the author accessed for his/her publication.
Example
FAO. (2011) FAO fishery and aquaculture country profiles: Turkey. Available at http://www.fao.org/fishery/countrysector/FI-CP_TR/en (accessed 10 Oct. 2011).

All rights reserved: Articles published in this Journal are under copyright protection. Such rights as arise from it are reserved, in particular those of translation, reprinting, public lecture, reproduction of illustrations and tables, radio and television transmission, microfilming or other methods of reproduction, including extract form. Duplicating, reproduction or distribution for commercial purpose of this journal or parts thereof is not permitted. The copying of individual articles or parts thereof is permitted only under the provisions of the Turkish Copyright Law.

Disclaimer: The Publisher and Editors cannot be held responsible for errors or any consequences arising from the use of information contained in this journal; the views and opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the Publisher and Editors.

*What is ORCID?

ORCID is an open, non-profit, community-based effort to create and maintain a registry of unique researcher identifiers and a transparent method of linking research activities and outputs to these identifiers.

More information on ORCID can be found on the ORCID website, http://www.ORCID.org

For registration: https://orcid.org/register

Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractice Statement

Journal of the Black Sea / Mediterranean Environment is an international journal committed to provide a platform where standards of publication ethics are the major aspect of the editorial and peer-review process. The Editorial process for a manuscript consists of a review, blind and peer-reviewed, followed by editor’s decision to accept or decline the submission.

Journal of the Black Sea / Mediterranean Environment abides by the following principles defined by COPE’s Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors and principles of transparency and best practice in scholarly publishing specified by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). The relevant duties and expectations of all parties involved in the publishing process including editors, reviewers, authors and others are required to adhere to the publication ethics guidelines and malpractice statements defined below.

Authors’ Ethical Responsibilities

Authors of original research should present an accurate account of the work performed and the results, followed by an objective discussion of the significance of the work. The manuscript should contain sufficient detail and references to permit others to replicate the work. Review articles should be accurate, objective and comprehensive, and it should be clearly identified as such. Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute unethical behaviour are unacceptable.
Authors may be requested raw data on their framing of evaluation processes; in such a case authors should be ready to submit the expected data and information to the editorial board for at least five years.
Authors should ensure that they have written and submit only entirely original works, and if they have used the work and/or words of others, that this has been appropriately cited. Publications that have been influential in determining the nature of the work reported in the manuscript should also be cited. Plagiarism takes many forms, from “passing off” another’s paper as the author’s own, to copying or paraphrasing substantial parts of another’s paper (without attribution), to claiming results from research conducted by others. Plagiarism in all its forms constitutes unethical publishing behaviour and is unacceptable.
The work submitted for publication must have not been published in another journal or submitted at the same time.
Corresponding author should ensure that all appropriate co-authors and no inappropriate co-authors are included in the author list and verify that all co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the manuscript and agreed to its submission for publication.
Authors should disclose any conflicts of interest that might be construed to influence the results or their interpretation in the manuscript. All sources of financial support for the work should be disclosed (including the grant number or other reference number if any).
Authors should ensure that they have properly acknowledged the work of others, and should also cite publications that have been influential in determining the nature of the reported work. Information obtained privately (from conversation, correspondence or discussion with third parties) must not be used or reported without explicit, written permission from the source.
If the work involves chemicals, procedures or equipment that have any unusual hazards inherent in their use, authors must clearly identify these in the manuscript. If the work involves the use of animals, the authors should ensure that all procedures were performed in compliance with relevant laws and institutional guidelines and that the appropriate institutional committee(s) has approved them; the manuscript should contain a statement to this effect.
Authors are obliged to participate in the peer review process and cooperate fully by responding promptly to editors’ requests for raw data, clarifications, and proof of ethics approval, patient consents and copyright permissions. In the case of a first decision of “revisions necessary”, authors should respond to the reviewers’ comments systematically, point by point, and in a timely manner, revising and re-submitting their manuscript to the journal by the deadline given.
When authors discover significant errors or inaccuracies in their own published work, it is their obligation to promptly notify the journal’s editors or publisher and cooperate with them either to correct the paper in the form of an erratum or to retract the paper. If the editors or publisher learns from a third party that a published work contains a significant error or inaccuracy, then it is the authors’ obligation to promptly correct or retract the paper or provide evidence to the journal editors of the correctness of the paper.

Referees’ Ethical Responsibilities

Peer review assists editors in making editorial decisions and, through editorial communications with authors, may assist authors in improving their manuscripts.
The evaluation should be carried out on time and on the below ethical responsibility.
Reviews should be conducted objectively and observations formulated clearly with supporting arguments so that authors can use them for improving the manuscript. Personal criticism of the authors is inappropriate.
Referees should identify relevant published work that has not been cited by the authors. A reviewer should also notify the editors of any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other manuscript (published or unpublished) of which they have personal knowledge.
Referees who has conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, companies or institutions connected to the manuscript and the work described therein should immediately notify the editors to declare their conflicts of interest and decline the invitation to review so that alternative referees can be arranged.

Editors’ Ethical Responsibilities

Editors evaluate submitted manuscripts exclusively on the basis of their academic value (importance, originality, validity, clarity) and its relevance to the journal’s scope, without regard to the authors’ race, gender, sexual orientation, ethnic origin, citizenship, religious belief, political philosophy or institutional affiliation. Personal information about the articles is kept confidential.
Editors and editorial staff will not disclose any information about a submitted manuscript to anyone other than the corresponding author, referees, potential referees, other editorial advisers, and the publisher, as appropriate.
The editors will recuse themselves from considering manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships/connections with any of the authors, companies or institutions connected to the papers.
The editors ensure that all submitted manuscripts being considered for publication undergo peer-review by at least two referees who are experts in the field. The Editor-in-Chief is responsible for deciding which of the manuscripts submitted to the journal will be published, based on the validation of the work in question, its importance to researchers and readers, the referees’ comments, and such legal requirements as are currently in force regarding libel, copyright infringement and plagiarism.

Publisher’ Ethical Responsibilities

In cases of alleged or proven scientific misconduct, fraudulent publication or plagiarism, the publisher, in close collaboration with the editors, will take all appropriate measures to clarify the situation and to amend the article in question.

OPEN ACCESS STATEMENT

Journal of the Black Sea / Mediterranean Environment is an open access journal which means that all content is freely available without charge to the user or his/her institution. Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author. This is in accordance with the BOAI definition of open access.

Journal of the Black Sea / Mediterranean Environment does not charge any submission, processing and publication fee.