Express Polymer Letters

Guide for authors

Submitting Papers to the Express Polymer Letters

1. Submitting Papers to the Express Polymer Letters

Papers may be submitted only online via the Manuscript Central. Please register at the journal website, www.expresspolymlett.com. You can upload your manuscript after logging into the system as an author.

Submission of a paper implies that it is original work, which has not been published previously and is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, and that, if accepted, it will not be published elsewhere in the same form, in English or any other language, without the written consent of the Publisher of Express Polymer Letters.

If revision of the original manuscript is required, authors will have a maximum of two weeks (if minor revision is required) and four weeks (if major revision is required) to revise and submit the revised manuscript.

Papers that do not follow the instructions below may not be accepted for publication.

Types of paper

The following types of contributions can be published in Express Polymer Letters:

Research article: Research paper of max. 6000-8000 words in length, with tables, illustrations, equations and references, in which hypotheses are tested, the results evaluated and reported.

Review article: Only review papers that provide a novel perspective and critical evaluation will be considered. Manuscripts that simply summarize the current state of knowledge are not suitable. Review papers are more flexible in format and length than research papers. Review papers are typically less than 12.000 words, including references.

Editorial corner – a personal view: The opinions of one or two researchers, typically from narrower fields of expertise, reflect the state-of-the-art and prospects. The typical length is 600-800 words.

First submission

The complete paper must be uploaded in PDF format for the initial submission. The subsections of the manuscripts should be in the following order: title, author(s) and affiliation(s), telephone and email address of the corresponding author, abstract, keywords, graphical abstract, main text with figures and tables, and references. Tables and figures must be inserted into the main text of the manuscript. The sequences of pages, tables, and figures should be numbered with Arabic numerals. If your submission is incomplete, it must be completed within one month; otherwise, it will be automatically deleted from our database. If the author(s) fail this deadline, the manuscript should be submitted as new.

Submission of the revised manuscript

For submission of the revised manuscript, the following must be uploaded:

The revised manuscript showing the corrections and modifications (including the figures and tables in the right places) in PDF (preferred) file.
A text file containing the revised text, references, acknowledgement, figures, and tables with their own legends in their own space, prepared according to the specification described below. The preferred file format is Word (.doc; .docx).
A response to the reviewer's comments in PDF (preferred) file.
Graphical abstract (see instructions below).
A separate image file of each figure. Ensure that figures will be legible and comprehensible at the final size and of sufficiently high resolution (see instructions below).

Proof correction

Proofs in PDF format can be downloaded from Manuscript Central after the notification is emailed to the corresponding author. The proofs should be returned within 72 hours of receipt. It is, therefore, essential to provide the email addresses of each author. Corrections should be restricted to minor corrections (like typesetting errors, etc.). Please use the commenting tools of your PDF software. We do not accept hand-written corrections. Please submit the corrected proof through Manuscript Central.

2. Formatting Guidelines

2.1. Manuscript

The manuscript should be written in English (American or British English is accepted, but not a mixture of these) clearly and concisely and should follow the style of Express Polymer Letters. The manuscript must be typewritten, with 1.5 line spacing and 2.5 cm margins around, using Times New Roman and 12 pt font size. All pages must be numbered consecutively. The subsections of the manuscripts should be in the following order: title, author(s) and affiliation(s), telephone and email address of the corresponding author, abstract, keywords, main text with figures and tables, and references.

The title should be concise, informative and representative of the manuscript's contents. Please avoid abbreviations in the title.
Complete affiliations and postal addresses must be given for all authors. An asterisk should designate the author to whom correspondence should be addressed. Please consider that our journal policy allows only one corresponding author. Quantification of author contributions in percentages is not possible.
An abstract of a minimum of 10 and a maximum of 15 typewritten lines identifying the new and significant results of the study must be provided. The abstract should comprise a brief review of the contents and the conclusions of the paper.
A graphical abstract is provided to help the readers to gain an overview of a paper quickly and is not intended to replace the paper itself but rather to help draw attention to it. It must be created in landscape format, with 1500 pixels (width) x 900 pixels (height).
A minimum of five keywords from the list below are required. One additional one can be given freely.
List of topics and their keywords (click on the name of the topic)
- Biopolymers
- Elastomers
- Fibrous polymers
- Functional polymers
- Medical polymers
- Polymer chemistry
- Polymer foams
- Recycling of polymers
- Smart polymers
- Testing, simulation and modeling
- Thermoplastic composites
- Thermoplastics, blends
- Thermoset composites
- Thermoset polymers, coatings
The main text should include an introduction, experimental section, results and discussion and conclusion. All footnotes (except table footnotes) should be identified with superscript Arabic numbers. Headings and subheadings for different sections of the papers should be used and identified. If each section needs to be numbered, a sequence such as 2., 2.1., 2.1.1., etc., should be used. All tables and figures (subfigures) should be referred to in the text as 'Figure 1', 'Table 1'. Reaction schemes and chemical structures should be included among the figures numbered consecutively.

A proper introduction is required in the papers. The purpose of the introduction is to summarize previous work and recent progress in the field briefly and not repeat information found in previous publications. The introduction must be kept to a minimum length, and only references that pertain to the information in the manuscript should be used. The experimental section should provide sufficient detail of the materials, methods and equipment to allow repetition of the work elsewhere but should not contain excessive detail of commonly used procedures. Precautions for handling dangerous material or for performing hazardous procedures should be explicitly stated. All data should be given in SI units.

Equations should be produced using Word Equation Editor. Equations should be numbered in sequence and referred to in the text, e. g. 'Equation (1)'. This journal does not accept supporting information. Please include all important information in the main text, considering the limitation of figures described in chapter "2.2. Illustrations" of the "Guide for authors" section.

Author(s) take full responsibility for the accuracy of their references. The format of references must be uniform and consistent with the instructions below. All publications cited in the text should be referred to by a number in square brackets (e.g. [1]). Note that only one number belongs to one reference. Before formatting the references, please consider the following:

In the list of references, please do not use automatic numbering,
First, give the family name and then the abbreviated given name(s) of the author(s), with a dot and space: (Smith A. D.),
Do not use a colon between authors, only a comma,
Do not use commas between first and last names, only spaces,
Do not use 'and' or 'et al.'; give the names of each author (Smith A. D., Small B., Big C.: ),
Please provide the complete title of the publication (title of paper, book, book chapter, standard, patent) in lowercase; only the first letter should be capital (Title of the paper),
Please give the complete name of the journal; never use the abbreviated form of it, and use capital letters for the initials (Express Polymer Letters)
Please insert the DOI number (if there is one) in a separate line as an active link in the following format (example): https://doi.org/10.3144/expresspolymlett.2009.1. Note that the DOI number is generally displayed in the referred publication OR it can be found by searching at http://www.crossref.org/SimpleTextQuery/,
If you are uncertain of the correct format, please check the reference lists of any of our published papers.
Website addresses are not to be cited.

A complete reference should be given in a list at the end of the paper in the following form:

Papers:
[1]	Smith A. C., Small B.: Complete title of the paper. Complete Name of the Journal, 1, 48-58 (2020). https://doi.org/10.3144/expresspolymlett.2009.1
Books:
[2]	Big B. D.: Title of the book. Publisher, City (2018).
Book chapters:
[3]	Tailor B.: Title of the chapter. in ‘Title of the book’ (ed(s).: Jones Z., Small U.) Publisher, City, Vol. 1, 86-123 (2019).
Proceedings:
[4]	Smith D.: Title of the proceeding. in ‘Proceeding of Name of the Conference or Symposium. Place of the conference, Country’, Vol. 1, 72-76 (2017).
Standards:
[5]	EN ISO 527: Plastics. Determination of tensile properties (2018).
Patents:
[6]	Jones G.: Title of the patent. Registration number, Country (2010).

Please feel free to use our EndNote template or Mendeley template. Note that the embedded list of references is only appropriate and unified if your EndNote database format is set correctly. Please double-check the format of the final list of references right before submitting the manuscript concerning the DOI links (https://doi.org/...), the format of acronyms (e.g. DMTA, MWCNTs, ABS, PLA, etc.), names (Avrami-equation, Owen–Wendt method etc.) and others (CO₂, copper (II) ion, since these are also converted to small letters automatically (only the first character of the title of references remains capitalized).

2.2. Illustrations

Not more than 20 figures (included subfigures) are allowed in research papers, while in the case of a review article, 30 figures can be used. For best results, illustrations should be prepared and submitted in the actual size at which they should appear in the journal and fit a single column width (80 mm) or page width (165 mm) and a maximum height of 210 mm. The microscope images should also be a single column width; if there are several images in the figure, they should be 80 mm wide each. In the case of three microscope photos, they should be 53 mm wide each. They should also have the same resolution as the other figures. Authors must ensure that the labelling of the figures will be legible at the final size. The minimum font size for lettering appearing in a figure should be 8 pt size (equivalent to 2 mm in height for capital letters) at final width; lines should not be thinner than 0.5 points and should be of uniform density. Ensure that curves on multiple plots are clear, particularly that any symbols used on graphs can be distinguished following reduction. Check that all labels are correct and free of spelling or numerical errors. Axis labels should be of the typical form: Stress [MPa]; Velocity, v [m/s]. Only SI units are accepted. Chemical structures should be produced with the use of any commercially available drawing package. No hand-drawn chemical structures will be accepted. Structures must fit a one or two-column width on the journal page. Structures occupying one-column width are highly preferred. The actual size at which they should appear in the journal will provide the best publication quality. Colour artworks are available, but please consider that articles will be printed mainly in black and white. Graphs with coloured lines and keys, contour maps, model outputs, etc., will not be reproduced adequately if converted directly to grayscale. For example, red and blue will be converted to similar grey levels and will not be distinguishable. Optimization for grayscale reproduction may improve the final result.

At the submission of the revised version, each figure must be supplied in digital form as a separate file. Permitted file formats are JPEG (.jpg) and TIFF (.tif). Figures embedded in Word documents are not suitable for reproduction. Images should be saved at a resolution of at least 300 DPI at the final size (DPI=dots per inch). Do not save at the default resolution (72 DPI) and use' Print screen' options due to the resulting poor resolution. Crop any unwanted white space from around the figure before saving. Colour figures must be provided in RGB format.

Published by:

Budapest University of Technology and Economics,
Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Department of Polymer Engineering