Author Guidelines

Guidelines to authors

Manuscripts premeditated to be published in OIJS must be written in good English and limited to, the following parts: Title, Author(s) names and affiliations, Abstract and keywords, Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results and Discussion, Conclusions, Acknowledgements, Conflict of interest and References. The main and second headings are written in upper case letters, whereas headings above two levels are written in sentence case letters.

All submitted manuscripts will be sent to at least two appropriate peer reviewers. Authors are encouraged to recommend the names and full addresses of potential reviewers, but the editorial board shall make its own decision on the selection of the reviewer/s. Original research articles and review articles should not occupy more than 12 manuscript pages while technical notes and short communications should not occupy more than 6 manuscript pages.

Title

The title should be concise, precise and describe the contents of the paper. It should be written in less than 150 characters. Do not use abbreviations and formulae in the running title.

Author names and affiliations

Indicate the given name(s) and family name(s) of each author and do not forget to correctly spell them. Present the authors' affiliation addresses (where the actual work was done) below the names. Write all affiliations with a lower-case superscript letter immediately after the author's name and in front of the appropriate address. Provide the full postal address of each affiliation, including the country name, and, if available, the e-mail address of each author. Clearly indicate who will handle correspondence at all stages of refereeing and publication, also post-publication. Ensure that the e-mail address is given and that contact details are kept up to date by the corresponding author.  Asterisk superscript should be used to identify the corresponding author.

Abstract

The abstract should be informative and explainable without reference to the text. The abstract should state concisely the principal objectives, methods, results, discussion, conclusions and recommendations of the manuscript. It should be written in the past tense. Using abbreviations and formulae is not encouraged. The abstract should not be longer than 250 words.

Key words

About 3 to 6 key words that will give indexing references should be listed in alphabetical order. 

Avoid plural terms and multiple concepts. Key words will be separated by semicolon.

Introduction

The introduction part should briefly state the background and justification or statement of the problem, the underlying hypothesis for conducting a research and a review of the literature pertinent to the problem. At the end of the introduction, an explicit and precise statement of the aim of the work should be presented.

Materials and Methods

A concise explanation of the state of affairs under which the study was carried out and the procedures, techniques, experimental designs and materials used should be given. In addition, data collection, statistical methods and analysis of data should be clearly described.

Results and Discussion

Results should be presented scientifically using sentences, tables and illustrations. Statistically significant differences between variables should be clearly declared in this section. Detailed interpretation of data should be discussed with reference to problems indicated in the introduction or stated as objectives with other earlier findings in the area of current research work. The credibility of the evidence (result), comparison with already recorded observations and the possible practical implication is discussed. Duplicating data in verdict, tables and figure should be avoided.

Tables

Tables are numbered consecutively in Arabic numerals (e.g., Table 1, Table 2) and should bear a short, yet adequately explanatory caption. Avoid using vertical and/or horizontal grid lines to separate columns and/or rows. Footnotes to tables are designated by lower case letters which appear as superscripts in appropriate entries. All tables should be referenced in the text. In full-length papers maximum 8 result tables can be considered where as short communications should include less than 3 result tables.

Figures

Figures should be restricted to the display of results where a large number of values are presented and interpretation are difficult in Tables. Figures should not reproduce the same data as Tables. Figures should be numbered consecutively in Arabic numerals (e.g., Figure 1, Figure 2), and refer to all figures in the text. Originals of figures should preferably be A4 size, of good quality, drawn or produced on good quality printer and saved in a separate file. Vertical and horizontal axes should be labeled consequently.

Photographs

Should be original and suitable for reproduction. Photographs should be unmounted with lettering clearly indicated on overlays or photo-copies. For composites, photographs should be unmounted and soft copy enclosed to indicate the required measurement. Magnification should be given in the legend or indicated by a scale or bar. They should be numbered as part of the sequence of Figures.

Conclusions in a few sentences, can be stated at the end of the results and discussion part of the paper. Authors are encouraged to forward Conclusions (two to three brief statements) from the study summarizing the main findings and indicating the practical implications of the findings. Author(s) are also privileged to state recommendations if interested.

Acknowledgments

Acknowledgements of persons, funds, etc. should be presented in brief, may be given in a separate section immediately following the conclusions.

Conflict of interest

All authors are requested to unveil any concrete or potential conflict of interest within two years after publication, including any financial, personal or other affairs with other people or organizations work that could improperly influence, or be perceived to influence their work.

References

Cite references by given name and date. When there are more than two authors, only the first author’s name should be mentioned, followed by et al. in the text. Personal communications and unpublished work should be cited in the text only, giving the initials, given name and date; however, they should not appear in the list of references. All references should be listed alphabetically and then further sorted chronologically. More than one reference from the same author(s) in the same year must be identified by the letters 'a', 'b', 'c', etc., placed after the year of publication. References should be selected based on their relevance and the numbers should be kept to a minimum. Ethiopian names should be in direct order, i.e., the first name followed by the father’s name and should not be abbreviated. When citing the Ethiopian authors in the text, it's customary to use only the first name of the author but not the father's name (e.g., Yisehak, 2010; Haftom et al., 2014; Fantahun, 2010 or Behailu, 2011); conversely, full name of Ethiopians is cited in bibliography. Except for invited reviews, no more than 30 papers should be cited. In the text, a reference identified by means of an author(s) name should be followed by the year of publication of the reference in parentheses (author- year-style). All foreign author(s) names should be inverted in the references.

Journal Article

Yisehak Kechero, Becker A, Rothman JM, Dierenfeld ES, Marescau B, Bosch G, Hendriks W, Janssens GPJ (2012). Aminoacidic profile of salivary proteins and plasmatic trace mineral response to dietary condensed tannins in free-ranging zebu cattle (Bos indicus) as a marker of habitat degradation. Livestock Science, 144(3): 275-280.

Book

Citation of books usually follow the name of author(s), year of publication, title of the book in italics, edition number, editor (if any), publisher and place of publication.

Strunk JR, White EB (2000). The Elements of Style. 4th Ed. Longman, New York, USA.

Alred GJ, Brusaw CT, Oliu WE (2000). Handbook of technical writing, 7th Ed., St. Martin's (Ed), New York, USA.

Chapter in a Book

Referencing of chapters from books follows the name of author(s), year of publication, title of the book chapter in italics, editor (if any), enclosed statement (Inc:), chapter number, publisher, place of publication, and page number

Zerbini E, Takele Gemeda, Alemu Gebrewold, Azage Tegegne (1995). Effect of draught work on the metabolism and reproduction of dairy cows. Philips, CJC (Ed.), Inc: Progress in Dairy Science, Chapter 8. CAB International, pp. 145-168.

Paper in Proceedings

Alemu Gebrewold, Mengistu Alemayhu, Azage Tegegne, Zerbini E, Larsen C (1998). On-farm performance of crossbred cows used as a dairy-draught in Holeta area. Inc: proceedings of the 6th National Conference of the Ethiopian Society of Animal Production (ESAP), May 14-15, 1998. Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, pp. 232-240.

Theses

Theses (dissertations) should be presented using the order: Name of Author, year of publication, full title of the thesis, the institution where the thesis submitted, date, country, page no.

• Roumen, EC (1991). Partial resistance to blast and how to select for it. PhD thesis. Agricultural university, Wageningen, The Netherlands. 108 P.
• Gatluak Gatkouth (2008). Agroforestry potentials of underexploited multipurpose tree and shrubs (MPTS) in Lare district of Gambela Region. MSc thesis, College of Agriculture, Hawassa University, Hawassa, Ethiopia, 92 P.

Web based papers

Anonymous (for unknown author), year, title (on line), available at: web page pp and accessed date should be indicated.

• Anonymous (2007). Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Technology on the Horticultural Plant Production at Nursery. http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/faculty/davies/
  students/alarcon/AMFApplications.pdf, pp1-11 (accessed 10-07-2007).

When author(s) is/are known: Author(s), year, title (online), available at: web page, pp. Accessed date should be indicated.

• Wiersum F (2008). Experiences with certification of wild forest coffee in Ethiopia. www.underutilizedspecies. org/Documents/PUBLICATIONS/pp1-25 (accessed 28-05-2008)

Short Communications

Short communications are limited to a maximum of two result tables and/ or two figures. They should present a complete study that is more limited in scope than is found in full-length papers. The items of manuscript preparation listed above apply to short communications.

Publications of Organizations

 WHO (world health organization) (2005). Make every mother and child count: the 2005 world health report. WHO, Geneva, Switzerland.

Page setup and Fonts

Top, bottom, left, and right margins should be 1 inch (2.54 cm) and number all pages. The line spacing for all of the narrative is 1.5 although the single line spacing is to be applied to captions of tables and figures. An extra line (1.5 spacing) is kept between paragraphs above and below all headings, sub-headings and captions. All paragraphs should be in the justified paragraph format. Use Times New Roman font throughout the manuscript, in the sizes and styles shown in Table 1 bellow.

Table 1 Recommended fonts and sizes.

Units

Follow internationally accepted rules and conventions: use the international system of units (SI). If other quantities are mentioned, give their equivalent in SI.

Contact us

Arba Minch University
P.O. Box 21
Tel: +251-46881-4986
Fax: +251-46881-0820/0279
E-mail: oijs2016@gmail.com/

Website: http://www.amu.edu.et/oijs

Arba Minch, Ethiopia