Jump To: Aims and Scope | Policy on Prior Publication | Style and Formatting Requirements | Preparing Manuscript Main Text | Required Declaration Sections | Preparing Materials for Submission |  Preparing Illustrations and Figures | Preparing Tables | Accessibility Requirements | English Language Editing Service | Authorship and Contributorship | Use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) Tools |  

Annals of Forest Science provides templates for manuscript preparation that help to format your manuscript according to presentation requirements in an easy and fluid way. The templates are accessible directly during the submission process on Editorial Manager, or below. We encourage you to use and follow these templates, as all required formatting is explained.

Given Annals of Forest Science is using a double-blind peer-review procedure, each manuscript should be presented in two files: (i) a title page (see the corresponding template here) and (ii) the anonymised body of the manuscript (with no indication about authorship; see here the corresponding templates). 

Aims and Scope

A summary of the journal’s scope and article types can be found on the author instructions landing page. 

This applies in particular to preprints recommended by a Peer Community in… (PCI Forest and Wood Sciences) for which the recommendation will be taken into account during the submission process.

Style and Formatting Requirements

This section provides general style and formatting information. 

Formatting guidelines for specific article types can be found below. Specific templates are available for all types of manuscripts and should be used while preparing the manuscript.

1. Research Paper

A research paper presents novel results addressing a few explicit research-questions. It is based on original data and provides a clear presentation and discussion of the results. This is the most common paper format in Annals of Forest Science.

A research paper undergoes a double-anonymous review procedure. 

Please use the templates (title page and body of the manuscript) for preparing and formatting research paper manuscripts submitted to Annals of Forest Science. The body of the manuscript needs be anonymised.

2. Review Paper

A review paper is organized around a comprehensive and exhaustive review of the current literature and should provide the state of the art in response to an explicit research-question. Therefore, it is not necessary (but still possible) to provide “Material and methods” and “Results”. The main section here is close to an extensive “Discussion” in a research paper. 

A review paper undergoes a double-anonymous review procedure. 

Please use the templates (title page and body of the manuscript) for preparing and formatting a review paper manuscripts submitted to Annals of Forest Science. The body of the manuscript needs be anonymised.

3. Data Paper

A data paper describes a dataset that is made available to the broader community for re-use, under the condition of a proper citation of the dataset. Re-use includes integration into meta-analyses, larger datasets, etc…. Unlike a research paper, it does not focus on testing hypotheses or present results. Instead, it focuses on documenting the dataset, its structure, and the methods used to ensure data quality, helping researchers accurately evaluate and reuse the data. The data paper therefore needs to describe how the dataset was collected, cleaned, processed, and validated, while also providing context and defining the variables present in the dataset. 

Please be aware that “data” refers to numerical figures, to pictures, to codes and to many different objects.

Data paper manuscripts will undergo a single-anonymous review. 

Please use the template of a data paper for preparing and formatting a data paper manuscripts submitted to Annals of Forest Science. There is no need to anonymise the manuscript.

4. First Report

A first report provides a concise account of a novel or previously undocumented observation or discovery of scientific significance, which may subsequently be investigated and presented in greater detail in a full research paper. This may include, for example, the first observation of a disease, pathogen, or pest in a particular species or region, but may also encompass other innovative findings that may subsequently be investigated and presented in greater detail in a full research paper. Please keep the first report manuscript as short as possible. The sections of the manuscript are relatively free. There is no abstract, but a key message providing a brief account of the main results is necessary (less than 100 words). 

Suggested sections for the First Report manuscript: Key message, Context, Material & Methods, Results, Discussion, Conclusion.

First reports will undergo a single-anonymous review. 

Please use the template for a first report manuscript submitted to Annals of Forest Science.

5. Perspective

A perspective provides a forward-looking analysis of an emerging novel, or potentially underappreciated research area. It may also address promising new methodologies, technical developments, or conceptual approaches requiring further development or discussion. Perspectives should highlight emerging issues, knowledge gaps, and research strategies of interest to the broader scientific community. They should focus on a clearly defined topic and remain concise (about 4-5 pages), although no specific length limit is prescribed. 

A perspective manuscript will undergo a double-anonymous peer-review. 

Please use the templates while preparing a “perspective” manuscript (including a title page and the anonymised body of the manuscript) submitted to Annals of Forest Science.

6. Opinion

An Opinion is a short manuscript of about 3-4 pages, that addresses a very well-defined question that remains open in the scope of the journal. An opinion needs be based on developed and explicit arguments. An opinion should backed by some references to the existing literature, but not necessarily by novel data or specific experiments. It aims at sharing thoughts about important issues in forest and wood sciences.

An Opinion will undergo a single-anonymous peer-review, done possibly by members of the editorial board of the journal. 

Please use the template while preparing an “Opinion” manuscript for submission to Annals of Forest Science.

7. Commentary

A commentary is a brief analysis of an important and innovative contribution to Annals of Forest Science (usually a research paper). A commentary put such results into a perspective and synthesises the current knowledge in the field, the importance of the findings with respect to the existing consensus and in general underlines the novelty and originality in the published paper.

A commentary will be commissioned by the editorial board, and will undergo a single-anonymous peer-review by members of the editorial board. 

It does not require an APC payment.  

Please use the template while preparing a Commentary for submission to Annals of Forest Science

8. Editorial

An editorial is a brief article, usually proposed and prepared by the Editorial Board, addressing topics relevant to the journal, its community, or its development. Editorials are generally concise  and do not undergo  formal peer review before publication. 

It does not require an APC payment and no template is available.

General Formatting Guidelines

• Preparing main manuscript text
• Required declarations sections
• Preparing materials for submission
• Preparing illustrations and figures
• Preparing tables
• Accessibility requirements
• English language editing service
• Authorship contributions
• Use of artificial intelligence (AI) tools

Preparing Main Manuscript Text 

• Please use whenever possible the template provided for the article type you intend to submit. They will guide you during the formatting of the manuscript.
• Include line and page numbering
• Use italics for scientific species names and add the authority name at first citation (i.e., Quercus robur L.) (see http://www.ipni.org/) and use abbreviated names later on (i.e., Q. robur)
• Use SI units: Please ensure that all special characters used are embedded in the text, otherwise they will be lost during conversion to PDF
• Do not use page breaks in your manuscript
• Keep lettering consistently sized throughout your manuscript (10/11 pt for body text and 11/12 pt for headings for example)
• To comply with the European Accessibility Act, please avoid shading, outlining letters, and any other style elements that could compromise readability.

List of Abbreviations

All abbreviations should be written out in full on first usage in the text followed by the abbreviation in parentheses; this includes abbreviations and acronyms that may be well known in a specific field, but may not be known to a non-specialist reader. Please maintain consistency throughout the whole manuscript. Abbreviations defined in the abstract should be defined again at first usage in the text. Abbreviations should be used in place of the expansion in every subsequent mention.

Required Declarations Sections

All manuscripts must contain the following sections under the heading 'Declarations':

• Acknowledgements
• Author contributions
• Data availability statement
• Declaration of interests
• Ethics and consents
• Funding statement
• Reference style

Please see below for details on the information to be included in these sections. If any of the sections are not relevant to your manuscript, please include the heading and write 'Not applicable' for that section.

Acknowledgements

Please acknowledge anyone who contributed towards the article who does not meet the criteria for authorship including anyone who provided professional writing services or materials. 

See our authorship policy for a full explanation of acknowledgements and authorship criteria. If you do not have anyone to acknowledge, please write "Not applicable" in this section.

The use of AI needs be clearly acknowledged and appropriately justified in this section. AI tools may be used to assist with specific tasks, such as literature searches, translation, language editing, or presentation of the manuscript.  However, they should not be used to define the aims and research questions of the study, and their use should remain limited to clearly identified supporting tasks: Any use of AI should be declared using the following statement: “During the preparation of this manuscript and/or  the research described herein, AI tools were used (list tools) for the following purposes (describe specific uses)”.

Further guidance related to the use of artificial intelligence tools can be found here: 

Author Contributions

The individual contributions of authors to the manuscript should be specified in this section. Guidance and criteria for authorship can be found below in the author instructions. Preferably use the CRediT taxonomy: https://credit.niso.org/. Please use initials to refer to each author's contribution. 

Please include the following statement : “All co-authors have read and approved the final version of the manuscript."

Data Availability Statement

In accordance with this journal’s research transparency policies, all manuscripts must include a data availability statement in the declarations. 

1. If the data are available from a public data repository, please provide a permanent link (or a temporary one if the data are under embargo) to the data set. The data set should also be cited in the reference list like a full reference, and be considered like a scientific production of the research team.
2. If you are unable to provide an open access to the data sets, please state that: “The data-set will be made available upon reasonable requests to the corresponding author” and provide a brief explanation why it was not possible to provide an access to the data.
3. If no new data were produced (case of review papers for instance, please state that: “No new data were produced during this research”. 

Access to the data set is a prerequisite to submit a Data Paper. Further information may be found in our blog or through our linked guidance. 

Data availability statements are short, human-readable statements explaining where readers can find the minimal dataset that would be necessary to interpret, replicate and build upon the findings reported in the article. This should include any data available from third parties, which should be explained in the data availability statement with full citations according to this journal’s reference style and included in the reference list. 

We recognise it is not always possible to share research data publicly, for instance when individual privacy could be compromised. In these cases, data availability statements should explain why materials cannot be shared publicly and describe any conditions for access. For further guidance and examples of how to write a data availability statement, please refer to these instructions.

Declaration of interests

Authors with no competing interests to declare should use the following wording: ‘The authors declare that they have no competing interests’. 

Where the author of an article is also part of the journal editorial team, information on the Handling Editor should be included using the following wording: ‘Author [author name] is the [journal role] of [journal]. [Author name] was not involved in the editorial handling of this manuscript, or in the decision to publish. The peer review process was managed independently by the [handling editor role] [name of handling editor].’

Ethics and consents

Manuscripts reporting studies involving human participants, human data or human tissue must:

• include a statement on ethics approval and consent (even where the need for approval was waived)
• include the name of the ethics committee that approved the study and the committee’s reference number if appropriate

Studies involving animals must include a statement on ethics approval and for experimental studies involving client-owned animals, authors must also include a statement on informed consent from the client or owner.If your manuscript contains any individual person’s data in any form (including any individual details, images or videos), consent for publication must be obtained from that person, or in the case of children, their parent or legal guardian. All presentations of case reports must have consent for publication.

Please see our editorial policies for more information. 

If your manuscript does not report on or involve the use of any animal or human data or tissue, please state not applicable in this section

Funding statement

All sources of funding for the research reported should be declared. If the funder has a specific role in the conceptualization, design, data collection, analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript, this should be declared.

Use the following wording: ‘This work was supported by [Funder Name] (grant number [XXX]).'

Reference List

Annals of Forest Science uses the Chicago Manual Of Style (CMOS) author-date referencing style. 

The corresponding format is illustrated in the article type templates for manuscript preparation.

Preparing Materials for Submission

Appendix

Annals of Forest Science does not accept supplementary material. Additional material should instead be included an appendix to the main text (see the templates provided for formatting appendices) or deposited in a data repository, whenever possible, and with a DOI.

An appendix is only required when there is additional information, which is not essential for understanding the main demonstration in the manuscript, but may be useful to some readers, for example for detailed model descriptions and for additional information about methods. 

• Include in the appendix any relevant element (development, detailed protocol, or supporting tables and/or figures), not available in a repository, that may be useful for developing certain aspects of the research without being essential for understanding the research that has been conducted;
• Continue the consecutive numbering of the main text for the figures and tables in the appendix. 

Footnotes

Footnotes are not accepted. Instead, insert references into the main text by name and year in between parentheses.  

File Formats 

The following file formats are acceptable for the main manuscript documents:

• Microsoft Word (DOC, DOCX)
• TeX/LaTeX and accompanying PDF

Please note: editable files are required for processing in production. If your manuscript contains any non-editable files (such as PDFs) you will be required to re-submit an editable file when you submit your revised manuscript, or after editorial acceptance in case no revision is necessary.

All relevant editable source files must be uploaded during the submission process. Failing to submit these source files will cause unnecessary delays in the production process.

Preparing Illustrations and Figures

When preparing figures, please follow the formatting instructions below. Please find more detailed guidance in our journals artwork guide. 

• Figures should be designed to ensure clarity and readability at the final publication size. They should be prepared to fit either one (85 mm wide) or two columns (170 mm wide), with all text, symbols, and labels remaining clearly legible at the final size
• Each figure should be closely cropped to minimise the amount of white space surrounding the illustration. Cropping figures improves accuracy when placing the figure in combination with other elements when the accepted manuscript is prepared for publication on our site
• Do not include titles or captions within your illustrations. Figure titles (max 15 words) and captions (max 300 words) should be provided in the main manuscript, not in the graphic file
• Figures should be numbered in the order they are first mentioned in the text and uploaded in this order. Multi-panel figures (those with parts a, b, c, d etc.) should be submitted as a single composite file that contains all parts of the figure
• Supply high resolution figures (minimum of 300 DPI) as separate files. Individual figure files should not exceed 10 MB. Please find information related to preferred file formats below
• Figures should be uploaded in the correct orientation
• Lettering must be of the same style for all figures and be 1.5 to 2.0 mm in height (capitals and numerals)
• Colour illustrations should be submitted as RGB (8 bits per channel)
• Provide figures containing vector/editable objects rather than embedded images
• Figure keys should be incorporated into the graphic, not into the caption of the figure
• Please note that it is the responsibility of the author(s) to obtain permission from the copyright holder to reproduce figures (or tables) that have previously been published elsewhere. Please find further guidance on the linked page. 

Figure file format, size and resolution 

For information on suitable figure size and resolution, please see our journals artwork guide.

For information on suitable file formats for specific figure types, read more about data presentation.

Figure Captions

Please supply a detailed caption for each figure with all the information required to understand the elements.

• All figures must be cited in text
• Figure captions begin with the term Fig., followed by the figure number. Figure captions should follow minimum capitalisation
• Number all figures using Arabic numerals
• Cite figures in the text in consecutive numerical order
• Denote figure parts by lowercase letters (a, b, c, etc.)
• Include the captions in the text file of the manuscript, not in the figure file
• Describe all elements of the figure in the figure caption (e.g. boxes, circles, etc.)
• Identify previously published material by giving the original source in the form of a reference citation at the end of the figure caption

Preparing Tables

Please provide detailed captions indicating all information required to understand the components of the table without any reference to the main text. Be as explicit as possible.

• All tables must be cited in the text to comply with accessibility requirements
• If citing multiple tables, please avoid ranges (e.g., ‘Tables 1–3)
• Table captions begin with the term Table, followed by the figure number. All tables must have captions as this is necessary to comply with accessibility legislation
• Table captions should follow minimum capitalisation
• Number all tables sequentially using Arabic numerals
• Align plus or minus (±) or decimal separator (.) in column of numerical results
• Use three significant figures (like: 154; 1.54; 0.00154; etc…) unless a higher precision is required;
• Table titles (max 15 words) should be included above the table, and legends (max 300 words) should be included underneath the table
• Identify any previously published material by giving the original source in the form of a reference at the end of the table caption
• Indicate footnotes by superscript lower-case letters (or asterisks for significance values and other statistical data) and include the footnotes beneath the table
• Tables cannot be included as images in the original manuscript; all tables in the manuscript must be editable in the source format