STYLE MANUAL Fourth Edition Prepared under the Direction of the AIP Publication Board Searchable version provided with permission by Ken Hanson; home page http://public.lanl.gov/kmh/ American institute of Physics New York Copyright @ 1990 American lnstitute of Physics, Inc. This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 89-81194 InternationalStandard Book Number 0-88318-642-X American lnstitute of Physics 500 Sunnyside Blvd. Woodbury, NY I1797 AIP Pub. R-283.2 Printed in the United States of America First edition, 1951 Second edition, 1959; revisions 1963,1965, 1967,1968,1969,1970,1973 Third edition, 1978 Fourth edition, 1990 fifth printing, 1997 Preface The American Institute of Physics published its first At the time of the third edition ( 1978 ) the text pages of Style Manual in 195 1. It was produced at the request of the many AIP and Member Society journals were composed by Publication Board, which was made up of the editors of all typewriter, because the monotype composition used earlier Member Society journals, and with their approval. had become too expensive. Since then practically all journal At that time there were five Member Societies, each pages have been produced by computer-controlled photo- publishing one or two journals through the services provided composition, and at the present time a second generation of by the Institute. Now there are ten Member Societies, which computer typesetting systems is coming into use. The next between them publish about forty archival journals and sev- steps, which will be made possible by this new typesetting en translated journals. In addition, AIP itself now has a pub- technology, will include the easy transfer of authors' own lishing program that comprises seven archival journals, digitized text files to the publisher's composition system eighteen translated journals, and two magazines. without rekeyboarding, and, eventually, the production of Roughly half of the Member Society journals are still complete "electronic pages" that can be stored on disks or produced through AIP's publishing services, as are all of transmitted by telephone line. AIP's own publications. But the remainder are published by Given the accelerating march of new publishing tech- their Member Society owners independently of AIP's copy- nology, it appears probable that the next edition of the AIP editing and composition facilities. Style Manual will have to follow this one at a closer interval The 1951 AIP Style Manual was followed by a second than has been the case with the previous editions. edition in 1959 and a third edition in 1978. This year, in the The number of members of the AIP staff and of the fourth edition, the emphasis is changing. The Style Manual Publication Board, both past and present, to whom the Insti- is no longer tied closely to the procedures followed in the tute is indebted for their various contributions to this Man- AIP journal production offices, but instead attempts to ac- ual is so great that it would take another section to name commodate the different style rules and procedures prac- them all. Instead, therefore, a hearty "Thank you" to all of ticed throughout the AIP "family" of journals. It presents you from today's AIP and Publication Board. advice which, if followed, should result in the preparation of clear, concise, and well organized manuscripts eminently suitable for submission to any physics or astronomy journal Robert T. Beyer editor's office. Chair, AIP Publication Board I. Summary information for journal contributors A. MANUSCRIPT PREPARATION ed abstracting journals. For this reason the abstract should not contain literature citations that refer to the main list of The information on this and the following page is a sum- references attached to the complete article, nor allusions to mary of the advice given in detail in later sections of the the illustrations. Define all nonstandard symbols and abbre- manual. Authors should note in addition that the journal for viations. Do not include tabular material or illustrations of which they are writing may have particular requirements any kind. Avoid "built-up" equations that cannot be ren- that differ in detail from those presented here. Consult the dered in linear fashion within the running text. Type or print "Information for Contributors" page in the selected journal. the abstract double spaced, preferably as a single paragraph. In general, a study of the form and style of published articles It should be about 5% of the length of the article, but not is the best guide to the requirements of individual journals. more than about 500 words. 3. Mathematics 1. General instructions Type or print as much of the mathematical material as Manuscripts must be in English (American usage and possible. Handwritten material must be neatly lettered in spelling), typed or printed double spaced throughout, on black ink. When confusion is possible, distinguish between white paper preferably 2 15 X 280 mm ( 84 x 11 in. ) in size. similar-looking letters, numbers, and special symbols when Use one side of the page only, leaving wide margins at both they first occur [for example, the number "one" ( 1) and the sides and at top and bottom. Indent paragraphs. Number all letter "ell" (1); the Roman letter "kay" (k) and the Greek pages consecutively, beginning with the title and abstract letter "kappa" (K); the "proportional to" symbol ( a ) and page. Submit the original manuscript with production-quali- the Greek "alpha" (a),and so on]. Write the identification ty figures and one or more duplicate copies (including clear of these symbols in the margin where they first occur. copies of figures), as required by the editor of the journal to Notation should be clear, as simple as possible, and con- which the manuscript is submitted. Manuscripts that cannot sistent with standard usage. Display all numbered equations be read or easily understood will be returned to the author. on separate lines set off from the text above and below. Con- Include the following material, in the order shown: secutive numbering of equations throughout the text is gen- a. title, with the first word capitalized, erally preferred, in which case use arabic numbers in paren- b. authors' names, theses flush right with the right margin. In some journals, c. authors' affiliations, including adequate postal numbering by section may be permitted, with the section addresses, number made part of the equation number. d. abstract, preferably on the first page with the title, e. appropriate indexing codes selected from the 4. Footnotes and references Physics and Astronomy Classification Scheme Type or print all footnotes (including references) in or- (see Appendix I ) , der of citation as a separate double-spaced list at the end of f. text, the manuscript, before the tables and figures. Start with foot- g. acknowledgments, notes to the title, authors' names, and authors' affiliations; h. appendixes (if necessary ) , for these, some journals use a sequence of letter superscripts, i. collected references in the order in which they some use a series of symbolic indices (asterisks, daggers, are cited, etc.). Check a recent issue of the journal to which the paper j. tables, each with a caption, is to be submitted for the correct form. Acknowledgments of k. collected figure captions, financial support should be made in the acknowledgments 1. figures, section of the paper, not as footnotes to the title or to an m. if necessary, supplementary material for deposit in author's name. For literature references in the body of the AIP's Physics Auxiliary Publication Service paper, most AIP and Member Society journals prefer to (see Appendix J). number them in order of appearance and list them in that Ask someone else to read the manuscript, however satis- order at the end of the article. (Some journals will also per- fied you may be with its clarity and accuracy. A second pair mit references to be cited in text by author and year only, of eyes can often find a typographical error or unclear state- with the reference list arranged alphabetically by author's ment that the author missed. name; see See. I1 C 10 for a more complete discussion.) In the usual case, where literature citations are numbered, use superscript arabic numerals appearing in consecutive nu- 2. Abstract merical order through the text. The names of authors in the An abstract must accompany every article. It should be reference list should be given in the form in which they ap- a concise summary of the significant items in the paper, in- pear on the title page of the cited work, with the family name cluding the results and conclusions. In combination with the ("surname") last. For journal references use the standard title it must be an adequate indicator of the content of the abbreviations for journal names given in Appendix G; give article, because it will appear separated from the text and the volume number, the first page number, and the year of illustrations in electronic bibliographic databases and print- publication. For model footnotes and references see Table 11. 5. Tables colored illustrations when the color is an important feature Tabular material more than four or five lines long of the scientific content; contact the editor to determine any should be removed from running text and presented as a special requirements of the specific journal. separate table. Type each table double spaced on a separate page after the list of footnotes and before the collected figure 7. Physics Auxiliary Publication Service captions. Use roman or arabic numerals, according to the Material that is part of and supplementary to a paper, usage in the selected journal. Be sure to cite every table in the but of too limited interest to warrant full publication in the text.