INSTRUCTIONS TO AUTHORS

1. At least one author must be Member of the European Association of Coleopterology (AEC) whose annual fee has been paid. The Executive Committee may occasionally invite outstanding non-members to publish their works in Elytron.

2. The opinion expressed in the works to be published are of the exclusive responsability of their authors.

3. Papers may be in any language of latin alphabet and must be original contributions in the field of Coleopterology. All manuscripts must be submitted to the Secretary Editor of the Editorial Board.
 

5. Submission of a paper implies that it has not been published previously and that it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere.

6. Manuscripts must be typed on one side of the paper only, double spaced with a wide margin. Manuscripts must also be submitted on floppydisk (3 ½"). The manuscripts must be written either in AmiPro, Excel, Word, WordPerfect, WordPro, WordStaar, XyWrite or in pure ASCII (i.e., without any codes for page format, underlining, boldface, etc.). Footnotes should be avoided.
Authors are requested to keep their works as concise as possible. Manuscripts shall not exceed twenty pages. Papers exceeding this length will usually not be considered. The original, and two copies of the text, figures and tables must be sent.

7. The manuscript should contain the following information:

• Title: This should be short and concise, and when appropriate include Order and Family, e.g. (COLEOPTERA: LUCANIDAE).
• Name and address of the author(s), e.g.

    Dr. Jon DOE
    Departament of Animal Biology
    Entomological University
    555-50 Your City (Your Country)
    Tel. (1) 93 555-55-55. Fax (1) 93 555-55-56.
    e-mail: email@address.com
 
• Abstract: Each paper shall contain only one Abstract, in English, irrespective of the language in which it is written. This should be a short summary, including the contents and conclusions, and should not be longer than 200 words. The title shall be in English and must precede the Abstract.
• Key words: A short list of words, in English, should be provided for rapid scanning of the contents of the paper, in order of importance, noting the geographical area last.
• Introduction: This should contain a brief survey of the relevant literature and the reasons for doing the work.
• Material and Methods (for experimental works): Sufficient information should be given to permit repetition of the experimental work. The technical description of methods should be given only when such methods are new.
• Results and Discussion: Other titles could be accepted for this section, which can be divided into different subsections. Comparison with relevant published works should be made and conclusions drawn. Scientific names (genera and species) must be underlined or in italics, e. g. Pogomocherus ovatus (Goeze, 1777).
• Nomenclature: Nomenclature must be in absolute agreement with current ICZN rules. The only acceptable type concepts are: holotype, allotype, paratype, lectotype, paralectotype and neotype. Use standardized abbreviations as follows; gen. n., sp. n., ssp. n., sp. rev., stat. n., comb. n., syn. n., etc. The author (unabbreviated) and preferably also the year of description should be given once for all genus –and species– group names mentioned. The specific name must always be preceded by the generic name, although this latter may be abbreviated. Geographical names should be given in their present spelling, if necessary with the original spelling in parentheses.

When a new taxon is described, the author(s) must state the composition of the type material, number of specimens, label data and where it be deposited. Indications of the etymology of the new taxon must be presented. The inclusion of a brief diagnosis before description is suggested.
• Acknowledgments.
• References: Every work must be accompanied by an alphabetically ordered literature containing all the publications referred to in the text. The references must be set out chronologically and in alphabetical order for each author, adding the letter a, c, ... to the works of the same author(s) and year. The references must be presented according to the following examples:
• references in periodical publications
• KRAATZ, G. 1862. Revision französischen Dorcadion – Arten. Berl. ent. Zeitschr., 6: 351-357.
• books or other non-periodical publications
• BALACHOWSKY, A. 1949. Faune de France, 50. Coléoptères Scolytides. Librairie de la Faculté des Sciences, Paris, 320 p.
• book chapters
• CROWSON, R.A. 1981. Cytology and Genetics. In: The Biology of the Coleoptera. p. 397-428. Academic Press. London.
In the text, references, should be given as HOWDEN (1986) or (BARAUD, 1984). When a citation includes more than two authors, the paper should be referred to in the text as ARNETT et al., provided that this is not ambiguous. Titles of journals should be abbreviated according to the World List of Scientific Periodicals. References to papers «in press» are permitted only when these have been accepted for publication.
References to «personal communications» and unpublished works are permitted in the text only.

8. Illustrations.

All necessary illustrations should accompany the manuscript, but should not be inserted in the text. Photograph, graphs and diagrams should be numbered consecutively in Arabic numerals in the order in which they are referred to in the text. Glossy photographs or positive prints should be unmounted whenever possible and should be kept to a minimum. Diagrams, graphs and charts should be drawn boldly in black ink good quality white paper or fine card-board and grouped whenever possible. Lettering to appear on the illustration should be given in full and should be of sufficient to allow for considerable reduction where necessary. Scales should preferably be indicated. Colour figures will be published at the author(s) expenses. The author’s name, the figure and the top of the illustration sould be stated on the back of each figure. The approximate position of each figure should appear in the text, should be indicated in pencil on the manuscript.
 Legends to figures should be typed on a separate sheet and not on the back of the original. They must be clear and concise.
 A translation into English of all figure legends must be provided when the paper is written in another language. Examples of figure captions:

 Fig. 42: Female internal copulatory organs of Psilothrix viridicaerulea (Geoffroy).
 Fig. 1–5: Agonum aeneum (Reiche), de Culebrillas: avant-corps (1); quatrième article du métatarse gauche, vue ventrale (3); édéage (4), Agonum andicola Bates, de Pisayambo: avant-corps (2); lobe médian de l’édéage (5). Echelle: 0,3 mm..
 Fig. 1–5: Agomun aeneum (Reiche), from Culebrillas: anterior part of the body (1); 4th segment of the left metatarsus, in ventral view (3); aedeagus (4). Agonum andicola Bates, from Pisayambo: anterior part of the body (2); median lobe of the aedeagus (5). Scale 0.3 mm.

9. Tables should be typed on separated sheets and every table should be provided with an explanatory caption. Units of measurement should always be indicated clearly. All tables and figures must be referred to in the text.
 A translation into English of all tables must be provided when the paper is written in another language. The approximate position in which each table should appear in the text should be indicated in pencil on the manuscript.

10. Fifty free reprints are provided to authors. Additional reprints may be requested when returning the galleys and will be charged to authors.

11. Papers that do not follow the Editorial Instructions will be returned to the authors.

12. Manuscripts should be sent to:

Dr. José Carlos OTERO
    Departamento de Biología Animal
    Facultad de Biología Animal
    15782 Santiago de Compostela (Spain)
    Tel. (34) 981563100. Fax (34) 981596904
    e-mail: baotero@usc.es