ISSN 0373-580X
printed version
ISSN 1851-2372
online version

Instructions to authors

• Scope and policy
• Form and preparation of manuscripts
• Sending of manuscripts

The Bulletin of the Botanical Society of Argentina publishes original scientific articles in all areas of Botany (structure, development, taxonomy, cytology, genetics, evolution, phytogeography, ecology, etc.) in basic and applied aspects of the diverse plant organisms and fungi. Articles should not exceed 16 printed pages, including illustrations, excepting especially invited articles.

Manuscripts will be evaluated by two anonymous reviewers. Manuscripts receiving "split reviews" will be sent out to a third reviewer, and the final decision will be taken by the Editorial Board. After this process, authors will be informed on the evaluation result.

Authors are to follow strictly the Instructions detailed hereafter, as this will facilitate the evaluation of manuscripts submitted for publication. If manuscripts do not agree with these instructions, they will be sent back to the authors before being considered by the Editorial Board. In addition, the journal itself should be the first guide for contributors.

For revision, the original manuscript and two copies (including copies of all sets of illustrations, graphics, and tables) must be sent to the Chief-Editor in A4 paper size, double-spaced throughout, printed on one side of page only, and with margins of no less than 2.5 cm, along with the respective file in a 3 1/2 floppy disk. The original illustrations should be sent once the article is accepted. An e-mail address should be provided in order to make contact with the author (or at least one of the authors) possible.

The accepted article, once reviewed and corrected, must be sent according to the same conditions as the original manuscript.

Page proof corrections should be limited to typographical errors, eluding extensive modifications to the original. Should such changes prove unavoidable, the additional correction costs must be borne by the author. Colour illustrations, if applicable, and offprint costs are expected to be covered by the author.

Articles are accepted in Spanish, Portuguese, or English. Authors should prepare their manuscripts using a word processor compatible with Word, or documents RTF type.
Use UPPERCASE LETTERS, boldface, and italics where indicated. Leave only one space between words and use just one "Enter" at the end of each paragraph.
It is advisable to preserve the following sequence of chapters: Summary, Resumen, Introduction, Material and Methods, Results, Discussion, Conclusions, Acknowledgements, Bibliography. Such chapters will not be numbered, and although the scheme can be varied depending on the subject, they must always keep the same order.
The Summary and Resumen must have a maximum of 200 words each and must include a synthesis of the conclusions. If the paper is written in Spanish or Portuguese, the Summary should also contain the title; the same should be done in the Resumen for an English-written article. Up to seven Key words and "Palabras clave" should be included respectively.
The Introduction must include the purpose of the paper and the background information on the subject.
Material and Methods should refer to the material studied, the techniques applied, the nomenclature used, the colour tables employed, the herbarium abbreviations, the preparation of the figures, etc.
Results should only incorporate original data, obtained through the research work. When including keys, they must be dichotomic and progressively indented.
The Discussion should contain a comparative analysis between what was already known and what the author observed.
The Conclusions will summarise the contribution made by the author(s). Depending on the case, Discussion and Conclusions might be combined.
Tables should be drawn in units fitting the journal page size.

Titles

The title of the article should be concise and informative. Authors are asked to suggest an abbreviated title for the page heading. The title must be written in boldface and capital letters; if the specific or generic name of a taxa is included, the superior taxonomic category to which it belongs must be added between brackets (except for Trachaeophytes, the Division must always appear), excluding plant author's names. If a very specific geographical region is mentioned in the article, the name of the country where is located and, if applicable, the appropriate political subdivision should be added between brackets.
The name(s) of the author(s) should be written in capital letters, under the title. Affiliation(s) or any other relevant personal information that the author/s may wish to specify shall be indicated as footnotes.
The title of each chapter will also be written in capital letters and aligned to the left. Subtitles, if any, will also be aligned to the left but in italics.

Scientific names

Latin names, which designate genus, species, subspecies, and varieties, will be written in italics, except for those leading the descriptions of taxa, which shall in turn be written in boldface. Names of families, orders, etc., shall be written in normal, plain font.

Plant Author's names

Plant author's names should be written with only the first letter in capital. They shall be mentioned neither in the title nor in the figure legends. They must be written when the taxonomic categories are mentioned for the first time in the text, or, in any case, they should appear in the list of studied material.
For the abbreviations, the use of:
BRUMMITT, R.R. & C.E. POWELL (eds.). 1992. Authors of Plant names. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, is recommended.

Studied material

In taxonomic articles, the following order in data reference is advisable: country (capital letters); province (Prov.); Department (Dpto.); locality or place; date; collector's last name and number; herbarium abbreviation (in parentheses), following the indications from the latest edition of Index Herbarium, as in the following example:

ARGENTINA. Prov. Tucumán: Dpto. Trancas, Tapia, 14-XI-1920, Venturi 1046 (BAA, LIL).

If the number of specimens is high, the citing of only one specimen per location is recommended.
In non-taxonomic articles, authors should write complete information regarding the place, date of collection, collector and number, indicating the herbarium in which specimens are kept.

Works that are cited in the text should be listed at the end of the article in alphabetical order under the first author's name, and in chronological order when citing several papers of the same author. When there are several authors, only the first author's last name precedes the first name and the remaining authors' names shall be written in the normal order. Names should be written in capital letters. When listing the same author more than once his/her full name must be repeated. Then, the year of publication (in the case of several papers of the same author and year, the year of publication will be followed by a, b, etc.), the paper's title, the name of the journal were it was published (abbreviated following Botanico-Periodicum-Huntianum) in italics, the volume number, colon, the paging. 

Some examples:
CABRERA, A. L. 1962. Compuestas andinas nuevas. Bol. Soc. Argent. Bot. 10: 21-45.
RICHARDS, A. J. 1997. Plant breeding systems. 2nd ed. Chapman and Hall, London.
DONOGHUE, M. J. & J. A. DOYLE. 1989. Phylogenetic analysis of angiospems and the relationships of Hamamelidae. In: CRANE, P. R. & S. BLACKMORE (eds.), Evolution, systematics and fossil history of the Hamamelidae, pp. 17-45. Clarendon Press, Oxford.

In numbering the volumes, it is recommended to transform the Roman numbers into Arabic numbers.
Bibliographic cites or references of bibliography in the text should be written as follows: Smith & Robinson (1994), (Burkart, 1952, 1957a, b; Archangelsky & Petriella, 1971), Poggio et al. (1993).
Bibliography accompanying the Latin names of the species or genus, shall not be repeated in the Bibliography chapter, unless mentioned in a comment. Data should be ordered as follows: author; name of the journal or book; volume and number; colon; paging (just the page where such name is mentioned); year of publication.

Type material

Data shall be written right after the bibliographical cite of each taxon, following the order as indicated in STUDIED MATERIAL (see e). Thereafter, the category and the herbarium(s) where sample(s) is (are) kept will be indicated, marking the samples examined by the author with an exclamation mark. For example:

Gaya eligulata Krapov., Tressens et Fernández. Bol. Soc. Argent. Bot. 16: 97. 1974. Tipo: Brasil. Bahía, Joazeiro, Estaçao Experimental Manda-carú, 6-IV-1967, Krapovickas 12882 (Holotypus CTES!).

If the type belongs to a very old species, it is advisable to write the complete cite from the original diagnosis enclosed in quotation marks in order to complete the data of the specimen.

They should match either the column width (7.2 cm) or the full page width (15 cm x 21.5 cm, including the legend). Original illustrations exceeding twice the size of the printing area will not be accepted.
Capital letters will be used to characterize the elements of each figure. Preferentially, they should be aligned to the right and placed below each illustration, maintaining a horizontal order from left to right. Lowercase letters or abbreviations will be used to indicate particular details of each element. Figures should either have a printed scale on them or indications of the exact augmentation in the legend.
Drawings and graphics can be done manually with Chinese ink or with a personal computer. In the latter case, authors should submit high-resolution printouts. White paper of an adequate thickness should be used. The use of rub-off for letters, symbols, etc. is recommended.
Well-contrasted highly defined photographs should be printed in brilliant paper. When framing them, leave no spaces among them. Photographs should be glued on a white cardboard.
On the reverse side of each illustration, authors should write lightly with soft pencil their names, the title of the paper, and the figure number. Letters and scales from the figures should be indicated in a transparent sheet over each illustration. All figures should be arranged in a resistant cardboard and protected with a paper cover.
Legends must be written in a different page appended to the text.
All figures, photographs, graphs, or diagrams must be numbered consecutively throughout the manuscript in the same order as they are cited in the text.

• Tariffs
  1. Each paper will be charged pernumber of pages, per number.
  2. Cost will be AR $20 per page.
  3. Members who are current on their monthly payment will not pay the tariff and if they publish with "NON MEMBERS", they will receive a 150% bonus according to their participation on the papaer.
  Members who are not current on their payment will have the option to choose between fulfilling their payment (in which case they will receive their corresponding bonus) or pay as non members.

In order to calculate the tariff to be paid, the following formula will be used:
DUE TO PAY = (# of pages X $20) - (# of pages X $20) X (# of members current in pay X 1.5)/# of authors.