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Submission Guidelines

  • The Indian Journal of Ecology is an open-access journal. You do not need to be a member of the Indian Ecological Society to submit a manuscript. At least an Annual Membership of Rs 1000 [Indian and the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC)  countries]  of each author is compulsory once the manuscript is accepted for publication. In case of other countries, at least the first or corresponding author should take an Annual Membership of the Indian Ecological Society by paying US$ 125. However, the author(s) can also opt for a life membership of INR 8000 (Indian and SAARC countries) and US$ 750; in that case, each author does not need to be an annual or life member for publishing in the Indian Journal of Ecology. In the case of the low-income and lower-middle-income country groups (excluding India and SAARC countries), there shall be 50% and 25% discounts, respectively, on annual or life membership charges (https://blogs.worldbank.org/en/opendata/world-bank-country-classifications-by-income-level-for-2024-2025 ). 
  • At the time of submission, a non-refundable processing charge of Rs 750 or US$10 must be paid.
  • Original research papers concerned with various fields of ecology, both basic and applied, are accepted from the annual/life members or non-members of the Indian Ecological Society if considered suitable by peer reviewers and the Editorial Board. It is presumed that the articles submitted for publication to the Indian Journal of Ecology have not been previously submitted and will not be simultaneously submitted and published in any other journal.

Writing and Formatting

Research article

  • Manuscripts of research articles should be prepared under the following headings: 
    • Title of the article (Title case)
    • ABSTRACT
    • Keywords 

    Manuscript Template - Before Review
    Manuscript Template - After Acceptance

  • IMRD format for Research Articles (Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion)
    • 1. INTRODUCTION
    • 2. MATERIALS AND METHODS (including subsections - 2.1, 2.2... in title case) 
    • 3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION (including topical subsections - 3.1, 3.2... in title case) It is advisable to submit a combined Results and discussion section. However, if authors prefer to submit two distinct Results and Discussion sections, they should justify this choice in the cover letter. 
    • 4. CONCLUSION
    •  Acknowledgments
    •  Funding
    • CRediT Authorship Contribution Statement (In pre-review submission, “CRediT Authorship Contribution Statement”  should be given on the title page for anonymised review process) 
    • Conflict of Interest
    • Declaration of Generative AI and AI-assisted technologies in the writing process 
    • Data Availability Statement 
    • REFERENCES
  • Short notes should have no headings or abstract. The manuscript should be uploaded to the designated website for consideration.
  • Each MS must have names of three reviewers from an institution other than the authors’ place(s) of work, including a valid email address.
  • The manuscript should be in Times New Roman with font size 12. Use page numbering, line numbering, and double line spacing.
  • Title must be short and specific. The byline should comprise the name(s) of author(s), complete postal address, and e-mail address. Full first and last names of authors with an asterisk “*” highlighting the corresponding author; postal addresses; and email address of the corresponding author.

Abstract 

The abstract must be self-explanatory and should include the background of the research problem, the objectives, the methodology,  the novelty, the key results, and a conclusion. The abstract should not contain abbreviations or literature references. An abstract is often presented/uploaded separately from the article on the journal website, so it must stand alone. It should not, in any case, exceed 250 words.

Keywords

The authors should also suggest up to 5-7 keywords below the abstract.

Introduction

The introduction should be brief and include a justification for the investigation and a brief review of prior peer-reviewed work. It should provide an adequate background and the ecological context. Key references related to the work must be cited. Avoid information not related to the study conducted.

Materials and Methods 

  • Materials and methods should be clear and provide sufficient detail to enable an independent researcher to reproduce the work. It should be divided into subsections for clarity and to provide details of methods and materials. 
  • Methods that are already published should be summarised and indicated by a reference. This section can be subtitled for clarity. Provide references for methods used as appropriate.
  • New methods used should be described in detail so that another researcher can reproduce your experiment/method.
  • All statistical tests should be described coherently, and the theoretical and empirical frameworks should be stated in detail.
  • Descriptions should be in the past tense, and use SI units

Results and Discussion

  • Results should be written concisely in a logical order. All data must invariably be given in the metric and decimal system. Data presented in figures should not be duplicated in tables and vice versa. All figures and tables should be cited in text and should have concise and self-explanatory headings. The results should be based on proper statistical analysis. In case of papers with qualitative data of significance without statistical analysis, the Editor's decision to consider the same for review shall be final.
  • Discussion should be oriented towards explaining the significance and implications of the results obtained and should be well-connected with the previous work in this direction. A description of study limitations should be included in this section. Any related papers published in the Indian J Ecology must be cited. See Journal Contents link.

General Guidelines

  • The total text length of research articles is limited to 6000 words (approximately 15-16 double-spaced pages, in Times New Roman, font size 12), including Figures, Tables, Illustrations, and References.  The total length of the review article is 8000 words.
  • In the manuscript, abbreviations must be explained when they first appear in the text.  
  • Do not use symbols such as @ to denote “at the rate of”.
  • Use the “%” symbol for per cent.
  • Use either British or American good-quality English to write your manuscript. 
  • The International System of Units (SI) should be used. The use of SI units is mandatory.

Notes: 

  • Rs. 750 (Indian authors) and $10 (International Authors) are charged towards the article
    submission/processing fee, which is non-refundable even if an article is accepted/not accepted/withdrawn. 
  • In case the number of pages of an article, in the print copy of the journal, exceeds 6 on account of Photos/Illustrations/ Figures/ Long Tables, etc., the authors will have to bear the charges for pages in excess of 6.  The charges/print cost per page of more than 6 pages is INR 400 per page.    

Review article

For review articles, please follow the general instructions for research articles, with the following exceptions:

  • Review articles must highlight the novelty of the review and the current state of review in a particular field, with a robust methodology/methods section providing further details on how the review was conducted. Preferably follow the PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses) process: https://www.prisma-statement.org.   
  • In the review article, the authors should give details about the Methodology employed for conducting the review, such as “Meta-Analysis“, Systematic Review", "Narrative Review”,  ”Comparative Review", “Critical Review”.
  • In a review article, a paragraph describing why the review is novel and why a review on this subject is needed. In a review article, the first part should cover general and global issues, then specific and scientific issues, in about 5-6 sentences. 
  • The first section of the article should be “1. Introduction”,  “2. Methodology”, and the last section should be “X. Conclusion”, and sections should have topic titles. All sections and sub-sections should be numbered. At the end of each section, authors are advised to propose a concise view of the novelty described and/or the main research hypotheses addressed by the reviewed knowledge. In review articles, it is not compulsory to follow IMRaD elements.
  • The text length of review articles is limited to 8000 words, excluding figures, tables and references.
  • The title should end  with “ A review”
  • The abstract of less than 300 words should contain two parts: the first part should give general and global issues, then specific and scientific issues in about 5-6 sentences.
  • The review article should include references to all relevant published work worldwide. Include references to previous work that has had a significant bearing on the subject.
  •  
  • The introduction should explain to the reader the background of the subject area. The section should end by explaining why the author(s) are reviewing the subject area. 

Title page

  • The title page of the manuscript should be uploaded as a separate file, including the article title, authors' names, affiliations, email addresses, the corresponding author, ORCID of at least the first and corresponding authors, and authors' contributions.
  • Full first and last names of authors with an asterisk “*” highlighting the corresponding author; postal addresses; and email address of the corresponding author. The manuscript file should be without author details for a double-blind review: neither the authors nor the reviewers know each other's identities.

Title Page - Template

Cover letter

The cover letter should explain the ecological aspect covered in the submitted manuscript and why you consider it appropriate for the diverse readership of the Indian Journal of Ecology.

Scientific names

  • Complete scientific name to every living organism with authority must be given on its first mention to avoid confusion with common names, ensuring scientists worldwide understand exactly which species is being discussed. The contributors must ensure the authenticity of the current scientific name and authority.

Figures, photos and illustrations

  • Provide graphs in an editable format, instead of as static images.
  • Figures, images, artwork, diagrams and other graphical media must be supplied as separate files along with the manuscript. The authors should clearly indicate their place in the manuscript.
  • Please provide captions for all figures, images, and artwork.
  • Add a sentence or two with figure captions to make it stand alone, so that the reader can understand completely on their own, without requiring the reader to refer to the main text. 
  • Explain the abbreviations used in the Tables / Figures in the Table footnotes / with figure captions.
  • Figures/illustrations/graphs /photos should fit A4  paper size with margins of 2.54 cm (25.4mm ) at top, bottom, right and left. 
  • Sizing of graphs/illustrations/photos, etc., should be less than 18 cm  (180mm) wide and 23 cm in height (230mm).
  • Text graphics may be embedded in the text at the appropriate position.
  • Photographs should be of high quality (300 dpi) with sharp details and contrasts. The publication cost of colour photographs will be charged separately at the prevailing market rates. Small figures should be grouped to fill a page, and full-page figures should be larger than 26 x 36 cm.
  • Cite all Figures/ Photos/or Illustrations in the manuscript text as Figure 1, Figure 2 and so on.
  • Figures/photos/artwork should be uploaded as separate files at the submission stage. 

Math formulae

  • Submit math equations as editable text, not as images. Equations should be typeset in equation format and cited in the text as Eq. 1, etc.
  • Present variables in italics.
  • Display equations separately from your text, numbering them consecutively in the order they are referred to within your text.

Tables

  • Tables must be submitted as editable text, not as images. 
  • Place tables next to the relevant text or on a separate page(s) at the end of your article.
  • Cite all tables in the manuscript text.
  • Number tables consecutively according to their appearance in the text.
  • Please provide captions along with the tables.
  • Place any table notes/  full form of abbreviations below the table body ( Table footnote).
  • Avoid vertical rules and shading within table cells.
  • We recommend that you use tables sparingly, ensuring that any data presented in tables does not duplicate results described elsewhere in the article.

Supplementary material

  • Tables and Figures not directly related to the description of the main findings, but needed to understand and replicate the study, should be uploaded as a separate supplementary material file. Supplementary Information that is relevant to the conclusions of the paper should be included. 
  • The Supplementary Information document will be sent to peer reviewers alongside the manuscript file. 

Note: All supplementary materials provided will appear online only in the same way as received and will not be part of the print copy of the journal. These files will not be checked, formatted, or typeset by the production team.

English language

All articles submitted to the journal must be written in grammatically correct English. Use spell-check and grammar-check to avoid errors.

Authors should not use generative artificial intelligence (AI) and AI-assisted technologies in the writing process.  

File format

  • Format Word files in a single-column layout.  Only Word files are accepted.
  • Upload figures, tables and text graphics in editable format.

Peer Review

  • Indian Journal of Ecology follows a single anonymised review process. Review of manuscript -  A minimum of two referees will review the article, and a revised article documenting the authors’ response to the reviewer comments and any editorial direction will have to be submitted within 15 days. Any further delay will result in a change of the date of receipt of the article.
  • Articles that do not follow the format of the journal will not be considered for review. 
  • Editors shall not be involved in making decisions about the papers they have written themselves or their colleagues. Any such submissions will be subject to the journal's usual procedures, and peer review will be handled independently of the editor involved.

The Indian Journal of Ecology follows the APA style of referencing.

  • References within text
  • In-text citation: Parenthetical citation: (Bedenel et al., 2019); (Dhawan & Peshin, 2009); (Chhuneja, 1991). Use an ampersand (&) in parenthetical citations.
  • Narrative citation: Use "and" in narrative citations. The narrative citation integrates the author's name directly into your sentence, for example, Dhawan and Peshin (2009)  reported on the risks of using synthetic parathyroid pesticides. 
  • Single author: the author's name (without initials, unless there is ambiguity) and the year of publication, for example (Allan, 2020a, 2020b). 
  • Two authors: both authors' names and the year of publication, for example (Allan & Jones, 2019). 
    Three or more authors: first author's name followed by 'et al.' and the year of publication, for example ( Allen et al. 2021). 
  • Two or more than two references cited jointly should be arranged chronologically and distinguished from each other by (;) except that the word ‘and’ should be used between the last two references. For example ( Dhawan 2008;  Dhawan et al. 2009 and  Pimentel, 2014),   

Reference style

Journal article

Reference to a journal publication with a DOI

Peshin, R., Dhawan, A. K., Kranthi, K. R., & Singh, K. (2009). Evaluation of the benefits of an insecticide resistance management programme in Punjab, India. International Journal of Pest Management, 55(3), 207–220. https://doi.org/10.1080/09670870902738786

Reference to a journal publication without a DOI ( in case a DOI is  not available):

Dhawan, A. K., Kumar, V., & Shera, P. S. (2013). Ecological perspectives in pest management for sustainable IPM. Indian Journal of Ecology, 40(2),167-77.

Reference to a journal publication with an article number:

Van der Geer, J., Handgraaf, T., & Lupton, R.A. (2022). The art of writing a scientific article. Heliyon, 19, e00205. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.heliyon.2022.e00205.

Online magazine article

Thomson, J. (2022, September 8). Massive, strange white structures appear on Utah’s Great Salt Lake. Newsweek. https://www.newsweek.com/mysterious-mounds-great-salt-lake-utah-explainedmirabilite-1741151 (accessed on date-day/month/year)

Print magazine article 

Nicholl, K. (2020, May). A royal spark. Vanity Fair, 62(5), 56–65, 100.

Authored book

Painter, R. H. (1951). Insect Resistance in Crop Plants. The Macmillan Company, New York, USA.

Edited book

Peshin, R., & Dhawan, A. K. (Eds.). (2009). Integrated Pest Management: Innovation-Development Process (Vol. 1). Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-8992-3_17

Edited book chapter

Dhawan, A. K., Kumar, V., & Shera, P. S. (2012). Management of insect pests of cotton: retrospect and prospect. In R. Arora, B. Singh, & A. K. Dhawan (Eds.), Theory and Practice of Integrated Pest Management (pp. 274–297). Scientific Publishers, Jodhpur, India.

Conference proceedings

Peshin, R., Kaul, V., Perkins, J.H., Sood, K.K., Dhawan, A.K., Sharma, M., Yangsdon, S., Zaffar, O., & Sindhura, K. (Eds.) (2022). Sustainable Agricultural Innovations for Resilient Agri-food Systems. Proceedings of the Indian Ecological Society International Conference 2022.https://doi.org/10.55362/IJE/IESIC/2022/PROC

Dissertation

Horvath-Plyman, M. (2018). Social Media and the College Student Journey: An Examination of How Social Media Use Impacts Social Capital and Affects College Choice, Access, and Transition. Doctoral Dissertation, New York University, USA.

Open educational resource

Fagan, J. (2024, February 7). Nursing Clinical Brain. OER Commons. https://www.oercommons.org/authoring/53029-nursing-clinical-brain/view (accessed on date.. day/month/year).

Webpage with a retrieval date 

Worldometer. (n.d.). Current world population. Retrieved October 17, 2025, from https://www. worldometers.info/world-population/

Reference to a dataset

FAOSTAT. (2025). Food and Agriculture Data. Food and Agriculture Organisation Corporate Statistical Database (FAOSTAT). https://www. fao.org/faostat/en/#home (accessed on date.. day/month/year).

Duties of Authors

  • Underlying data should be represented accurately in the paper. A paper should contain sufficient detail and references to permit others to replicate the work. Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute unethical behaviour and are unacceptable. All manuscripts submitted to the journal will be  checked for plagiarism 
  • Authors will be asked to provide the research data supporting their paper for editorial review and/or to comply with the open data requirements of the journal. Authors should be prepared to retain data for a reasonable number of years (at least 3 years) after publication.
  • Authors should ensure they have not indulged in any research misconduct and must follow publication ethics.  Authors should not submit for consideration in another journal a paper that has been published previously, except in the form of an abstract or as part of a published lecture, academic thesis or electronic preprint.

Authorship of the paper

Authorship criteria: Authors should only be listed on a manuscript if they have made a significant contribution to the research and the writing of the manuscript. Please follow the ICMJE definition of the authorship or Contributor Role Taxonomy (please see https://credit.niso.org/ ). All authors should agree to the final version of the manuscript and its submission for publication. The authors' contributions should be listed on the Title page. 

Author contributions

Corresponding authors are required to acknowledge each author’s contributions  using the Contributor Role Taxonomy (CRediT) https://credit.niso.org/ :

  • Conceptualization
  • Data curation
  • Formal analysis
  • Funding acquisition
  • Investigation
  • Methodology
  • Project administration
  • Resources
  • Software
  • Supervision
  • Validation
  • Visualization
  • Writing – original draft
  • Writing – review and editing.

Conflict of Interest Statement
 

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial or personal relationships that could have influenced the work reported in this paper.


                                                                       OR


The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships that  may be considered as potential competing interests:

Personal interest:

Financial interest:

Generative AI or  the use of AI tools in writing, figures/ images and artwork

The journal does not permit the use of generative AI or AI-assisted tools to create or alter images in submitted manuscripts.

Authors should not use AI tools in writing the manuscript. The author(s)    must insert at the end of the manuscript, immediately above the references, entitled ‘Declaration of Generative AI and AI-assisted technologies in the writing process, ' that no   AI tools have been used in the writing process. Basic checks of grammar, spelling and punctuation need no declaration. 

 

Point-wise Reply to Reviewers' Comments

  • The author should submit a point-wise reply to each reviewer's comment separately in tabular format. The changes incorporated with page numbers and line numbers should be mentioned against each point. 
  • Both a clean version and a tracked-changes version of the revised manuscript should be uploaded.  

 

All editorial correspondence should be addressed to:

Editor-in-Chief, Indian Journal of Ecology
The Indian Ecological Society,
Punjab Agricultural University Campus, Ludhiana – 141004, India

Editor-in-Chief : editorinchief@indianjecol.org

Chief Managing Editor: indianecologicalsociety2025@gmail.com