PNIS IS NO LONGER ACCEPTING SUBMISSIONS. WE ARE CLOSED. SORRY.

Instructions for Submitting a Manuscript to PNIS

How to submit your manuscript:

1. Compose your manuscript (with everything including text, tables, figures, images, etc.) in whatever word processing software you prefer. See below for guidelines on how to prepare your manuscript.

2. Upload your manuscript to Google Docs.

3. Invite PNIS to view your manuscript. Send the invite to: 

4. Your manuscript will then be reviewed and a decision will be made if your manuscript is to be published by PNIS.

Manuscript Guidelines:

The very first word of your manuscript should be one of the following: HARD, SOFD, Editorial, Special Paper, or SCI-NEWS. This designation will tell us the type of PNIS your manuscript belongs to. Remember that SOFD uses satirical or fake data, HARD uses real data that you have collected, and Editorial is when you have no data or have not done any type of analysis. If you are submitting to HARD, you must attest that your data is real and was collected by you. If in doubt, designate your PNIS submission as SOFD. Final decisions regarding which PNIS journal your paper is to be published will be made by PNIS editors.

After you tell us what type of PNIS you are submitting to, give the title of the manuscript, and then the list of authors. The authors can be your actual name or anything else if you wish to remain anonymous. You may also provide an email address and/or a website (such as your own website) for each author.

After that, the structure (or lack thereof) of your manuscript is up to you. Most scientific papers are structured as (in order): Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, and References. However, PNIS does not require any kind of specific structure. All manuscripts, though, must be scientific in some nature. Note that if you are submitting a SCI-NEWS piece, you probably shouldn't adhere to the Intro, Methods, Results, structure. Here are some examples or unacceptable and acceptable manuscript ideas:

Unacceptable	Acceptable
Your poem	A statistical analysis on why your poem is not good
Thoughts about your cat	An ethogram of your cat's daily behaviors
A rant about why your vacuum sucks	A test (with the resulting data) to see if your vacuum is actually working
A story about a supposedly funny thing your kid did today	A write-up of your kid's science fair project

 

The format and style must also closely resemble those of an actual scientific article (for free examples, see the Public Library of Science, PeerJ, or arXiv). A good idea would be to read some examples of the different types of articles that PNIS publishes and base your format/style on that.

There is no stated required minimum or maximum for length of articles, although shorter articles will increase your chances of being published.

Your final manuscript should be just one file (so you should embed figures, tables, and images).

Figures, Tables, and Images

For the initial submission of the manuscript, don't worry too much about getting a good quality figure or image. If we are interested in your manuscript, we will work with you on the exact dimensions and resolution your figure or image needs to be. However, do worry on the content of your figure. At PNIS, we love fancy figures.

Tables are a different story, though. Don't try to be fancy with tables. Usually, just horizontal borders or alternating gray background colors are needed.

If you do use pictures, make sure that you are legally able to do so. Any pictures included with submissions also need to contain a source for the picture, as well as a statement from the author that they are legally able to use the picture.

References

No matter what your article is about, you should probably have references. Chances are, someone else has had your idea, or something similar to it, and has published it in a blog or academic journal. Please make sure your manuscript is adequately researched, fact-checked, and referenced before submitting to PNIS.

There is no specific style in which you need to format your references. In fact, you can use APA style for one reference, MLA style for another reference, and then make up your own style for another. The only requirement is that you provide enough information that anybody could reasonably look up your reference.

Edits

PNIS editors reserve the right to edit (which includes adding and/or deleting text) any manuscript. Often, these edits will be extensive. Before publication, authors will be asked to approve these edits.

Copyright Information

Authors retain copyright of any material they produce. No transfer of copyright to PNIS is required.