SIAM Journal on Discrete Mathematics

Instructions for Authors

Submitting a Manuscript

Please enter submissions directly into the Journal Submission & Tracking System. Authors should submit both the manuscript and a cover letter in PDF format. Note: Figures, if any, must be embedded "inline" in the manuscript.

If you have not used the Journal Submission & Tracking System, you'll need to create an account. Instructions for using this system are available here.

Submission of a manuscript to SIDMA is representation by the author that the manuscript has not been published or submitted simultaneously for publication elsewhere, including conference proceedings, and in case of acceptance to SIDMA, it will not be submitted elsewhere. However, SIDMA welcomes full versions of papers containing results accepted to conference proceedings. If the results contained in a manuscript have appeared previously, in any form, authors must clearly indicate this both in their cover letter and in a footnote on the first page of the manuscript. In addition, authors must upload the conference work along with their submission to SIDMA.

Original Scholarship

A large duplication of another author's or one's own work is a sign of poor scholarship. There is also a copyright issue if the source is not cited. Your manuscript should provide proper citations, use quotation marks or indentation (for quotations of five or more lines) to indicate borrowed wording, and minimize duplication. Refusal by an author to make these necessary changes is grounds for rejection.

Potentially Offensive Material

There is no general rule on what material is appropriate for publication in SIAM publications. However, if an editor believes that the use of some material (text, images, etc.) may offend SIAM readers, there will be an exchange with the authors on the need for the particular material and whether alternatives can be identified to express the same results. Unless the authors can make convincing arguments that the particular material is essential to convey the scientific contribution, it is expected that the material be replaced prior to review and further consideration for publication. For example, the "Lena image" has been used in past publications on imaging but is inconsistent with efforts to promote inclusion in mathematics, science, and engineering. SIAM will not consider submissions containing this image.

Resubmission

A resubmission of a manuscript previously rejected by this journal will generally not be considered for publication. If the author seeks an exception to this policy, or if the manuscript was previously rejected by another SIAM journal, the history of the manuscript will be available to the handling editor and possibly to referees. The cover letter should give a detailed response explaining how each comment of the previous referees has been addressed. The manuscript might be sent to the same editor and referees or to different ones.

Editor Selection

Authors can suggest an editor from among those listed on the journal's masthead, but the Editor-in-Chief has the exclusive right to assign papers to members of the editorial board. The editors reserve the right to reject any manuscript that does not conform to the journal's standards.

Permissions

If your paper contains material (for example, tables or figures) from another source, that material must be accompanied by written permission from the copyright holder. Permission is needed in cases of alternations to the original, as well. To assist referees unpublished references can also be submitted with an indication of whether they have been accepted for publication.

ORCID

SIAM is a member of ORCID - a central registry of researchers. Authors submitting papers to SIAM journals can log in to the submission system through their ORCID account, or can go to their SIAM system profile to connect their ORCID to their SIAM journals work. If the paper is accepted and published, SIAM Journals Online will display an icon next to the author’s name which links to their ORCID page, which can in turn list their published article if the author chooses.

SIAM encourages authors to take advantage of ORCID’s capability, which can be viewed as a DOI for an individual. Wherever it is used, this unique identifier then pulls together the individual’s work and professional activities from across publications, disciplines and workplaces. The researcher controls, through his or her ORCID account, which work and activities are publicly displayed.

Those interested can register for an ORCID ID here. Use it for login at manuscript submission, or contact SIAM to add it to your account.

TeX Papers

Authors of accepted papers must submit TeX files to SIAM for typesetting. Authors are highly encouraged to prepare their papers using SIAM's standard LaTeX 2e macros. Note that the SIAM office will format Plain TeX and AMSTeX files to LaTeX 2e. The LaTeX 2e macro package and documentation are available here or by email request.

Illustrations

All illustrations must be of professional quality with no handwritten elements. Note that tables and algorithms are not considered figures and should not be treated as such. Illustrations must be numbered consecutively and cited in the text. If your article is accepted for publication, SIAM will accept electronic (TeX, PDF, PNG, JPG, and EPS) figure files. Hand-drawn artwork will not be accepted. SIAM will not redraw figures. Illustrations must use lines one point or thicker; thinner lines may break up or disappear when printed. When choosing line weight and character size, keep in mind that illustrations may be reduced.

To ensure the optimal appearance of figures when they are printed in black and white or when viewed by a reader with color blindness, consider using colors that will appear as differing shades of gray when printed, and minimize use of yellow. Use of line markers and broken or dotted lines will also improve differentiation. Some aids in preparation of your figures are the parula colormap in MATLAB and the color blindness tests in the Proof Setup view in Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop.

Color Text and Color Figures

SIAM journals are printed in black and white. For optimum quality all text within the article must be in black. Though art may appear in color online, it is printed in color only when it is deemed by the editor to be scientifically necessary. If it is your wish or expectation that any of the figures in your paper appear in color in the printed version, please inform us immediately. Color art that is not deemed scientifically necessary by the editor can be printed in color at the author's expense.

Title

Titles should be brief and appropriate for indexing and should specifically describe the content of the paper. An abbreviated title, which will be used as a running head, must accompany all articles, must not consist of more than 50 characters (including spaces), and must not contain abbreviations.

Abstract

A one-paragraph abstract, not exceeding 250 words, that summarizes the principal techniques and conclusions of the manuscript in relation to known results must accompany each manuscript. Because the abstract must be able to stand independently, mathematical formulas and bibliographic references should be kept to a minimum; bibliographic references must be written out in full, not given by number. LaTeX commands specific to the article should be avoided; use the generally accepted form.

Keywords and Mathematics Subject Classifications

Keywords and MSC codes must accompany all articles. A list of the subject classifications can be accessed or searched online in the Annual Index of Mathematical Reviews.

References

References should be listed in either alphabetical order or order of citation at the end of the manuscript. The following reference styles should be used; other examples may be found in the journal style manual.

Journal articles (titles of journals should be abbreviated in accordance with Mathematical Reviews; abbreviations are available here):
[16] L. N. Trefethen, Cubature, approximation, and isotropy in the hypercube, SIAM Rev., 59 (2017), pp. 469–491.
Books, research reports:
[9] H. Kaper and C. Rousseau, Mathematics of Planet Earth, SIAM, Philadelphia, 2015.
Paper in a bound collection:
[2] C. Archetti and M. G. Speranza, Arc routing problems with profits, in Arc Routing: Problems, Methods, and Applications, MOS-SIAM Ser. Optim. 20, A. Corberan and G. Laporte, eds., SIAM, Philadelphia, 2014, pp. 281–299.
Acceptable variants on SIAM's references style are:
[T] L. N. Trefethen, Cubature, approximation, and isotropy in the hypercube, SIAM Rev., 59 (2017), pp. 469–491.
or
L. N. Trefethen (2017), Cubature, approximation, and isotropy in the hypercube, SIAM Rev., 59, pp. 469–491.

Citations Within the Text

A consistent style should be used, and the style of in-text citations should conform to the reference style chosen. To refer to a specific page or item in an article or book the following formats may be used: [2, p. 51]; [M, p. 51]; Mandelbrot [2, p. 51]; or Mandelbrot (1977, p. 51).

SIAM Macros

Authors are highly encouraged to prepare their papers using SIAM's standard LaTeX 2e macros. Although doing so is optional, using the SIAM macros enables features that will aid editors and referees during review as well as reducing the time needed to process a paper after acceptance. If an author chooses not to use the SIAM macros, the SIAM office will reformat Plain TeX and AMSTeX files to use SIAM's standard LaTeX 2e macros after the paper has been accepted for publication. The SIAM standard LaTeX 2e macro package and documentation are available here or by email request.

Review Procedures

Manuscript Submissions

Authors must submit manuscripts to SIDMA in electronic form. Hard-copy submissions will not be considered. Authors must enter submissions directly into the Journal Submission & Tracking System. Authors should submit both the manuscript and a cover letter in PDF format. Figures, if any, must be embedded "inline" in the manuscript.

After the submission has entered SIAM's tracking system, the corresponding author receives email that acknowledges receipt and provides the manuscript number. Authors are asked to include the manuscript number in all correspondence regarding the paper.

Once SIAM has processed a submission, a copy of the manuscript goes to the editor-in-chief along with any reference material the author may have submitted. The editor-in-chief decides which associate editor is best suited to handle the review. Note that all contact with the editor-in-chief and all subsequent review correspondence with the associate editor and the SIAM office regarding the manuscript will be done via email. The editor-in-chief can reject papers that are clearly inappropriate for SIDMA without assigning them to a review editor.

Direct Submissions

Members of the Editorial Board occasionally receive submissions directly from authors. In such cases the editor should ask the author to resubmit the paper to the SIAM office through the Journal Submission & Tracking System. This procedure ensures that the SIAM office will have the opportunity to access the manuscript for proper processing and tracking throughout the review process. Editors should not review a new submission without the approval of the editor-in-chief, who assigns the review editor for each paper.

Papers Authored by Editorial Board Members

Papers authored by Editorial Board members are subject to the same anonymous peer-review process as other papers. Submissions to the journal authored by the members of the Editorial Board will be handled by the editor-in-chief. Submissions to the journal authored by the editor-in-chief will be directed to the vice president for publications, who will oversee the review process.

Status Changes

Once the review editor has obtained referee reports and made a decision on a manuscript, the author receives email informing him/her of the decision. Anonymous referee reports are generally included, along with the associate editor decision.

Conflicts of Interest

It is vital to the reputation of SIAM and all of its journals that conflicts of interest be avoided. Therefore, it is SIAM policy that editors not review papers authored by their friends, colleagues, co-workers, students, or recent former students. The same policy applies to referees; editors should not send papers to referees who work at an author's institution or who are known to have close ties to the author. To help avoid conflicts of interest, it is SIAM policy that editors who receive manuscript submissions or who are assigned manuscripts that present a conflict of interest contact the SIAM office and the editor-in-chief to request that the manuscript be reassigned to another editor.

Supplementary Materials

Authors are encouraged to submit Supplementary Materials to complement articles in SIDMA. This might include additional figures or examples, animations, data sets used in the paper, computer code used to generate figures or tables, or other materials that are necessary to fully document the research contained in the paper or to facilitate the readers' ability to understand and extend the work.

Supplementary Materials under consideration for SIDMA will be refereed. When a paper is published, the Supplementary Materials are linked from the main article webpage. They can be cited using the same DOI as the paper.

SIAM intends to maintain archives of Supplementary Materials but does not guarantee their permanent availability. SIAM reserves the right to remove Supplementary Materials from a published article in the future if they are found to be inappropriate or to violate copyright laws or software licenses.

Guidelines

If you are submitting more than one Supplementary Material file, we strongly suggest you use a common compressed file format such as TAR, TGZ, RAR, or ZIP.
Supplementary Materials must be submitted at the same time the article is first submitted (use the author submission form located here). They will be available to the editor and referees to inspect. The referees will be asked whether the materials are appropriate to accompany the article.
The referees or editor may suggest changes, including removing some extraneous Supplementary Materials or moving items from the main text to the Supplementary Materials.
Supplementary Materials can be modified in accordance with these suggestions and resubmitted along with a revised manuscript in response to a round of refereeing.
Once accepted for publication, Supplementary Materials cannot be changed unless reason is found to remove an item. If a significant error is found in any of the Supplementary Materials then the authors may submit errata to the journal, similar to what would be done for other errors in the paper.
The authors must certify that they have the right to publish all Supplementary Materials and are not violating copyright or software licenses by doing so. Copyright of Supplementary Materials remains with the original copyright holder, not SIAM.
An index of Supplementary Materials must also be submitted. Each item should be listed along with a brief description and a justification for why the item should be included. This index will be used by the editor and referees in judging the appropriateness, and the descriptions will also ultimately appear on the Supplementary Materials webpage available to readers. This html template should be used to create the index (right click and "save link or target as" to download: also available as a text file).
If the Supplementary Materials contain additional figures or tables, it may be most convenient to combine these in a single PDF file. It is recommended that figures and tables be numbered S1, S2, etc. so they are distinct from numbering in the main article.
The following file types are allowed for Supplementary Materials:
- Text/figures/tables/multimedia: TIF, JPG, GIF (including animated GIFs), PS, EPS, PSD, PDF, PPT, PPS, AU, MP3, WAV, MPG, MP4, AVI, MOV, TXT, TEX.
- Computer code: should be contained within a common compressed file format such as TAR, TGZ, RAR, or ZIP.
If a TAR, TGZ, RAR, or ZIP file is included in the Supplementary Materials, it is recommended that a corresponding TXT file also be included within that gives an index of the contents. This might be appropriate for a collection of computer codes, for example.
The linux command "ls -R1F < directory >" may be useful to generate a list of all files organized by subdirectory.
Any computer code submitted with the Supplementary Materials should be a snapshot of the code used to obtain the published results. If the authors want readers to have access to later improvements of the code, it is suggested that the paper and/or Supplementary Materials contain a link to the external website or public code repository where the authors will maintain the code.
Virtual machines are a popular way to encapsulate the complete computing environment to accompany software, but are too large to be included as Supplementary Materials. Authors are encouraged to point to virtual machines available from other sites or on cloud computing platforms if they wish to indicate an environment on which their code runs.
Other than prohibition of huge files such as virtual machines, there is currently no size restriction on Supplementary Materials.

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