Submission Guidelines

Submission Guidelines for Scientific Malaysian Magazine

1. The proposed word count for the various types of submissions are as follows:
Feature articles: 1500 words/article
Opinion articles: 1500 words/article
Project Collab: 800 words/article
Creative writing (science storytelling, short stories, book reviews): 800 words/article

We may accept other types of article not listed above, please contact us for enquiries.

2. Columns: We are establishing columns for the magazine to enable easier reading for our readers and to provide writers with focus on what to write. It is best to pitch your article to an editor to establish which column you wish to write for and the focus of the article before fully writing it. You may submit for more than one column if you wish.

Please refer to the current theme for the issue you wish to write for on the submission guideline webpage and ensure your article fits within the theme.

• In Brief: Introductory articles that conveys the basic knowledge or background of the theme.
• Cutting Edge: Technology/Treatment/Discovery that is new to the field.
• Stats and Facts: Well-sourced (referenced and reasonably up to date) facts and stats that when aggregated, provide insight to an issue within the theme. This will be assembled into an infographic by our illustrator team.
• Interviews and Anecdotes: Personal anecdote or an interview showcasing expert knowledge or personal experience. Example: Interview with a scientist/doctor/patient or a recounting of a personal experience.
• Top 5: Article that describes the top five most pressing/interesting/well-established issues within the theme. Examples: misconceptions/trends/disease types/ challenges.
• Tip of the Iceberg: An article that delves into deeper underlying issues. Example: the ethical implications, history or misconceptions about a subject.
• Inkwell: Short stories, book or movie reviews. Serialised stories that run through several magazine issues may be considered depending on quality, length and suitability.

3. All articles submitted should ideally be original and have not been published elsewhere (magazines, journals, institutional websites, blogs etc.). If the article has been published elsewhere, please provide a copy or the link(s) to the original article during the submission.

4. Submissions should ideally be written in a manner that is as least technical as possible to cater for our non-specialist readers.  [Important!]

5. All submissions must be accompanied by a 1-paragraph summary or abstract (max. of 100 words), highlighting the key points in the article in non-technical terms. This summary can be in written in bullet points.

6. Submissions may be accompanied by a glossary and up to three graphs/diagrams/other images to clarify/illustrate technical points. All accompanying figures and diagrams should also be submitted as separate image files (E.g.: *.jpg, *.png). Permission to use each figure should be requested by the author from the relevant source(s).

7. Authors should provide reference(s) for all facts and figures quoted in their article. References in the main text should be cited in numbered square brackets, such as [1], [2], [3-5]. Full references should be included at the end of the article in the following format:

[1] Feinman, L.  (1989). Absorption and utilization of nutrients in alcoholism. Alcohol Health & Research World., 13(3):207-210.

8. Our magazine is published twice a year. Submissions are accepted on a rolling basis (see below for submission deadlines and themes for each issue). Submissions of articles not within the chosen themes below may still be considered for publication in webzine format only (but will still be highlighted in our PDF version of the magazine). 

9. Submissions will be edited for typos, grammatical errors, punctuation errors, and other common writing mistakes, as well as to improve sentence structures and the overall flow of information.

10. Submissions should be submitted only in MS Word format (*.doc, *.docx).

11. A series of articles on the same topic may also be submitted to be published in series/parts in more than one issue.

12. All author retains the full copyright to the articles submitted and may republish their articles elsewhere only after a prior notice is given to Scientific Malaysian. The republished articles must provide a link back to the original article published on Scientific Malaysian Magazine website.

13. All articles cannot be reproduced without prior permission from the author(s) and Scientific Malaysian.

14. The SciMy editorial board retains the rights to final editorial decisions.

15. To submit an article, email your article and accompanying figures to magazine[at]scientificmalaysian.com.