How to write and publish a scientific paper - Barbara Gastel, Robert A. Day 2022

Listing affiliations and addresses
How to list the authors and addresses
Preparing the text

Listing authors’ affiliations and addresses serves two purposes. It helps to identify the authors. It also indicates how to contact them. Because scientists now communicate largely by email, an email address generally should be included at least for the author to whom inquiries about the paper should be conveyed. Some journals use asterisks, footnotes, or the acknowledgments to identify this person. Authors should be aware of journal policy in this regard, and they should decide in advance which author will serve in this role.

Scientific papers often have multiple authors, from multiple institutions or departments. For example, there may be seven authors, from a total of three institutions. In such instances, each author’s name and address should include an appropriate designation, such as a superscript a, b, or c after the author’s name and alongside the appropriate affiliation. (Sometimes a journal may just request the affiliation of each author and then do the formatting itself. In this regard, as in others regarding affiliations and addresses, follow the instructions to authors from that particular journal.)

Sometimes graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, or others do research at one institution and then move to another. In such situations, researchers may wonder: Which one should I list? You should list the institution where the research was done. Your new information should then appear in a “present address” footnote.

The author who should receive inquiries about the paper is called the corresponding author. Journals ask that a corresponding author be designated for each paper. The corresponding author typically submits the paper, receives the editor’s decision whether to publish it, submits revisions, works with the editorial office after acceptance (for example, by answering questions from the manuscript editor and checking page proofs), and responds to inquiries from readers. The corresponding author should be someone who expects to be readily reachable during and after publication. Opinions vary as to whether being a corresponding author is an honor or just a task.

Unless scientists wish to publish anonymously (or as close to it as possible), they should devote appropriate care to presenting their names, affiliations, and contact information.