1. Submission Overview

Before you decide to publish with Intelligence & Robotics (IR), please read the following items carefully and make sure that you are well aware of Editorial Policies and the following requirements.

1.1 Topic Suitability

The topic of the manuscript must fit the scope of the journal. Please refer to Aims and Scope for more information.

1.2 Open Access and Copyright

The journal adopts Gold Open Access publishing model and distributes content under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Copyright is retained by authors. Please make sure that you are well aware of these policies.

1.3 Publication Fees

IR is an open access journal. When a paper is accepted for publication, authors are required to pay Article Processing Charges (APCs) to cover its editorial and production costs. The APC for each submission is $1500. There are no additional charges based on color, length, figures, or other elements. For more details, please refer to OAE Publication Fees.

1.4 Language Editing

All submissions are required to be presented clearly and cohesively in good English. Authors whose first language is not English are advised to have their manuscripts checked or edited by a native English speaker before submission to ensure the high quality of expression. A well-organized manuscript in good English would make the peer review even the whole Editorial handling more smoothly and efficiently.

If needed, authors are recommended to consider the language editing services provided by OAE to ensure that the manuscript is written in correct scientific English before submission. An extra charge is required to enjoy this service. Please visit https://www.oaepublish.com/index/author_services or contact English-Editing@oaepublish.com for more details.

1.5 Work Funded by the National Institutes of Health

If an accepted manuscript was funded by National Institutes of Health (NIH), the author may inform Editors of the NIH funding number. The Editors are able to deposit the paper to the NIH Manuscript Submission System on behalf of the author.

2. Submission Preparation

2.1 Cover Letter

A cover letter is required to be submitted accompanying each manuscript. Here is a guideline of a cover letter for authors' consideration:

• List the highlights of the current manuscript and no more than 5 short sentences;
• All authors have read the final manuscript, have approved the submission to the journal, and have accepted full responsibilities pertaining to the manuscript's delivery and contents;
• Clearly state that the manuscript is an original work on its own merit, that it has not been previously published in whole or in part, and that it is not being considered for publication elsewhere;
• No materials are reproduced from another source (if there is material in your manuscript that has been reproduced from another source, please state whether you have obtained permission from the copyright holder to use them);
• Conflicts of interest statement;
• If the manuscript is contributed to a Special Issue, please also mention it in the cover letter;
• If the manuscript was presented partly or entirely in a conference, the author should clearly state the background information of the event, including the conference name, time, and place in the cover letter.

2.2 Types of Manuscripts

There is no restriction on the number of figures, tables and references, provided that the manuscript is concise and comprehensive. The journal publishes Research Article, Review, Technical Note, etc. For more details about paper type, please refer to the following table.

2.3 Manuscript Structure

2.3.1 Front Matter

2.3.1.1 Title

The title of the manuscript should be concise, specific and relevant, with no more than 16 words if possible.

2.3.1.2 Authors and Affiliations

Authors' full names should be listed. The initials of middle names can be provided. The affiliations and email addresses for all authors should be listed. At least one author should be designated as the corresponding author. In addition, corresponding authors are suggested to provide their Open Researcher and Contributor ID upon submission. Please note that any change to authorship is not allowed after manuscript acceptance. The authors' affiliations should be provided in this format: department, institution, city, postcode, country.

2.3.1.3 Abstract

The abstract should be a single paragraph with word limitation and specific structure requirements (for more details please refer to Types of Manuscripts). It usually describes the main objective(s) of the study, explains how the study was done, including any model organisms used, without methodological detail, and summarizes the most important results and their significance. The abstract must be an objective representation of the study: it is not allowed to contain results that are not presented and substantiated in the manuscript, or exaggerate the main conclusions. Citations should not be included in the abstract.

2.3.1.4 Graphical Abstract

The graphical abstract is essential as this can catch first view of your publication by readers. We recommend you submit an eye-catching figure. It should summarize the content of the article in a concise graphical form. It is recommended to use it because this can make online articles get more attention.

The graphical abstract should be submitted as a separate document in the online submission system. Please provide an image with a minimum of 531 × 1,328 pixels (h × w) or proportionally more. The image should be readable at a size of 5 cm × 13 cm using a regular screen resolution of 96 dpi. Preferred file types: TIFF, PSD, AI, JPEG, and EPS files.

2.3.1.5 Keywords

Three to eight keywords should be provided, which are specific to the article, yet reasonably common within the subject discipline.

Sections 2.3.1.1 and 2.3.1.2 should appear in all manuscript types.

2.3.2 Main Text

Manuscripts of different types are structured with different sections of content. Please refer to Types of Manuscripts to make sure which sections should be included in the manuscripts.

2.3.2.1 Introduction

The introduction should contain background that puts the manuscript into context, allow readers to understand why the study is important, include a brief review of key literature, and conclude with a brief statement of the overall aim of the work and a comment about whether that aim was achieved. Relevant controversies or disagreements in the field should be introduced as well.

2.3.2.2 Methods

The methods should contain sufficient details to allow others to fully replicate the study. New methods and protocols should be described in detail while well-established methods can be briefly described or appropriately cited. Statistical terms, abbreviations, and all symbols used should be defined clearly. Protocol documents for clinical trials, observational studies, and other non-laboratory investigations may be uploaded as supplementary materials.

2.3.2.3 Results

This section contains the findings of the study. Results of statistical analysis should also be included either as text or as tables or figures if appropriate. Authors should emphasize and summarize only the most important observations. Data on all primary and secondary outcomes identified in the section Methods should also be provided. Extra or supplementary materials and technical details can be placed in supplementary documents.

2.3.2.4 Discussion

This section should discuss the implications of the findings in context of existing research and highlight limitations of the study. Future research directions may also be mentioned.

2.3.2.5 Conclusion

It should state clearly the main conclusions and include the explanation of their relevance or importance to the field.

2.3.3 Back Matter

The following sections should appear in all manuscript types.

2.3.3.1 Acknowledgments

Anyone who contributed towards the article but does not meet the criteria for authorship, including those who provided professional writing services or materials, should be acknowledged. Authors should obtain permission to acknowledge from all those mentioned in the Acknowledgments section. This section is not added if the author does not have anyone to acknowledge.

2.3.3.2 Authors' Contributions

Each author is expected to have made substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work, or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data, or the creation of new software used in the work, or have drafted the work or substantively revised it.

Please use Surname and Initial of Forename to refer to an author's contribution. For example: made substantial contributions to conception and design of the study and performed data analysis and interpretation: Salas H, Castaneda WV; performed data acquisition, as well as providing administrative, technical, and material support: Castillo N, Young V.

If an article is single-authored, please include "The author contributed solely to the article." in this section.

2.3.3.3 Availability of Data and Materials

In order to maintain the integrity, transparency and reproducibility of research records, authors should include this section in their manuscripts, detailing where the data supporting their findings can be found. Data can be deposited into data repositories or published as supplementary information in the journal. Authors who cannot share their data should state that the data will not be shared and explain it. If a manuscript does not involve such issues, please state "Not applicable." in this section.

2.3.3.4 Financial Support and Sponsorship

All sources of funding for the study reported should be declared. The role of the funding body in the experiment design, collection, analysis and interpretation of data, and writing of the manuscript should be declared. Any relevant grant numbers and the link of funder's website should be provided if any. If the study is not involved with this issue, state "None." in this section.

2.3.3.5 Conflicts of Interest

Authors must declare any potential conflicts of interest that may be perceived as inappropriately influencing the representation or interpretation of reported research results. If there are no conflicts of interest, please state "All authors declared that there are no conflicts of interest." in this section. Some authors may be bound by confidentiality agreements. In such cases, in place of itemized disclosures, we will require authors to state "All authors declared that they are bound by confidentiality agreements that prevent them from disclosing their conflicts of interest in this work.". If authors are unsure whether conflicts of interest exist, please refer to the "Conflicts of Interest" of IR Editorial Policies for a full explanation.

2.3.3.6 Consent for Publication

Manuscripts containing individual details, images or videos, must obtain consent for publication from that person, or in the case of children, their parents or legal guardians. If the person has died, consent for publication must be obtained from the next of kin of the participant. Manuscripts must include a statement that written informed consent for publication was obtained. Authors do not have to submit such content accompanying the manuscript. However, these documents must be available if requested. If the manuscript does not involve this issue, state "Not applicable." in this section.

2.3.3.7 Copyright

Authors retain the copyright of their works through a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License that clearly states how readers can copy, distribute, and use their attributed research, free of charge. A declaration "© The Author(s) 2024." will be added to each article. Authors are required to sign a License to Publish before formal publication.

2.3.3.8 References

References should be numbered in order of appearance at the end of manuscripts. In the text, reference numbers should be placed in square brackets and the corresponding references are cited thereafter. List all authors when the number of authors is less than or equal to six, if there are more than six authors, only the first three authors' names should be listed, other authors' names should be omitted and replaced with "et al.". The journal's name should be required to be italicized and the journal references should have corresponding DOI numbers. Information from manuscripts accepted but not published should be cited in the text as "Unpublished material" with written permission from the source. Journal names should be abbreviated according to the List of Title Word Abbreviations.

References should be described as follows, depending on the types of works:

2.3.3.9 Supplementary Materials

Additional data and information can be uploaded as Supplementary Materials to accompany the manuscripts. The supplementary materials will also be available to the referees as part of the peer-review process. Any file format is acceptable, such as data sheet (word, excel, csv, cdx, fasta, pdf or zip files), presentation (powerpoint, pdf or zip files), image (cdx, eps, jpeg, pdf, png or tiff), table (word, excel, csv or pdf), audio (mp3, wav or wma) or video (avi, divx, flv, mov, mp4, mpeg, mpg or wmv). All information should be clearly presented. Supplementary materials should be cited in the main text in numeric order (e.g., Supplementary Figure 1, Supplementary Figure 2, Supplementary Table 1, Supplementary Table 2, etc.). The style of supplementary figures or tables complies with the same requirements on figures or tables in main text. Videos and audios should be prepared in English, and limited to a size of 500 MB.

2.4 Manuscript Format

2.4.1 File Format

Manuscript files can be in DOC and DOCX formats and should not be locked or protected.

Manuscript prepared in LaTex must be collated into one ZIP folder (including all source files and images, so that the Editorial Office can recompile the submitted PDF).

When preparing manuscripts in different file formats, please use the corresponding Manuscript Templates.

2.4.2 Length

The word limit is specified in the item "Types of Manuscripts". There are no restrictions on number of figures or number of supporting documents. Authors are encouraged to present and discuss their findings concisely.

2.4.3 Language

Manuscripts must be written in English.

2.4.4 Multimedia Files

The journal supports manuscripts with multimedia files. The requirements are listed as follows:

• Video or audio files are only acceptable in English. The presentation and introduction should be easy to understand. The frames should be clear, and the speech speed should be moderate;
• A brief overview of the video or audio files should be given in the manuscript text;
• The video or audio files should be limited to a size of up to 500 MB;
• Please use professional software to produce high-quality video files, to facilitate acceptance and publication along with the submitted article. Upload the videos in mp4, wmv, or rm format (preferably mp4) and audio files in mp3 or wav format.

2.4.5 Figures

• Figures should be cited in numeric order (e.g., Figure 1, Figure 2) and placed after the paragraph where it is first cited;
• Figures can be submitted in format of TIFF, PSD, AI, EPS or JPEG, with resolution of 300-600 dpi;
• Figure caption is placed under the Figure;
• Diagrams with describing words (including, flow chart, coordinate diagram, bar chart, line chart, and scatter diagram, etc.) should be editable in word, excel or powerpoint format. Non-English information should be avoided;
• Labels, numbers, letters, arrows, and symbols in figure should be clear, of uniform size, and contrast with the background;
• Symbols, arrows, numbers, or letters used to identify parts of the illustrations must be identified and explained in the legend;
• Internal scale (magnification) should be explained and the staining method in photomicrographs should be identified;
• All non-standard abbreviations should be explained in the legend;
• Permission for use of copyrighted materials from other sources, including re-published, adapted, modified, or partial figures and images from the internet, must be obtained. It is authors' responsibility to acquire the licenses, to follow any citation instruction requested by third-party rights holders, and cover any supplementary charges.

2.4.6 Tables

• Tables should be cited in numeric order and placed after the paragraph where it is first cited;
• The table caption should be placed above the table and labeled sequentially (e.g., Table 1, Table 2);
• Tables should be provided in editable form like DOC or DOCX format (picture is not allowed);
• Abbreviations and symbols used in table should be explained in footnote;
• Explanatory matter should also be placed in footnotes;
• Permission for use of copyrighted materials from other sources, including re-published, adapted, modified, or partial tables from the internet, must be obtained. It is authors' responsibility to acquire the licenses, to follow any citation instruction requested by third-party rights holders, and cover any supplementary charges.

2.4.7 Abbreviations

Abbreviations should be defined upon first appearance in the abstract, main text, and in figure or table captions and used consistently thereafter. Non-standard abbreviations are not allowed unless they appear at least three times in the text. Commonly-used abbreviations, such as DNA, RNA, ATP, etc., can be used directly without definition. Abbreviations in titles and keywords should be avoided, except for the ones which are widely used.

2.4.8 Italics

General italic words like vs., et al., etc., in vivo, in vitro; t test, F test, U test; related coefficient as r, sample number as n, and probability as P; names of genes; names of bacteria and biology species in Latin.

2.4.9 Units

SI Units should be used. Imperial, US customary and other units should be converted to SI units whenever possible. There is a space between the number and the unit (i.e., 23 mL). Hour, minute, second should be written as h, min, s.

2.4.10 Numbers

Numbers appearing at the beginning of sentences should be expressed in English. When there are two or more numbers in a paragraph, they should be expressed as Arabic numerals; when there is only one number in a paragraph, number < 10 should be expressed in English and number > 10 should be expressed as Arabic numerals. 12345678 should be written as 12,345,678.

2.4.11 Equations

Equations should be editable and not appear in a picture format. Authors are advised to use either the Microsoft Equation Editor or the MathType for display and inline equations.

• Display equations should be numbered consecutively, using Arabic numbers in parentheses;
• Inline equations should not be numbered, with the same/similar size font used for the main text.

2.4.12 Headings

In the main body of the paper, three different levels of headings may be used.

• Level one headings: they should be in bold, and numbered using Arabic numbers, such as 1. INTRODUCTION, and 2. METHODS, with all letters capitalized;
• Level two headings: they should be in bold and numbered after the level one heading, such as 2.1 Statistical analyses, 2.2 ..., 2.3..., etc., with the first letter capitalized;
• Level three headings: they should be italicized, and numbered after the level two heading, such as 2.1.1 Data distributions,and 2.1.2 outliers and linear regression, with the first letter capitalized.

2.4.13 Text Layout

As the electronic submission will provide the basic material for typesetting, it is important to prepare papers in the general editorial style of the journal.

• The font is Times New Roman;
• The font size is 12pt;
• Single column, 1.5x line spacing;
• Insert one line break (one Return) before the heading and paragraph, if the heading and paragraph are adjacent, insert a line break before the heading only;
• No special indentation;
• Alignment is left end;
• Insert consecutive line numbers;
• For other details please refer to the Manuscript Templates.

2.5 Submission Link

Submit an article via https://oaemesas.com/login?JournalId=ir

3. Publication Ethics Statement

OAE is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). We fully adhere to its Code of Conduct and to its Best Practice Guidelines.

The Editors of this journal enforce a rigorous peer-review process together with strict ethical policies and standards to guarantee to add high-quality scientific works to the field of scholarly publication. Unfortunately, cases of plagiarism, data falsification, image manipulation, inappropriate authorship credit, and the like, do arise. The Editors of IR take such publishing ethics issues very seriously and are trained to proceed in such cases with zero tolerance policy.

Authors wishing to publish their papers in IR must abide by the following:

• The author(s) must disclose any possibility of a conflict of interest in the paper prior to submission;
• The authors should declare that there is no academic misconduct in their manuscript in the cover letter;
• Authors should accurately present their research findings and include an objective discussion of the significance of their findings;
• Data and methods used in the research need to be presented in sufficient detail in the manuscript so that other researchers can replicate the work;
• Authors should provide raw data if referees and the Editors of the journal request;
• Simultaneous submission of manuscripts to more than one journal is not tolerated;
• Republishing content that is not novel is not tolerated (for example, an English translation of a paper that is already published in another language will not be accepted);
• The manuscript should not contain any information that has already been published. If you include already published figures or images, please get the necessary permission from the copyright holder to publish under the CC-BY license;
• Plagiarism, data fabrication and image manipulation are not tolerated;
• Plagiarism is not acceptable in OAE journals.

Plagiarism involves the inclusion of large sections of unaltered or minimally altered text from an existing source without appropriate and unambiguous attribution, and/or an attempt to misattribute original authorship regarding ideas or results, and copying text, images, or data from another source, even from your own publications, without giving credit to the source.

As to reusing the text that is copied from another source, it must be between quotation marks and the source must be cited. If a study's design or the manuscript's structure or language has been inspired by previous studies, these studies must be cited explicitly.

If plagiarism is detected during the peer-review process, the manuscript may be rejected. If plagiarism is detected after publication, we may publish a Correction or retract the paper.

Falsification is manipulating research materials, equipment, or processes, or changing or omitting data or results so that the findings are not accurately represented in the research record.

Image files must not be manipulated or adjusted in any way that could lead to misinterpretation of the information provided by the original image.

Irregular manipulation includes: introduction, enhancement, moving, or removing features from the original image; the grouping of images that should be presented separately, or modifying the contrast, brightness, or color balance to obscure, eliminate, or enhance some information.

If irregular image manipulation is identified and confirmed during the peer-review process, we may reject the manuscript. If irregular image manipulation is identified and confirmed after publication, we may publish a Correction or retract the paper.

OAE reserves the right to contact the authors' institution(s) to investigate possible publication misconduct if the Editors find conclusive evidence of misconduct before or after publication. OAE has a partnership with iThenticate, which is the most trusted similarity checker. It is used to analyze received manuscripts to avoid plagiarism to the greatest extent possible. When plagiarism becomes evident after publication, we will retract the original publication or require modifications, depending on the degree of plagiarism, context within the published article, and its impact on the overall integrity of the published study. Journal Editors will act under the relevant COPE guidelines.

4. Authorship

Authorship credit of IR should be solely based on substantial contributions to a published study, as specified in the following four criteria:
1. Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work, or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work;
2. Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content;
3. Final approval of the version to be published;
4. Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

All those who meet these criteria should be identified as authors. Authors must specify their contributions in the section Authors' Contributions of their manuscripts. Contributors who do not meet all the four criteria (like only involved in acquisition of funding, general supervision of a research group, general administrative support, writing assistance, technical editing, language editing, proofreading, etc.) should be acknowledged in the section of Acknowledgement in the manuscript rather than being listed as authors.

If a large multiple-author group has conducted the work, the group ideally should decide who will be authors before the work starts and confirm authors before submission. All authors of the group named as authors must meet all the four criteria for authorship.
AI and AI-assisted technologies should not be listed as an author or co-author.

5. Reviewers Exclusions

You are welcome to exclude a limited number of researchers as potential Editors or reviewers of your manuscript. To ensure a fair and rigorous peer review process, we ask that you keep your exclusions to a maximum of three people. If you wish to exclude additional referees, please explain or justify your concerns—this information will be helpful for Editors when deciding whether to honor your request.

6. Editors and Journal Staff as Authors

Editorial independence is extremely important and OAE does not interfere with Editorial decisions. Editorial staff or Editors shall not be involved in processing their own academic work. Submissions authored by Editorial staff/Editors will be assigned to at least three independent outside reviewers. Decisions will be made by the Editor-in-Chief, including Special Issue papers. Journal staff are not involved in the processing of their own work submitted to any OAE journals.

7. Policy of the Use of AI and AI-assisted Technologies in Scientific Writing

Generative AI and AI-assisted technologies (e.g., large language models) are expected to be increasingly used to create content. In the writing process of manuscripts, using AI and AI-assisted technologies to complete key researcher work, such as producing scientific insights, analyzing and interpreting data or drawing scientific conclusions, is not allowed, and they should only be used to improve the readability and language of manuscripts.

AI and AI-assisted technologies should be used under human control and supervision as they may generate incorrect or prejudiced output, and they should not be listed as an author or co-author, nor cited as an author.

The use of AI and AI-assisted technologies should be disclosed by authors in their manuscripts, and a statement will be required in the final publication.

OAE will keep monitoring the development and adjust the policy when necessary.

8. Conflict of Interests

OAE journals require authors to declare any possible financial and/or non-financial conflicts of interest at the end of their manuscript and in the cover letter, as well as confirm this point when submitting their manuscript in the submission system. If no conflicts of interest exist, authors need to state "All authors declared that there are no conflicts of interest". We also recognize that some authors may be bound by confidentiality agreements, in which cases authors need to state "All authors declared that they are bound by confidentiality agreements that prevent them from disclosing their competing interests in this work".

9. Editorial Process

9.1 Pre-Check

New submissions are initially checked by the Managing Editor from the perspectives of originality, suitability, structure and formatting, conflicts of interest, background of authors, etc. Poorly prepared manuscripts may be rejected at this stage. If your manuscript does not meet one or more of these requirements, we will return it for further revisions.

Once your manuscript has passed the initial check, it will be assigned to the Assistant Editor, and then the Editor-in-Chief, or an Associate Editor in the case of a conflict of interest, will be notified of the submission and invited to review. Regarding Special Issue paper, after passing the initial check, the manuscript will be successively assigned to the Assistant Editor, and then to the Editor-in-Chief, or an Associate Editor in the case of conflict of interest for the Editor-in-Chief to review. The Editor-in-Chief, or the Associate Editor may reject manuscripts that they deem highly unlikely to pass peer review without further consultation. Once your manuscript has passed the Editorial assessment, the Associate Editor will start to organize peer-review.

All manuscripts submitted to IR are screened using CrossCheck powered by iThenticate to identify any plagiarized content. Your study must also meet all ethical requirements as outlined in our Editorial Policies. If the manuscript does not pass any of these checks, we may return it to you for further revisions or decline to consider your study for publication.

9.2 Peer Review

IR operates a single-blind review process, which means that reviewers know the names of authors, but the names of the reviewers are hidden from the authors. The scientific quality of the research described in the manuscript is assessed by a minimum of three independent expert reviewers. The Editor-in-Chief is responsible for the final decision regarding acceptance or rejection of the manuscript.

All information contained in your manuscript and acquired during the review process will be held in the strictest confidence.

9.3 Decisions

Your research will be judged on scientific soundness only, not on its perceived impact as judged by Editors or referees. There are three possible decisions: Accept (your study satisfies all publication criteria), Invitation to Revise (more work is required to satisfy all criteria), and Reject (your study fails to satisfy key criteria and it is highly unlikely that further work can address its shortcomings). All of the following publication criteria must be fulfilled to enable your manuscript to be accepted for publication:

• Originality
  The study reports original research and conclusions.
• Data availability
  All data to support the conclusions either have been provided or are otherwise publicly available.
• Statistics
  All data have been analyzed through appropriate statistical tests and these are clearly defined.
• Methods
  The methods are described in sufficient detail to be replicated.
• Citations
  Previous work has been appropriately acknowledged.
• Interpretation
  The conclusions are a reasonable extension of the results.
• Ethics
  The study design, data presentation, and writing style comply with our Editorial Policies.

9.4 Revisions

Authors are required to submit the revised manuscript within one week if minor revision is recommended while two weeks if major revision recommended or one month if additional experiments are needed. If authors need more than one month to revise their manuscript, we usually require the authors to resubmit their paper. We request that a document of point-to-point response to all comments of reviewers and the Editor-in-Chief or the Associate Editor should be supplied along with the revised manuscript to allow quick assessment of your revised manuscript. This document should outline in detail how each of the comments was addressed in the revised manuscript or should provide a rebuttal to the criticism. Manuscripts may or may not be sent to reviewers after revision, dependent on whether the reviewer requested to see the revised version. Apart from in exceptional circumstances, IR only supports a round of major revision per manuscript.

10. Contact Us

Journal Contact

Intelligence & Robotics Editorial Office
Suite 1504, Plaza A, Xi'an National Digital Publishing Base,
No. 996 Tiangu 7th Road, Gaoxin District, Xi'an 710077, Shaanxi, China.

Amber Ren
Managing Editor
editorial@intellrobot.com

Last updated on 5 September, 2024