Guidelines for authors

ZooBank registration

All new species must be registered with with ZooBank. A guide to this process can be obtained from the editor at [email protected].

The following information should be included on the first page of the paper:

• The author’s ZooBank registration, signified by the letters ‘author’ in the code. (This can be included after the author’s name and should include http://zoobank.org/ at the beginning of the code);
• The paper’s ZooBank registration, signified by the letters ‘pub’ in the code. (This can be included after the address information and should include http://zoobank.org/ at the beginning of the code).

At the beginning of the description of each new species, e.g. under the species’ name, the species’ ZooBank registration, signified by the letters ‘act’ in the code, should be given and should include http://zoobank.org/ at the beginning of the code. Once the paper has been published, the author must update the ZooBank registration for each species from ‘in press’ to ‘published’.

These procedures ensure that the Memoirs of Museum Victoria is compliant with the new rules from the International Commission for Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN) for electronic publishing of new scientific names.

Submission of papers and illustrations

Papers must be submitted to the editor in final manuscript form as a word document file only and double line spaced. Any accompanying images or drawings must be submitted separately and NOT embedded within the text.  

All line drawings and photographs must be submitted as 300 dpi scans at A4 size. Although not preferable, original artwork (photographs, line drawings) can be accepted for scanning by the museum. Although the museum takes no responsibility for any damage to original artwork, the utmost care will be taken while it is in the museum’s possession.

Memoirs of Museum Victoria does not charge authors for any part of the publication process.

Papers may be sent by either email to [email protected] or by post to the editor, Richard Marchant, Memoirs of Museum Victoria, GPO Box 666, Melbourne, Victoria 3001, Australia.

Instructions for authors

Papers should be arranged as follows:
title (including higher classification of zoological taxa)
authors’ name and address (postal and email)
abstract
key words
contents (only if the paper is extensive)
introduction
main text
acknowledgements
references
index (only if extensive)
tables within the text
figures

• Author’s email addresses in contact details should be in brackets.
• Primary headings are in bold and left justified; secondary headings in italics and left justified. Italics in the text should otherwise be restricted to generic and specific names. Paragraphs are indented. 
• Abbreviation of River and Island/s: Use R for River, I for Island and Is. for Islands.
• For numbers, use numerals except when used in text narrative when they should be spelt out, but only up to and including the number ten. Numerals should also be spelt out when used as follows: first, second, third, fourth, tenth, twentieth and so on.
• The word ‘Figure’ should be spelt out when used below a genus name in the body of the text and in each figure’s caption. However, when figures are referred to within the text do not spell out and instead use fig. or figs.
• Captions to illustrations must be submitted separately at the end of the manuscript and should follow this example:
  
  Figure 1. Storthyngurella hirsuta sp. nov., male, holotype: a, b, dorsal and lateral views of body; c, d, frontal and lateral views of cephalon.
  
  
• References should be listed alphabetically at the end of the manuscript. Journal and book titles must be in full and italicised, with the year of publication, edition, page number, publisher and city of publication in roman. Authors should follow this example:
  
  Paulin, C.D. 1986. A new genus and species of morid fish from shallow coastal waters of southern Australia. Memoirs of Museum Victoria 47: 201–206.
  
  Last, P.R., and Stevens, J.D. 1994. Sharks and rays of Australia. CSIRO Publishing: Melbourne. 513 pp.
  
  Wilson, B.R., and Allen, G.R. 1987. Major components and distribution of marine fauna. Pp. 43–68 in: Dyne, G.R. and Watson, D.W. (eds), Fauna of Australia Volume 1A General articles. Australian Government Publishing Service: Canberra.
  
  
• Reference citations should use the following style:
  
  Paulin, 1986; Last and Stevens, 1994; Smith et al., 1990.
  
  
• In taxonomic papers, synonymies should be of the form: taxon, author, year, pages, figures. A period and dash must separate taxon and author except in the case of reference to the original description, e.g. Leontocaris Stebbing, 1905: 98–99.—Barnard, 1950: 699.
• Supplementary information (extended lists of material examined, databases, etc.) should be submitted separately and with the final manuscript to be forwarded to referees. The Editorial Board encourages use of supplementary information as long as the requirements of the International Commission of Zoological Nomenclature are met in the printed paper.

Open access statement

The Memoirs of Museum Victoria is an open access journal. This journal is made available to the general public under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International license (CC BY-NC 4.0).