Guide for Authors

The authors are invited to submit their manuscripts using the journal online manuscript submission system (https://journal.ump.edu.my/mekatronika/submission) and the review website. The authors are provided with a paper template, which is downloadable here Template. Authors are encouraged to use and edit the template, rather than developing their own file.

  1. MANUSCRIPTS PUBLISHED

The journal publishes the following types of manuscripts:

Full Research Articles 
Full research articles provide significant new findings and conclusions obtained from scientific investigations and processes that fall within the scope of the journal. These articles should be between 3000-8000 words in length (excluding the abstract, tables, figures, and references), and they should include more than 20 references.

Review Articles 
The review articles are described the current state of the knowledge and provide suggestions for potential future research direction in the field. The length of a published review article is from 3000-10000 words (not including abstract, tables, figures, and references) with 100 or more references.

Case Studies
They summarise a unique case describing a great diagnostic or therapeutic challenge and providing a learning point for the readers. Cases with clinical significance or implications are given priority. The total number of words for a published case report is 1500 to 2000 words (not including abstract, tables and figures) with 40 or more references.

  1. MANUSCRIPT PREPARATION

These instructions are written in a form that satisfies all the formatting requirements for the author's manuscript. Please use them as a template in preparing your manuscript. Authors must take special care to follow these instructions concerning margins. The basic instructions are simple:

  •  Manuscript shall be formatted for an A4 size page.
  • The top, left, and right margins shall be 30 mm.
  • The bottom margin shall be 25 mm.
  • The text shall have both the left and right margins justified.

The manuscript file should be formatted as double-spaced, single-column text without justification. All pages must be numbered sequentially, facilitating the reviewing and editing of the manuscript. Standard fonts are recommended, and the 'symbols’ font should be used for representing Greek characters. The manuscript should be written in English in a clear, direct and active style.

The manuscript file should be formatted as double-spaced, single-column text without justification. All pages must be numbered sequentially, facilitating the reviewing and editing of the manuscript. Standard fonts are recommended, and the 'symbols’ font should be used for representing Greek characters. The manuscript should be written in English in a clear, direct and active style.

Manuscripts should include:

  • Title Page
  • Abstract
  • Keywords
  • Highlights (Optional)
  • Graphical Abstract (Optional)
  • Introduction
  • Methods and Materials
  • Results and Discussion
  • Conclusions
  • Conflict of Interest
  • Author(s) Contribution
  • Acknowledgements
  • References
  • Appendices
  • Figures/illustrations and tales included in the text
  • Supportive/Supplementary Material
  1. STRUCTURE OF MANUSCRIPT

The manuscript should be organized in the following order: title of the paper, authors' names and  affiliation, abstract, keywords, nomenclature (where applicable), introduction, the body of the paper (in sequential headings), conclusion, acknowledgment, references, and appendices (where applicable).

A. THE TITLE

The title is centered on the page and is set in boldface (font size 12 pt). The first letter of each word in the title should be capitalized. It should adequately describe the content of the paper. An abbreviated title of fewer than 60 characters (including spaces) should also be suggested.

B. ABSTRACT

A nonmathematical abstract, not exceeding 200 words, is required for all papers. It should be an abbreviated, accurate presentation of the contents of the paper. It should contain sufficient information to enable readers to decide whether they should obtain and read the entire paper. Do not cite references in the abstract.

C. KEYWORDS

The author should provide a list of three to six keywords that clearly describe the subject matter of the paper.

D. TEXT LAYOUT

The manuscript must be typed single spacing. Use extra line spacing between equations, illustrations, figures, and tables. The body of the text should be prepared using Times New Roman. The font size used for the preparation of the manuscript must be 12 points. The first paragraph following a heading should not be indented. The following paragraphs must be indented 10 mm. Note that there is no line spacing between paragraphs unless a subheading is used. Symbols for physical quantities in the text should be written in italics.

E. SECTION HEADINGS

Section headings should be typed centered on the page and in capital letters only. The type, fonts and style above (Times New Roman 11 point bold) are an example of a section heading. Do not underline section headings. A bold font should be used for section headings.

F. Subheadings
Subheadings should be positioned at the left margin, in a bold-faced font the same size as the main text (Times New Roman 10 point) with single line spacing above and below. The first letter of each word in the subheading should be capitalized.

G. Sub-subheadings
Sub-subheadings should be typed using italic font the same size as that used for the body of the text (Times New Roman 10 point italics). Only the first letter of the subheading should be capitalized. Note that a blank line precedes and follows the subheading.

H. EQUATIONS AND MATHEMATICAL EXPRESSIONS

Equation numbers should appear in parentheses and be numbered consecutively. All equation numbers must appear on the right-hand side of the equation and should be referred to within the text. Two different types of styles can be used for equations and mathematical expressions. They are:

In-line style
In-line equations/expressions are embedded in paragraphs of the text. For example, E = mc2. In-line equations should not be numbered.

Display style
Equations in display format are separated from the paragraphs of text. They should be flushed to the left of the column. Fractional powers should be used instead of root signs. A slash (/) should be used instead of a horizontal line for fractions, whenever possible; for example, use 2/3 for two-thirds. Refer to equations in the text as " Eq.(1)" or, if at the beginning of a sentence, as " Equation (1)". Vectors should be typed boldface. Do not use arrows, wavy-line underscoring, etc.

I. FIGURES AND TABLES

Figures (diagrams and photographs) should be numbered consecutively using arabicnumbers. They should be placed in the text soon after the point where they are referenced. Figures should be centered in a column and should have a figure caption placed underneath. Captions should be centered in the column, in the format “Figure 1” and are in upper and lowercase letters. When referring to a figure in the body of the text, the abbreviation "Figure" is used Illustrations must be submitted in digital format, with a good resolution. Table captions appear centered above the table in upper and lowercase letters. When referring to a table in the text, "Table" with the proper number is used. Captions should be centered in the column, in the format “Table 1” and are in upper and lowercase letters. Tables are numbered consecutively and independently of any figures. All figures and tables must be incorporated into the text (in portrait orientation).

J. UNITS

The use of SI units is strongly recommended, and mixed units are to be avoided.

K. CONCLUSION

A conclusion section must be included and should indicate clearly the advantages, limitations and possible applications of the paper. Discuss about future work.

L. ABBREVIATIONS

The author (s) should define all abbreviations used when the first time appeared in the text. A list of abbreviations may also be included at the end.

M. CONFLICT OF INTEREST

It should disclose any financial or non-financial interests such as political, personal, or professional relationships that may be interpreted as having influenced the manuscript. The phrase "The authors declare no conflicts of interest" should be included if there is no conflict of interest.

N. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

An acknowledgement section may be presented after the conclusion, if desired. Individuals or units other than authors who were of direct help in the work could be acknowledged by a brief statement following the text.

This section should describe sources of funding that have supported the work. Please also describe the role of the study sponsor(s) (if any) in study design; collection, analysis, and interpretation of data writing of the paper and decision to submit it for publication. Recognition of personal assistance should be given as a separate paragraph: people who contributed to the work, but do not fit the criteria for authors should be listed along with their contributions. You must ensure that anyone named in the acknowledgments agrees to being so named.  

Formatting of funding sources
List funding sources in this standard way to facilitate compliance to funder's requirements:

Funding
This work was supported by the name of funding sources including the type of grant and reference number [grant numbers …]. Detailed descriptions of the programme or grants and awards are not required.

The following statement should be included if there is no funding available for the research:

This study was not supported by any grants from funding bodies in the public, private, or not-for-profit sectors.

O. AUTHORS' CONTRIBUTION

Authors are encouraged to provide an author statement file describing their specific contributions to the article using the appropriate author contribution roles to increase transparency. The corresponding author is responsible for ensuring that all authors agree on the accuracy of the descriptions. All authors' roles should be mentioned, using the appropriate categories underneath. Authors may have played a variety of roles in their contributions. Contributions from authors do not affect the criteria for authorship established by the journal. The following are the words used to describe author contributions.

Conceptualisation; Methodology; Validation; Formal analysis; Data curation; Formal analysis; Investigation; Resources; Software; Visualisation; Writing - original draft; Writing - review & editing; Funding acquisition; Project administration; Supervision.

Authorship statements should be formatted with the names of authors first and the author contribution role(s) following, such as

M.M. Rahman (Conceptualization; Formal analysis; Visualisation; Supervision)

W.T. Urmi (Methodology; Data curation; Writing - original draft; Resources)

P. REFERENCE STYLE

There are strict requirements on reference formatting at submission stage. Author should be preparing references according to following examples and the reference style should be consistent where applicable, author(s) name(s), journal title/book title, chapter title/article title, year of publication, volume number/book chapter and the pagination must be present. The reference style used by the journal will be also applied to the accepted article at the proof stage. Note that missing data will be highlighted at proof stage for the author to correct.

The APA format 7 edition referencing system is to be used. In the body of the text a paper is to be referred to by the author’s surname with the year of publication in parentheses. References should be listed together at the end of the paper in alphabetical order by author’s surname. List of references indents 10 mm (or 0.39 inch) from the second line of each reference. Personal communications and unpublished data are not acceptable references.

Journal Papers
Hamada, K. I., Rahman, M. M. & Aziz, A. R. A. (2012). Characteristics of the time-averaged overall heat transfer in a Direct Injection Hydrogen Fueled Engine. International Journal of Hydrogen Energy, 38(11), 4816-4830.
Rahman, M. M. & Ariffin, A. K. (2006). Effects of surface finish and treatment on the fatigue behaviour of vibrating cylinder block using frequency response approach. Journal of Zhejiang University of Science A, 7(3), 352-360.
Journal titles should not be abbreviated. Note that journal title is set in italics.

Books
Juvinall, R. C. & Marshek, K. M. (2000). Fundamentals of machine component design. New York: John Wiley and Sons.
Stephens, R. I., Fatemi, A., Stephens, R. R. & Fuchs, H. O. (2000). Metal fatigue in engineering. New York: John Wiley and Sons, Inc.
Note that the title of the book is italicized and sentence case.

Chapters in Books
Barky, M. E. & Zhang, S. (2005). Fatigue spot welds. Fatigue testing and analysis. Lee et al. (Eds.). New York: Butterworth Heinrahmanemann, 285-311.
Note that the title of the book is italicized and sentence case.

Proceedings Papers
Rahman, M. M., Bakar, R. A., Sani, M. S. M. & Noor, M. M. (2008). Investigation into surface treatment on fatigue life for cylinder block of linear engine using frequency response approach. 15th International Congress on Sound and Vibrations, 2119-2127.

Web Pages
Felippa, C. A. (2011). Advanced finite element methods. Retrieved from http://www.colorado.edu/courses.d /AFM.d/Home.html.

Rockwell Automation. Arena. Retrieved from http://www.arenasimulation.com. IN-TEXT CITATION Document your study throughout the text by citing the author (or brief title if there is no author) and year of the works you researched. The reader can then locate the complete source in the alphabetical reference list at the end of your work. The in-text citation is highlighted in this example:

One author
Rahman (2010) claimed that … or the theory was first put forward in 1960 (Rahman, 2010).

Two authors
Always cite both authors.
Example: Rahman and Noor (2009) found … or The majority found … (Rahman & Noor, 2009).

Multiple authors for 3 or more authors
a full stop after “al”) and the year.
Example: Rahman et al. (2009) or (Rahman et al., 2009).

Multiple works (when two or more references are cited to make the same point)
List two or more works by different authors who are cited within the same parentheses in alphabetical order by the first author’s surname. Separate the citations with semicolons.
Example: (Rahman, 2010; Rahman & Kadirgama, 2009; Rahman et al., 2011)

Multiple works by the same author
Arrange two or more works by the same author by year of publication. Give the author’s surname once; for each subsequent work, give only the date.
Example: University research has indicated that… (Rahman, 2007, 2010).

PEER-REVIEW

All papers are subjected to a preliminary evaluation by an Editor, who may reject an article before it has been submitted for peer review if it falls outside the journal's scope or is of inadequate quality. Following this first screening, manuscripts that seem to be appropriate are submitted to single-blind peer-review by a minimum of two independent reviewers/experts. The authors are requested to nominate at least three individuals who are qualified to evaluate their paper. All recommended reviewers must have their present email addresses provided.

LANGUAGE

The manuscript should be written in the English language clearly and understandably. The manuscript should be proofread for proper spelling and grammar use. We shall promptly return any manuscripts that are not complete or are not in good condition.

PLAGIARISM

A well-established component of the editorial process is plagiarism screening. Turnitin software will be used to verify all submitted manuscripts for plagiarism check.

“ONLINE FIRST” PUBLICATION

Manuscripts ready for publication are uploaded as "Online First" versions as soon as they are completed. When the authors have completed the final proofreading and addressed issues, the manuscripts are deemed ready for publishing. Authors need to understand that once their articles are published online, they cannot be changed.