Guidelines for authors can be downloaded here (PDF). Appearing below is the same in content.

Hydrological Research Letters Guidelines for Authors

Revised on 11 December, 2020

I. General

Hydrological Research Letters (HRL; Portal site http://www.hrljournal.org/) has been first published in 2007 by Japan Society of Hydrology and Water Resources (JSHWR) and then was published jointly with Japanese Association of Groundwater Hydrology (JAGH), Japanese Association of Hydrological Sciences (JAHS), and Japanese Society of Physical Hydrology (JSPH) since April of 2017, for the purpose of encouraging debate and rapid exchange of information on a wide array of investigations in hydrology and water resources issues amongst academic researchers, students, practicing engineers and the general public. HRL also publishes critical reviews of various fields in hydrology and water resources and other information of interest to scientists to encourage communication and dissemination and wider utilization of scientific results.
The defining theme of HRL can be encapsulated in the abbreviation TOP: Transdisciplinary, Open access, and Prompt publication. Manuscripts submitted to HRL may cover all aspects of hydrology and water resources, including physical and biological sciences, engineering, and social and political sciences.
The HRL Editorial Board welcomes contributions from authors throughout the world. Whether to accept a contribution for publication or not is decided by the journal editors on the basis of the suitability of subject matter to the focus of the journal, originality of the contribution, potential impacts on society and scientific merit. The corresponding editor assigned to the submitted article (“the Editor”) has complete responsibility and authority on behalf of the Editor-in-Chief to accept the submitted article for publication or to reject it. The Editor may confer with a corresponding associate editor (“AE”) or reviewers for an evaluation to arrive at a decision.

II. Submission

The submission process can be initiated from the HRL home page (http://www.editorialmanager.com/hrl/). In the process authors are requested to upload manuscript files, a Manuscript Check List (MCL http://www.hrljournal.org/data/MCL.pdf). The newest template in Microsoft Word format is available at http://www.hrljournal.org/data/HRL_word_template.docx.
If the study has been conducted by a large group, the group can be an author with prior approval of the Editor-in-Chief and all the members of the group. One or more persons’ name can be added as authors if necessary. Upon submitting a group author manuscript, the corresponding author must list the other members’ names of the group that are indicated in the supplemental material.
When authors revise the manuscript after “Revise (Minor revision)” judgement, it is requested to add “point by point replies” file, to reply to all reviewers’ remarks for the previous manuscript and to clarify how and where authors revised the manuscript, e.g. changes are highlighted or noted.
If authors resubmit the manuscript after “Re-submission (Major revision)” judgement, the resubmitted manuscript will be handled as a new submission. However, the previous manuscript number must be entered in “Additional Information” during a submission process, and it is mandatory to add “point by point replies” file for the previous one.
A member of authors can be added or eliminated from the manuscript only at the time of revision. If this is the case, the modifications should be explicitly indicated.

Submission of an article to this journal is understood to imply that the article has not been published previously.

III. Contribution Categories

Contributions to HRL in the form of a Letter are intended to comprise the main category. A second and third category consists of contributions in the form of Invited Letters, and a Comment and/or a Reply.

A. LETTERS

i) Type
Two types of Letters may be accepted: Original Research and Short Review.

Original Research presents new and significant findings based on fully developed analysis, results, and discussion, with considering previous studies. It should be written concisely and is expected to allow quick communication on scientific topics within the journal scope.

Short Review presents new ideas and suggestions while integrating and summarizing previous papers. The ideas/suggestions should be shown objectively and if possible quantitatively with figures and tables. The authors have to keep in mind that they show not only the summary of the results of previous papers and/or research projects, but also their significances in terms of citing the papers.

ii) Paper Length
The standard length of a paper is 6 pages or less. At the initial submission the manuscript cannot exceed 3500 words excluding References, Tables and Figures (including title, authors’ names, affiliations, abstract, keywords, the body of the article, equations, acknowledgments, table captions and figure captions), and total number of Tables and Figures cannot exceed 6, which is estimated to be 6 pages or less. This rule is applicable to the resubmitted manuscript. The maximum length of the paper is 8 pages, however in this case an additional charge is required. If the total pages exceed the limitation, authors should consider moving a part of the text, Figures or Tables to Supplements.

iii) Publication Cost
Authors are requested to help support the cost of publication. The publication charge for the “Letter” with 6 pages or less is 55,000 JPYen per manuscript. An additional charge of 15,000 JPYen is requested for every page in excess of 6 pages. These charges do not include reprints. Please refer to the Reprints section if you require reprints. We cannot publish the accepted manuscript unless the publication charge is paid.

iv) Manuscript Preparation
Manuscripts should be written in English and prepared in 12-point type using a standard font, preferable Times, Helvetica, or Courier, and double spacing. The text should be in single-column format and include page and line numbers. The line numbers should be shown at least every 10 lines. Units should comply with the SI unit system, e.g. m s-1. (or m/s), but non-SI units commonly used with the SI units are also permitted, e.g. mm d-1 (or mm/d). Authors whose native language is not English should engage an English editor.
Tables and Figures must be on separate pages after the reference list, and they should not be incorporated into the main text. No changes to the accepted version are permissible without the explicit approval of the Editor.

v) Presentation of Manuscript
Authors can upload Word, Excel, PowerPoint, RTF, JPEG, and other major format files which are automatically converted to one PDF file. Alternatively, in the case of a malfunction of the automatic PDF building system, authors are allowed to upload a PDF file that includes some or all of the contents. Authors may be requested to upload original files, i.e. other than PDF files, in addition to the PDF files at the time of final manuscript request after the acceptance. Movie file(s), e.g. MPG, QT, AVI and other popular formats, can be uploaded as Supplements to which the link(s) are provided on the PDF that is automatically built. The manuscript should be arranged in the following order.

1. Title
2. Abstract
3. Keywords
4. Body of the article
5. Acknowledgments
6. Supplements
7. References
8. Figure captions
9. Figures (one figure one page)
10. Table captions
11. Tables (one table one page)
12. Body of the Supplements (as attached files / movies / excel sheets / high-resolution images, etc.)

1. Title
The Title should be concise and informative. Words in the Title should be in lower case letters except for the first character at the beginning of Title and the proper nouns. The Title page must include Short Title, authors’ names and affiliations.

2. Abstract
The Abstract should contain fewer than 200 words. A concise and factual abstract is required. The Abstract heading should be written on a separate line in bold face with centering as “Abstract:”. Do not include references in the Abstract.

3. Keywords
Immediately after the Abstract, provide up to six keywords in lower case letters, beginning with “KEYWORDS”.

4. Body of the Article
The text should be divided into clearly defined sections, each with a separate heading. Section headings should be written on a separate line in uppercase with centering, e.g. SECTION.
Subsection headings should be left-justified and written in italics font, e.g., Subsection.
Any additional headings should be in standard font with no italics or capital letters, e.g. subsubsection.
Footnotes and endnotes cannot be written in the article. Please describe all
contents in the body text or supplements.
Equations should be numbered and written on a separate line end without periods or commas.
Short Review should be composed of the appropriate section headings not like typical ones for Original Research such as “Methods” and “Results and Discussion”.

5. Acknowledgments
Acknowledgments should be limited to collegial and financial assistance and are not meant to recognize personal or manuscript production support.

6. Supplements
The list of Supplements with the title should be shown in the following format:

Text S1. Outline of the model
Figure S1. Comparison between X and Y
Table SI. Parameter changes in Z
Movie S1. Change in daily temperature

7. References
Each reference must be cited in the text as name and year within brackets: for example, (Brutsaert, 2006) or Brutsaert (2006). In case reference is made to more than one work by the same authors published in the same year, specify each citation in the text as follows: (Yasunari, 2000a; 2000b). In case two (three or more) authors are listed in the reference list, the reference must be cited in the text as Oki and Yasunari (1995), (Oki et al., 1995). A reference published by a corporation can be cited using abbreviation, e.g. as either JSCE or Japan Society of Civil Engineers. Unless English title and/or English journal name are shown in the original reference, authors or the third party can translate them with an annotation at the end of the reference, e.g. *Title and journal name are translated by “translator’s name”. Digital Object Identifiers (DOIs), unless it is not provided, must be added in the reference list. References to Internet pages require the published or last modified year, the title, the URL and date of access. If the published or last modified year is unknown, write access year instead. References should be alphabetically listed by the last name of the first author, and ordered as 1) first author alone, chronologically, 2) with one coauthor alphabetically by coauthor and then chronologically, 3) with two or more coauthors, chronologically, in the following style:

Journal
Mori N, Yasuda T, Mase H, Tom T, Oku Y. 2010. Projection of extreme wave climate change under global warming. Hydrological Research Letters 4: 15-19. DOI: 10.3178/hrl.4.15.

Journal without English title
Sato F, Sasa K, Fujiwara K, Masumoto H. 1992. The chemistry of snow and streamwater in the northernmost part of Hokkaido. I. The acidity of snow and the chemical influence for the winter runoff.Transactions of the Japanese Forestry Society 103: 601–602 (in Japanese).

One page in book
Flörke M, Alcamo J. 2004. European outlook on water use. Center for Environmental Systems Research, University of Kassel, Final Report, EEA/RNC/03/007, 83p.

Chapter in book
Oki T, Musiake K, Matsuyama H, Masuda K. 1995. Global atmospheric water balance and runoff from large river basins. In Advances in hydrological processes, Kalma JD, Sivapalan M (eds). Wiley, Chichester, UK; 411–434.
Kain JS, Fritsch JM. 1993. Convective parameterization for mesoscale models: the Kain-Fritsch scheme. In The representation of cumulus convection in numerical models. Emanuel KA, Raymond DJ (eds). Meteorological Monographs 24: American Meteorological Society, Boston, USA; 165-170.

Book
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). 2007. Climate change: The physical science basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the fourth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK; 996.

Proceedings
Yasunari T. 2005. A possible collaboration/coordination between WCRP and GWSP in Asia ―suggestions from GAME (GEWEX Asian Monsoon Experiment)―. Proceeding of GWSP Asia Meeting August 29–31, 2005 Kyoto, Japan; 38–39.

Report
WMO. 1986. Intercomparison of models of snowmelt runoff. Operational Hydrology Report No. 23, WMO-No. 646, WMO, Geneva.

Thesis
Doogan CB. 2010. Landscape controls on stream chemistry variability in the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest and White Mountains of New Hampshire. Master’s Thesis, Plymouth State University, Plymouth, NH; 129.

Internet page
The World Bank. 2012. Thai flood 2011: Rapid assessment for resilient recovery and reconstruction planning. https://www.gfdrr.org/thaifloods2012. Last access April 10, 2013.

8. Figure captions
Figures should be consecutively numbered in accordance with their appearance in the text. Each Figure must be entitled and cited in the text. A self-explanatory caption can be given if necessary. Figure captions end without periods.

9. Figures
Each Figure should be displayed on one page. In the final Figures for publication, the font size should be at least 8 pt. Figures are to be uploaded upon the initial submission, but the Editorial Office might require the authors to submit high-resolution files upon approval of the manuscript. If this is the case, the files should be provided in prevailing formats (e.g. EPS, TIFF or JPG) with a resolution of 600 dpi or greater.

10. Table captions
Each Table must have a title. Tables should be consecutively numbered in accordance with their appearance in the text, and can be captioned. All Tables must be cited in the text. Table captions end without periods.

11. Tables
All columns must have headings. Vertical rules should be avoided. Each Table should be shown on one page. The final font size for publication must be 8 pt or larger as mentioned above.

12. Body of the Supplements
Several items may be added as supplements in electronic form; for example, high-resolution Figures, pictures, data tables, animations, detailed support documents, and source code. Acceptable file formats are PDF, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, JPEG, Text, MPG, QT, AVI and other major formats. Supplements are subject to peer review since they are equally considered as an integral component of the published article. Any link to external source data may be provided from the supplement by links to appropriate web sites.
A Text, Equation, Figure or Table in supplements should be indicated by adding “S” in front of the number, respectively, e.g. Text S1, Equation S1, Figure S1 or Table SI. The other rules on the text, References including DOIs, Figures and Tables including their captions are the same as for the standard References, Figures and Tables described above except for the font size on Figures. The font size on Figures is not necessarily 8 pt or larger as long as it is readable online.
If there are references that do not appear in the main text, they should be listed in the “Supplement References” section. Multiple works by the same authors published in the same year in the main text and in the Supplements must be distinguished as follows: (Yasunari, 2000c).

B. INVITED LETTERS

Leading researchers and prominent persons may write invited letters by invitation of the Editorial Board. The guidelines for the invited letters are the same as in A. LETTERS except for no publication cost.
Invited papers are normally reviewed by two Editors but may be subject to peer-review if necessary.

C. COMMENT AND REPLY

i) Publication Cost
The publication charge for “Comment and Reply” is 15,000 JPYen per manuscript.
The waiver rule described in A. LETTERS holds true for the publication cost of Comment and Reply.

ii) Details
The Editorial Board will consider a Comment for publication, provided it is submitted within six months of the publication of the original letter. The Comment must concisely address one or more meaningful aspects of the original letter and cannot introduce any new issues. The Reply by the authors must directly respond only to the Comment. All procedures for submitting the Comment and Reply and for preparing these manuscripts are the same as in A. LETTERS except for publication cost, paper length, title, abstract, and keywords. The specific guidelines to be followed in preparing a Comment and its Reply are described below.
The editor that handled the original letter will proceed with the editorial process of the Comment, regardless of whether the original authors of the letter submit a Reply or not. Authors of a Comment are recommended to send their Comment to the authors of the Letter in question prior to the submission for a direct response, although this is not obligatory. The editor will make the decision to accept or reject, and, if necessary, can assign one reviewer who takes charge of both the Comment and the Reply. The Comment and the Reply will be consecutively published in the same volume, i.e. uploaded at the same time, but the Comment can be published by itself if there is no Reply.

iii) Page Length
A manuscript cannot exceed 1000 words (including title, authors’ name, affiliations, the body of the article, references, table caption and figure caption) with one Figure or one Table if necessary, corresponding to 1 or 2 printed page(s) with single spaced 10-point double column. The final word count after the review processes tends to increase in comparison with the original manuscript. The final word count for publication must be 1200 words or less with one Figure or one Table that occupies a half-page at a maximum.

iv) Title
The title for the Comment and Reply must start with “Comment on . . . .” and “Reply to comment on . . . . .”, respectively.

v) Abstract and Keywords
Neither Abstract nor Keywords are required in contributions of the Comment and Reply type.

IV. Copyright and Permissions

Copyright on any article in HRL published after 1 January 2017 is retained by the author(s). The article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided one gives appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.

If the manuscript contains extracts, including illustrations, from other copyright works (including material from on-line or intranet sources) the authors must obtain permission from the owners of the publishing rights to reproduce it. The permission should be uploaded upon submission of the manuscript.

V. Language Editing
The authors are responsible for final English language quality. Only accepted manuscripts written by non-native English speakers will be edited at no cost to the authors if necessary.

VI. Authors’ Proof
The authors can proofread the final form of their manuscript before it is uploaded on the Journal’s web site. This will be the only opportunity to review the proofs. Authors are responsible for the accuracy of their manuscript’s content after proofreading.

VII. Reprints
Paper reprints with the Journal cover (minimum quantity 50 copies) are available on publication to the authors. Reprints can be obtained by submitting a completed order form on the publication charge certificate (http://www.hrljournal.org/data/publicationcharge.docx) upon acceptance. The cost of the reprints is found in the order form.

VIII. Additional Remarks for Authors

1. The manuscript should be written in clear, concise English in order for its contents to be understandable by a wide range of readers. Therefore, technical words, which may not be generally recognized, should be given with a brief explanation.

2. Upon the revision authors must reply to the Editor within two weeks. If authors do not reply to the Editor in four weeks for the first revision without prior approval for a delay (two weeks for the second or more revision), the manuscript will automatically be rejected.

3. Authors can request the Editor-in–Chief to extend the due date of the first and second revision. The maximum extension period is three weeks from the day when the office has sent authors a request email for the first revision (one week for second revision). Unless the revised manuscript is submitted within the deadline, the manuscript will be regarded as withdrawn.

4. Manuscript should be English-proofread by an English editor before submission to the Editor-in-Chief if authors’ native language is not English. If the Editor encounters difficulty reading a submitted manuscript, it will be returned to the authors for English editing.

5. Authors are requested to input a Short Title (5 words or less) and potential reviewers (5 or more) during the submission processes.