The Natural Science and Advanced Technology Education journal is an international reviewed science publication which provides a forum for exchange and discussion of theoretical, experimental and methodological studies in the field of education in the natural sciences and related fields for all educational levels.
The journal accepts for publication original scientific research, overview articles, book reviews and short scientific communications (letters to the editor, etc.) in the following thematic areas:
- History of natural science education: Bulgarian and foreign traditions in education
- Natural science didactics (physics, chemistry, biology, ecology, geography etc.)
- Natural science and technological literacy
- Theory and practice of teaching natural sciences – curricula, educational plans, programs and standards
- Efficacy of natural science and advanced technology education
- Exercises and scholastic experiments in natural sciences
- Scientific accomplishments in research laboratories
- New materials and technology in the field of natural sciences
- Digital technologies in the process of natural science and technology education
- Interdisciplinary cooperation in natural science and technology education
- Perspectives in natural science and technology education
- Personalities in science
- History and philosophy of natural sciences
- Natural science and technology education's role in contemporary society
The journal accepts manuscripts in Bulgarian or in English which have not been sent for publication elsewhere. A manuscript which does not correspond to the topic of the journal or has not been formatted according to the Guidelines will be rejected without going through the procedure of anonymous review. All remaining manuscripts are sent for review to two anonymous independent reviewers.
The author agrees to adhere to the terms and conditions outlined in the Authors’ Guidelines and the Declaration of Publishing Ethics of "Az-buki" National Publishing House. Any violation will be considered a refusal of collaboration between the author and the publication in the future.
Submission of manuscripts
The manuscript must be sent as an attachment to an accompanying e-mail to the journal’s email address: science@azbuki.bg
When submitting a manuscript, the author explicitly declares that the manuscript has not been published or sent for publication in any other journal.
The submitted articles must contain original ideas and scientific results. The circumstantial description of widely known theories, terms or definitions which are easily accessible elsewhere is not encouraged.
All manuscripts sent for publication are examined using specialised instruments (such as StrikePlagiarism) to discover potential similarities between the submitted materials and other publications. The journal reserves the right not to publish a text which, upon examination, reveals a degree of similarity higher than 20%.
The scientific articles, overview articles and short scientific communications which adhere to the journal’s guidelines go through a procedure of dual-anonymous reviewing by independent experts. In certain cases, such as when the manuscript is with an interdisciplinary focus, the Editorial Board may call in additional reviewers.
The decision for publication or rejection of the manuscript is based on the reviewers’ recommendation. Should the two reviewers’ opinions differ, a super-reviewer is appointed and their recommendation is taken as final. A publication does not necessarily signify the Editorial Board’s agreement with the reviewers’ positions. The editors may edit the manuscripts, should that be necessary.
Publication is announced to the authors through an email, which contains the .pdf file of the article. The rights of the published text belong to the journal. The received .pdf file is not to be freely distributed, including in academic and social networks for sharing results of scientific research (e.g. ResearchGate.net and Academia.edu).
Preprints
The author may freely share the manuscript in the version which was originally submitted to the journal for consideration. Should the text be accepted, after publication the author must add to the shared manuscript the name, volume and number of the journal in which the text has been published.
The Transfer of Manuscripts service
The journal uses "Az-buki" National Publishing House‘s Transfer of Manuscripts. This means that, should an editor decide that a particular manuscript is more appropriate for another of the publishing house’s journals, the author may be asked to consider transferring the manuscript to that journal. Should the author agree, the manuscript will be transferred and the author will have the option of making changes to the presented material before submission. The transferred manuscript will once again be examined by two independent reviewers.
Publication fees
Publication in the journal is free for both the authors for and their scientific or educational organisations. The article is accessible:
– available in full text for subscribers of the journal;
– available as metadata (title, abstract, keywords, author’s business card) – for all readers.
In case the author (or the institution they represent) wants the article to be accessible in its entirety for all readers, the journal can accommodate that through its webpage – after the payment of a protection fee that covers the costs associated with the article.
Publication of a manuscript
A manuscript is considered accepted for publication when the author has received an email of confirmation no more than three months after the date of submission. In case of lack of confirmation for publication within three months, the author has the right to request in writing for their text to be withdrawn. The journal explicitly commits to informing the author, should their manuscript be rejected.
Before publication of the accepted manuscripts the authors receive proofs of their articles, which are to be returned to the editors within a week. At this stage of preparing the manuscript, significant changes to the text are not allowed.
By sending a text and/or an illustration to the Editorial Board, the author agrees to give up the rights of their announcement, publication and distribution with the purpose of promoting the publishing house’s other journals, to the publisher – "Az-buki" National Publishing House.
The author agrees to give "Az-buki" National Publishing House the exclusive rights to use any text and/or illustration published in the journal for the duration of three years, regardless of the territory on which the publisher has the right to use the text in accordance with Bulgarian Copyrights law.
Structure of the manuscript
Title page
Title of the article – it is recommended that the title of the article be short (5-10 words), with no abbreviations, and that it presents the main topic of study.
Full name of the author (authors), institutional affiliation (including university, institute), city and country (with no mention of academic and other titles).
Abstract – contains the specific features of the study in a concise form – aim/subject, methodology used, main results and conclusions. The abstract must correspond to the title, keywords and text of the scientific work.
Recommended wordcount of the abstract – 150 words.
Keywords: (between 3 and 6 keywords/phrases).
Main exposition
Should be structured in different sections, divided by short titles with a clearly indicated position in the hierarchy of the text.
Recommended character count of нa scientific article / overview – up to 35 000 characters, and of a review – up to 15 000 characters (including spaces).
Acknowledgements (if any) are to be written in both Bulgarian and English. The funding of the scientific study is acknowledged in this section as well.
Additional materials (if any) in the form of graphs, tables or illustrations must be readable and suitable to be processed with widely used programs and applications.
Notes – the cited archival sources and notes at the end of the text must be written only in the language of the main text of the manuscript. Their place should be marked in the text of the article with Arabic numerals as superscript.
References – references to literature which is irrelevant to the submitted text, enumeration of sources not used in the text or excessive self-citation are not encouraged. The citing of sources must be in accordance with Harvard citation and APA Style 7th Edition (2020).
The sources used (should the main text not be in the Latin script) are enumerated in two separate paragraphs in the end of the manuscript. In the first paragraph the sources are listed in their original script. In the second paragraph the contents of the first are repeated, using the Latin alphabet (either transliterated or translated).
In the case that the manuscript is in Bulgarian, the title, abstract and keywords in English should follow.
Detailed information about the author (authors) in English – including full name, academic title and scientific degree, institutional affiliation (including university, institute), city and country, personal ID of the author (WoS Researcher ID, Scopus Author ID, ORCID ID), work postal address, е-mail address for correspondence.
Requirements for formatting the manuscript
The submitted manuscripts must be formatted using a standard text-processing program (Microsoft Word) in adherence to the following:
Font: Times New Roman – Font size 12
Page formatting: Page Setup: Top: 2,5 см, Bottom: 2,5 см, Left: 2,5 см, Right: 2,5 см ; Line Spacing: 1,5 lines ; First Line: 1,25 см ; Paper Size: A4.
Specific formatting of the text itself concerning underlining, tabulators, usage of bullet points etc. is not encouraged. Tabulators are only accepted when formatting tables.
You can examine the formatting of articles and reviews both in Bulgarian and in English in the following samples:
Figures
Figures (illustrations) and their descriptions must be provided both in the main text and separately in an additional file in such a format, so as to be processable with widely used programs. As an exception, if the figures have a big size and cannot be put in the main text, their place must be explicitly shown – fig. 1, fig. 2, etc. Enumeration and description of the figures are to be put below them.
If possible, the figures should be created in graphics editor programs (Corel Draw, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe PhotoShop) or in Excel. Titles of the figures must not be included in the image.
Photos and scanned images should be in separate good quality files (at least 300 dpi), preferably in JPG, JPEG, PNG or TIFF format.
Tables
Tables and their titles must be provided both in the main text and separately in an additional file. Numeric data showcasing functional relations between magnitudes or variables can be presented in a table. Text tables complicate printing and reading of the articles, therefore their usage is not recommended.
Tables must be created in Word Table or Excel. They should be numbered consecutively according to their citation in the text. Every table must have a title. The number and title of tables are to be put above them. Any explanations needed are to be put below the table, marked with the appropriate symbols.
Abbreviations
Specific abbreviations used in the text should be introduced in parentheses at the first usage of the full term. Only standard abbreviations are to be used, and they should be avoided in the title and abstract.
Equations
If you’re using Word, please use Microsoft Equation Editor or the addition MathType. The equations must be editable by the Editorial Board and must not appear as images.
Chemical structures and reaction schemes
The chemical structures and reaction schemes must be created using an appropriate software package for that express purpouse. They must be created at such a scale, so that all details and text are readable when inserted in the manuscript (i.e. the text’s font size must be no less than 8 or 9).
Citations and sources used
The list of references must include literary sources accessible for examination or consultation. All other sources, including archival sources, documents, laws, etc., including online sources, should be recounted in the Notes section. There can also be included additional explanations or information that would make the main text convoluted.
References to other publications must be written in accordance with the Harvard citation and APA Style 7th Edition (2020). The examples below showcase how to do this.
Citations in the text
Authors, cited in the text, must be presented in one of the following ways:
Citing the author’s surname and the year of publication (e.g. Sendak, 2015).
If a particular page should be noted (e.g. p. 689), it must be done like this: (Sendak, 2015, p. 689).
Citing both authors’ surnames and the year of publication (e.g. Sendak & Wise, 2015).
In the case of three or more authors, only the name of the first author is written, followed by “et al.” and the year of publication (e.g. Sendak et al., 2015).
Citing the collective author and the year of publication (e.g. American Library Association [ALA], 2015).
List of sources used
General rules
The literary sources must be ordered alphabetically according to the surname of the first author.
In the case of several articles by the same author(s), the articles must be ordered chronologically, oldest to newest.
In the titles of books, chapters, articles, reports and other sources, only the first word of the title and subtitle, the first word after a semicolon or a dash in the title, or proper names are to be written with a capital first letter.
Books
Author(s). (Year). Title of the book. (Edition). Publisher.
For example: Fraser, C. (2017). Prairie fires: The American dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder. (2nd ed.). Metropolitan Books.
Edited Books
Editor(s). (ed.). (Year). Title of the book. Publisher.
For example: Melendy, R., & Kincaid, C. (Eds.). (2018). Birth order and personality. Doubleday.
Books by an anonymous author
For example: Anonymous. (2021). Kritika na porochnata praktika. PAN [in Bulgarian].
Chapters of books / collections
Author(s). (Year). Title of the chapter. In: Initials, Surname of the editor(s) (ed.). Title of the book/collection (pages). Publisher.
For example: Carman, T. (2005). On the Inescapability of Phenomenology. In: D.W. Smith &, A. L. Thomasson (Eds.). Phenomenology and Philosophy of Mind (pp. 67-89). Clarendon Press.
Articles in a journal
The titles of the journals are written in full and in cursive (italics). In the titles of scientific journals all main words are written with a capital first letter if they are in English, whilst that should not be done in the articles’ titles.
Author(s). (Year). Title of the article. Title of the journal, volume(number), pages. DOI number (if there is one).
For example: Capizzi, M. T., & Ferguson, R. (2005). Loyalty trends for the twenty-first century, Journal of Consumer Marketing, 22(2), 72-80. https://doi.org/10.1002/pon.750
Unpublished collections with announcements from conferences
Author(s). (Year, Month). Title of the material [Type of the material]. Name of the conference, place of the conference. URL address
For example: Bland, A. (2017, November). The implementation of a junior Samoan language programme in a South Island, New Zealand secondary school context [Paper presentation]. Australian Association for Research in Education (AARE) Conference 2017, Canberra, Australia. https://bit.ly/37DvrHR
Articles in a newspaper
Author(s). (Year, Month Date). Title of the article. Title of the newspaper, pages.
For example: Bidey, S. (2018, January 1). Bid to curb youth crime. Townsville Bulletin, p. 13.
Online sources
Author(s). (Year, Month Date). Title of the article. Title of online publication or web site. URL address.
For example: Rogers, O. (2021, July 9). Why naming race is necessary to undo racism. Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/who-am-i-who-are-we/202107/why-naming-race-is-necessary-undo-racism
Dissertation
Author. (Year). Title of the dissertation [Dissertation, place of defense]. Database or institutional repository. URL address
For example: Dodov, I. (2016). Automation of station setup processes in repair. [Dissertation, Virtual institute]. CSU ScholarWorks. https://www.kardam.com/daily-news/2016/12/11/ 1576104511.
Sources in Bulgarian
If the cited sources are in the Cyrillic script, two analogous paragraphs are created – one in the Cyrillic script and one in the Latin script.
Шанова, Г. (2019). Практическият български език в бакалавърската степен на Санктпетербургския университет. Български език и литература, 61(4), 343-352.
Shanova, G. (2019). Prakticheskiat balgarski ezik v bakalavarskata stepen na Sanktpeterburgskia universitet. , 61(4), 343-352.
In the Notes section can be inserted archival documents, laws, educational documents, online sources, artefacts from museum collections, in the following way:
NOTES
- Committee for health and longevity. 1949-4-21/1949-4-23. Programme of a meeting of the Committee for health and longevity. In: Documents of David Chakov. Private fund of the Chakov family. Ф. 13337К, оп. 2, а.е. 33, л. 21-22. At: State archive – Varna [ДА – Варна].
- Higher Education Law
In all other cases, not described in the guidelines, authors must consult the APA Style 7th Edition (2020) and follow those guidelines when citing.
