Authors must register before submitting a manuscript. The submission process is designed to ensure that all manuscripts meet the journal's standards for quality, originality, research integrity, and scholarly relevance.

Authors should submit manuscripts through the journal's online submission system and ensure that the manuscript is consistent with the journal's Aims and Scope and prepared according to these Author Guidelines.

Before peer review, submitted manuscripts undergo an initial editorial assessment covering completeness, scope, originality, basic scholarly quality, and similarity screening using iThenticate or an equivalent similarity-checking system. Manuscripts that pass the initial assessment may be sent for peer review.

The journal uses a double-blind peer-review process, in which the identities of authors and reviewers are concealed from each other to the extent practicable. Further information is available in the journal's Peer Review Process.

Authors will be notified of editorial decisions through the online submission system or by email. Where revisions are requested, authors should address reviewers' and editors' comments carefully and provide a clear response to the requested revisions.

Authors should also review the journal's Publishing Ethics policy before submission.

Authors are encouraged to provide their ORCID iD during submission. An ORCID iD helps distinguish authors from researchers with similar names and supports accurate attribution of scholarly work.

If you do not yet have an ORCID iD, you can register for a free ORCID iD.

Before submitting a manuscript, authors should ensure that the following requirements have been satisfied:

In addition to the main manuscript, authors should provide the following documents or information where applicable:

• Cover Letter — a brief letter introducing the manuscript and explaining its relevance and contribution.
• Supplementary Materials — supplementary datasets, figures, tables, methods, appendices, or other materials that support the manuscript, where applicable.
• Ethics Approval Statement — required where the research involves human participants, animals, or other activities requiring formal ethical review.
• Conflict of Interest Statement — disclosure of any financial, professional, personal, or other interests that could reasonably be perceived as influencing the research.
• Funding Statement — information about financial support for the research and/or manuscript preparation.
• Data Availability Statement — information describing where the data supporting the findings can be accessed, or why the data cannot be publicly shared.
• Author Contributions — a description of the substantive contributions made by each author for multi-author manuscripts.
• Preprint Disclosure — information about any previously posted preprint, including its DOI or URL where available.

All submissions should include a cover letter as a separate document. The cover letter should provide sufficient information for the editorial office to understand the nature and significance of the submission.

The cover letter should include:

• Manuscript information: the full title of the manuscript and the article type.
• Authors and affiliations: the full names and institutional affiliations of all authors. The corresponding author should be clearly identified.
• ORCID: ORCID iDs should be provided for authors who have them.
• Affiliation format: Department, University or Institution, City/State/Province, Postal Code, Country.
• Contribution and significance: a concise explanation of the research problem, principal findings, originality, and contribution to the field of smart ship technologies and related areas.
• Journal relevance: a brief explanation of why the manuscript is appropriate for the journal's scope.
• Originality statement: confirmation that the manuscript has not been formally published elsewhere and is not simultaneously under consideration by another journal.
• Author approval: confirmation that all authors have reviewed and approved the manuscript and agree to its submission.
• Disclosures: relevant information concerning funding, conflicts of interest, ethics approval, data availability, and preprints, where applicable.

Authors should ensure that the information in the cover letter is consistent with the information provided in the manuscript and submission system.

Authors must provide 3–5 concise Article Highlights summarizing the main findings, methodological contributions, or practical implications of the manuscript.

Article Highlights should help editors, reviewers, and readers quickly understand the principal contribution of the study. They may describe the research question, methodology, key findings, technological contribution, engineering implications, or practical applications.

Article Highlights should complement, rather than simply repeat, the title and abstract.

Smart Ship Technologies accepts several types of scholarly contributions. Manuscripts should be submitted under the article type that best reflects their purpose, content, and methodology.

Research Article

Research Articles present original research findings and should make a substantive contribution to knowledge. They normally include an abstract, introduction, methods, results, discussion, and conclusions, together with the relevant declarations and supporting information.

Review Article

Review Articles provide a critical and comprehensive synthesis of existing research on a defined topic. Reviews should identify important developments, research gaps, methodological issues, and opportunities for future research rather than merely summarizing individual publications.

Short Communication

Short Communications present concise reports of significant findings, methods, datasets, observations, or other scholarly contributions that can be communicated effectively in a shorter format.

Editorial

Editorials provide scholarly commentary, perspectives, or information relevant to the journal and its readership. Editorials may address emerging issues, research trends, special issues, journal developments, or other topics within the journal's scope. Editorials are generally invited or commissioned, although proposals may be considered by the editorial office.

Authors with manuscripts that fall within the journal's scope but do not clearly correspond to one of the categories above may contact the editorial office before submission to discuss the appropriate article type.

The following structure is primarily intended for Research Articles. Review Articles, Short Communications, Editorials, and other article types may use a structure appropriate to their purpose.

Title

The title should be concise, informative, and accurately reflect the content of the manuscript. Authors are encouraged to keep the title to approximately 20 words or fewer and avoid unnecessary abbreviations, jargon, and excessive punctuation.

Abstract

The abstract is typically 200–250 words long. For Research Articles, authors are encouraged to organize the abstract using the following components: Background, Methods, Results, Conclusions, and Significance.

The abstract should be self-contained and understandable without reference to the main text. References should not normally be cited in the abstract.

Keywords

Authors should provide 3–8 keywords following the abstract. Keywords should be separated by semicolons and should accurately represent the main concepts, technologies, methods, systems, applications, or other important aspects discussed in the manuscript.

Authors should select established terminology where possible and avoid unnecessary duplication of words already used in the title. Appropriate keywords can improve the discoverability and retrieval of published research.

The title, abstract, and keywords should be clear, concise, informative, and representative of the research.

Introduction

The Introduction should provide a clear literature-based background to the research problem, summarize relevant existing knowledge, identify important gaps or unresolved issues, and explain the rationale, objectives, and significance of the study.

Section Headings

Headings and subheadings should be clearly differentiated and numbered consistently throughout the manuscript.

• Main headings: 1, 2, 3, etc.
• Subheadings: 1.1, 1.2, 2.1, 2.2, etc.
• Sub-subheadings: 1.1.1, 1.1.2, etc., where necessary.

Authors should use clear and descriptive headings and maintain a consistent hierarchy throughout the manuscript.

Materials and Methods

The Materials and Methods section should describe the research design, materials, equipment, systems, experimental procedures, data sources, analytical methods, and statistical or computational approaches in sufficient detail to support evaluation and, where appropriate, reproducibility.

Methods adopted or substantially based on previous studies should be appropriately cited. Important assumptions, sampling procedures, experimental conditions, analytical criteria, software, hardware, or other technical specifications should be reported where relevant.

Results

The Results section should present the findings clearly and logically. Results should be supported by appropriate figures, tables, statistical analyses, simulations, experimental data, or other evidence where applicable.

Interpretation of the findings should generally be reserved for the Discussion section, although a combined Results and Discussion section may be appropriate for some manuscripts.

Discussion

The Discussion should interpret the findings in relation to the research questions and existing literature. Authors should discuss the significance and implications of the findings, relevant similarities or differences with previous research, limitations of the study, and potential directions for future research.

The Discussion should not simply repeat the Results.

Conclusions

The Conclusions section should summarize the principal findings and explain their relevance to smart ship technologies and related research or applications. Conclusions should be supported by the evidence presented in the manuscript and should avoid claims that extend beyond the study.

Author Contributions

For manuscripts with multiple authors, a statement describing the substantive contributions of each author should be included. Contributions may include conceptualization, methodology, investigation, data curation, formal analysis, writing, visualization, supervision, project administration, or other substantive contributions.

Authors should ensure that all listed authors meet the journal's authorship requirements. Single-author manuscripts do not require an Author Contributions statement.

Publishing Ethics

Authors must comply with the journal's Publishing Ethics policy.

Where appropriate, authors should include a statement confirming compliance with relevant ethical requirements. If the research raises a specific ethical issue, the manuscript should provide sufficient information for the editorial office and reviewers to evaluate the matter.

Funding

Authors must disclose all financial support relevant to the research and/or manuscript preparation.

If the research received no external funding:

This research received no external funding.

If the research received funding:

This research was funded by [NAME OF FUNDER], grant number [XXX].

Authors should use the official name of the funding organization and provide the relevant grant or award number where applicable. Funding information should be accurate and consistent with the information provided during submission.

Data Availability

Authors should provide a Data Availability Statement explaining where the data supporting the findings can be accessed and under what conditions.

Where data are publicly available, authors should provide a persistent identifier or direct link to the relevant dataset where possible. Where data cannot be shared because of privacy, confidentiality, legal, ethical, contractual, or other restrictions, the statement should explain the applicable restrictions and, where possible, indicate how qualified researchers may request access.

Conflict of Interest

All authors must disclose any financial, professional, personal, or other interests that could reasonably be perceived as influencing the research or its interpretation.

If no relevant conflict exists, authors may use the following statement:

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Acknowledgements

The Acknowledgements section may recognize substantive assistance received during the research or manuscript preparation from individuals or organizations that do not meet the criteria for authorship.

Examples may include technical assistance, administrative support, language or editorial assistance, access to facilities, provision of materials or data, and other appropriate forms of non-author contribution.

Artificial Intelligence and Generative AI

Authors should disclose the use of artificial intelligence or generative AI tools in the preparation of the manuscript where such use materially contributed to the work, in accordance with the journal's Policy on AI in Scholarly Authorship.

AI tools should not be listed as authors. Authors remain responsible for the accuracy, originality, integrity, and appropriate attribution of the submitted manuscript, including content produced or assisted by AI tools.

Figures, Tables, and Equations

All figures and tables should be cited in the text and placed near their first relevant reference rather than collected only at the end of the manuscript.

Each figure and table should have a concise and informative title or caption. Figure legends should explain symbols, abbreviations, panels, and other information necessary for understanding the figure.

Figures and tables should be numbered consecutively and separately according to their order of appearance in the manuscript.

Examples:

Figure 1. Title of figure.

Table 1. Title of table.

Figures should be of sufficient resolution and quality for publication. Authors should ensure that all labels, legends, symbols, and units are clearly readable.

Equations should be editable and should not be submitted solely as image files. Equations should be numbered consecutively where numbering is required. Authors are encouraged to use an equation editor such as MathType or the equation tools available in Microsoft Word.

The journal uses a numbered citation system for in-text references. References should be numbered consecutively according to their first appearance in the text and enclosed in square brackets, for example [1], [2], and [3].

Each numbered citation must correspond to a complete reference entry in the reference list. References should be listed in the same order in which they are first cited in the manuscript.

The bibliographic information should follow the principles of APA 7th edition, while retaining the journal's numbered citation system.

Authors are responsible for ensuring that all references are accurate, complete, relevant, and verifiable. Authors should verify author names, article titles, journal titles, publication years, volume and issue information, page ranges or article numbers, and DOI information before submission.

Where a DOI is available, it should be provided in the format https://doi.org/xxxxx.

Journal Articles

[1] Nwokedi, T. C., Eru, J., Osondu-Okoro, C., Folayan Ojutalayo, J., Ofurumazi, R., & Nwokedi, O. P. (2025). A hybrid green energy propulsion technology for navigation of inland watercrafts. Smart Ship Technologies, 1(1), 47–60. https://doi.org/10.65773/sst.1.1.64

Books

[2] Author, A. A. (Year). Title of the book (Edition if applicable). Publisher.

Book Chapters

[3] Author, A. A. (Year). Title of chapter. In A. A. Editor & B. B. Editor (Eds.), Title of book (pp. xx–xx). Publisher. DOI or URL if available.

Government or Institutional Reports

[4] Organization Name. (Year). Title of report. Publisher or Organization. URL if available.

Patents

[5] Inventor, A. A. (Year). Title of patent (Patent No. XXXXXXX). Patent Office or Issuing Authority. URL if available.

Conference Papers

[6] Author, A. A. (Year, Month). Title of paper. Paper presented at the Name of Conference, Location.

Authors should use the appropriate reference format for the type of source being cited and provide sufficient information for readers to identify and retrieve the source.

Articles published by Smart Ship Technologies are made available under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) license, unless otherwise stated for specific material.

Authors retain appropriate rights in their work while granting the rights necessary for publication and distribution under the CC BY 4.0 license.

The CC BY 4.0 license permits others to share and adapt the published work, including for commercial purposes, provided that appropriate credit is given to the original authors and source, a link to the license is provided, and any changes are indicated.

Authors are responsible for ensuring that they have the necessary rights and permissions for third-party materials included in their manuscript. Material that is not covered by the article's CC BY 4.0 license should be clearly identified, and appropriate permission should be obtained where required.

By submitting a manuscript, authors confirm that they have the necessary rights to submit the work for publication and that the submission does not knowingly infringe the rights of others.