Prepare your submission

Manuscript Types

Papers may be any length from 1 to 16 journal pages. Because of limited space available in the TRANSACTIONS, manuscripts that exceed 16 pages in the IEEE two-column format will be returned to authors to revise it to ensure compliance with the 16-page limit. In the initial submission authors are required to submit their manuscript in a pdf and source file formats with figures and tables included in the text. Only after a paper is accepted electronic files for figures, captions, references, author biographies etc are asked.
Communications are narrower in scope and shorter than Papers. They will typically cover an extension of previous work or provide new insight on a specialized topic. As a result, the review of past work will be limited to the key material. The manuscript length is normally up to 4 journal pages (two-column template) and should not exceed 6 journal pages, with the References section included. Communications are subjected to the same rigorous review as used for Papers.
Comments are brief notes containing remarks (and Authors' replies) as well as corrections on technical matters related to previously published manuscripts. They go through the regular peer-review process. After the review panel has accepted a Comment, the author(s) of the commented paper are contacted to provide a Reply. The Reply enters the review cycle as well and typically Comments and Replies are published together.
Review Papers are exceptional review article proposals that may be submitted for consideration by the Editorial Board. Author(s) interested in preparing an exceptional review article should send a proposal to the Editor-in-Chief.
Download relevant guidelines for authors.

Manuscript Preparation

Manuscripts should be specially prepared for publication in this TRANSACTIONS and submitted electronically via the submission site IEEE Author Portal.

Templates: The required format of the manuscript is the IEEE two-column template with figures and captions included in the text:

Download the template for Papers Word, PDF
Download the template for Communications, Comments and Errata. Word, PDF

Find the templates in LaTex in the IEEE Template Selector

Text fonts and size: All text should be in Times New Roman font.

For Paper submissions, the title is 24-point, the author list is 11-point, the main text is 10-point, the abstract is 9-point, and figures/tables captions and references are 8-point font.
For Communication and Comment submissions, the title is 16-point, the author list is 11-point, the main text is 9-point, whereas the abstract, references, and captions are 8-point.

Figures: Figures should be easily viewed on a computer screen. As a general rule, figures and tables are placed at the tops of columns as close to their first mention as possible, but preferably after the mention. The general style for captions is such that each caption number should be cited with the abbreviation “Fig.” and the number, followed by a period, an em space, and then the text of the caption. The first letter of the first word of the caption should always be capitalized. Please do not attach separate tables and figures in the initial submission of your manuscript; they are only required after acceptance. Please note that figures should be placed before References and preferably before Conclusions.

Color: Online publication of your graphics in color is always free at IEEE. You may choose to also print your graphics in color for a fee of $275 USD per color graphic. Once your accepted article enters the production stage, the IEEE Journal Production Manager will contact you to discuss color printing. You may choose to have your graphics in color online and in black and white in print at no cost. For details, please refer to the IEEE Author Center

Use of the international system of units: Only SI units and those units recognized for use with the SI are used to express the values of quantities. Equivalent values in other units are given in parentheses following values in acceptable units only when deemed necessary for the intended audience.
Download the Guide for the Use of the International System of Units

Abstract: Every published paper must contain an Abstract of about 150 words. All variables should appear lightface italic; numbers and units will remain bold. Abstracts must be a single paragraph. In order for an Abstract to be effective when displayed on IEEE Xplore as well as through other indexing services, it must be an accurate, standalone reflection of the contents of the article. Abstracts shall not contain numbered mathematical equations, numbered reference citations, or footnotes.

Index Terms: All articles must contain Index Terms. These are keywords provided by the authors. Index Terms appear in alphabetical order and as a final paragraph of the Abstract section. Capitalize the first letter of the first word of the Index Terms list; lowercase the rest unless capitalized in text. Include the definition of an acronym followed by the acronym in parentheses.
Please choose keywords for indexing your paper from the IEEE Approved Indexing Keyword List.

Affiliations: Authors should provide their complete affiliations and contacts in the submission record, otherwise the submission will be returned to draft. Within the manuscript, the second paragraph of the first footnote is made up for the authors’ affiliations and includes department, university or corporation, city, state, (province or prefecture, if provided), postal code, and country. Note that the country and corresponding author’s email address must be included. All authors may include their email addresses which would be separated by semicolons.

Corresponding author: If you are collaborating with other authors to publish an article, you will all need to agree on which author will be designated as the corresponding author. The corresponding author is the single point of contact between the authors and the Journal. According to the Journal’s policy we are only able to accept one corresponding author.
Tip: Select your article’s corresponding author before submitting to a publication. Co-authors remain responsible for the work submitted, reviewed, and published under their names. [Top]

Resubmission of previously rejected manuscript

Rejected submissions are entitled to resubmit ONE more time, but subject to approval from the Editorial Board. A resubmission is treated by submission standards as a new manuscript but must still be identified as a resubmission by the authors who should disclose the link to the previous submission. To facilitate the review process authors are expected to include in their submission

(i) a marked-up version of the manuscript with changes highlighted in red color
(ii) a point-by-point response letter addressing all the comments of the review panel
(iii) a cover letter mentioning it is a resubmission and quoting the original manuscript ID.

Once a resubmitted manuscript is rejected, authors are not allowed to resubmit a paper on the exact same topic.

Authors are advised to contact the Editorial Office, providing a response letter to the comments of the review panel, to seek permission for resubmission in advance. This helps conserve the journal's editorial resources and avoid involving authors in a new lengthy peer review process when a favorable outcome is deemed highly unlikely. According to the journal’s policy, if a resubmission passes prescreening, it is evaluated by the previous review panel, enhanced by new reviewer(s). [Top]

Useful resources for your manuscript preparation

The following resources can assist authors in the preparation of their article and help them enhance their work:

IEEE Reference Preparation Assistant is an automated tool for use by authors to validate references against both the IEEE Xplore and Crossref databases in order to ensure successful on-line linking.
IEEE Editorial Style Manuscript for Authors contains a formal set of editorial guidelines for IEEE Transactions, Journals, and Letters, including: Punctuation, Capitalization, Abbreviations, Section headings, Numbers, equations, Footnotes, Biographies.
IEEE Mathematics Guide illustrates how mathematical equations should be rendered in a technical article.
IEEE Reference Guide outlines how to cite a variety of references in IEEE style.
Write in Technical English; learn how to write in technical English and improve the readability of your paper.

More resources and tools for Authors can be found on IEEE Author Center. [Top]

Additional Information

Authors are requested to be prepared to respond to to the following four questions when submitting their manuscript through the IEEE Author Portal:

Problem Statement. What is the problem being addressed by the manuscript and why is it important to the Antennas & Propagation community?
Novelty. What is the novelty of your work over the existing work?
References from Submitting Authors. Authors can provide up to three references, published or under review, (journal papers, conference papers, technical reports, etc.) done by the authors/coauthors that are closest to the present work. The references cited should be uploaded as supporting documents if they are under review or not available in the public domain. Authors can enter “N.A” if it is not applicable.
References from other Authors. Authors should provide at least three references (journal papers, conference papers, technical reports, etc.) done by other authors that are most important to the present work. These references should also be discussed in the submitted manuscript and listed among its references. The citation numbers used in the manuscript should be included for easy reference. [Top]

Keyword Selection

Keywords play a crucial role in capturing the essence of an article. They enhance the searchability and discoverability of your work. Hence, it is vital to incorporate pertinent keywords that aid others in locating your paper. When you submit a paper through IEEE Author Portal, you will be provided with a picklist from which to choose your keywords. The picklist contains indexing terms from the IEEE Approved Indexing Keyword List. The authors, before selecting keywords, may refer to the IEEE Approved Keyword List. [Top]

Conference Papers vs Journal Papers

[In the following, Editors refer to the Editor-in-Chief, the Track Editors, and the Associate Editors]

TAP Editors and Reviewers are instructed to consider conference and journal papers as totally separate venues for publication.
TAP does not publish conference papers. A full-length conference paper cannot simply be republished in TAP verbatim without substantial differences.
Sometimes two different conference papers are "combined" into a journal paper. This is acceptable, as long as the resulting journal paper is coherent and of high quality.
IEEE policy simply requires "substantial" differences, with the meaning of substantial being at the discretion of the Editors. Examples of "substantial" differences include, but are not limited to, addition of new results, but may also imply more details on the theory, implementation, measurements…
Text and figures can be exactly copied from the conference paper(s) into the journal paper. This is not double publishing. At least a slightly different title should be used for the journal paper, to describe the typically broader journal contribution and to avoid confusion in the archival record. Authors must cite the conference version when submitting the journal paper in two places: (i) In the question “References from Submitting Authors” within the step “Additional Information” of the IEEE Author Portal (ii) in the journal paper itself.
See PSPB Ops Manual 8.2.4.G.2: "...Section 8.2.1.B.11 requires that the author(s) cite the previous work(s) and very clearly indicate how the new submission differs from the previously published work(s)." Authors should provide a copy of the conference paper when they submit their manuscript.
It is the responsibility of the Authors to ensure that any copyright commitments they have made outside the IEEE, however, are not violated by the eventual IEEE journal publication.

There does not need to be a summary explaining the differences/similarities, since they are assumed and allowed to be quite similar, simply the existence of such a paper must be acknowledged. However, authors are encouraged to explain what the new material is to assist the reviewers in their evaluation.

Overall rationale for this policy: Authors should be encouraged to present their work to the community at IEEE conferences, which inevitably involves publishing a conference version. A policy that prevented conference papers from being later published in a journal version would have the opposite effect and discourage researchers from presenting their best work at conferences. Similarly, it would damage the quality of IEEE journals if innovative ideas are barred from publication in them, simply because they have been presented in a conference format.

This rationale is in agreement with Section 8.1.7.F of the IEEE Publications and Services Products Board Operations Manual which states that:
" … IEEE Policies, Section 6.4, specifies that IEEE's technical publications shall include original material, which appears only once in the archival literature, and Section 1.3.A of this Manual presents a definition of an archival publication. Nevertheless, it is common in technical publishing for material to be presented at various stages of its evolution, such as publishing early ideas in a workshop, more developed work in a conference, and fully developed contributions as journal or transactions articles. IEEE recognizes the importance of this evolutionary publication process as a significant means of scientific communication and fully supports this publishing paradigm, but IEEE requires that this evolutionary process be fully referenced." [Top]

Papers Based on an Extension of a Patent

The Transactions on Antennas and Propagation allows publishing a manuscript that presents content from a patent, when the patent is co-authored by some of the authors of the manuscript, provided that the manuscript contains a substantial amount of new information in addition to what is published in the patent. The patent should also be included in the references of the manuscript. [Top]

Disclosure of Closely Related Work

According to the IEEE Publication Services and Products Board (PSPB) Operations Manual, it is the responsibility of authors to disclose if the manuscript has been published previously or is still under active consideration by TAP or another publication. Authors should include in the question “References from Submitting Authors” within the step “Additional Information” of IEEE Author Portal any closely related published or under review conference or journal paper. Moreover, any closely related work should be uploaded as "supporting document" in the submission record if it is not available in the public domain. [Top]

Supplementary Materials

IEEE Xplore can publish multimedia files (audio, images, video, pseudocode and detailed algebraic manipulations of proofs), datasets, and software (e.g. Matlab code) along with your paper. Alternatively, you can provide the links to such files in a README file that appears on Xplore along with your paper.

Recommended file formats for supplementary materials include:

Text: TXT, DOC, DOCX, or PDF
Image: JPG, TIF, PNG, GIF, PDF, PS, EPS, or BMP
Video: MP4, MOV, WMV, or AVI
Audio: MP3, AIFF, MOV (Quicktime Audio), RA (Real Audio), or WAV (Windows Audio)

Supplementary files should be labeled as supplementary and uploaded as separate files during article submission. More information. [Top]

Research Reproducibility

Authors are encouraged to make their work more transparent and useful to other researchers by publishing reproducible research. By leveraging the data and code sharing opportunities offered through IEEE DataPort and Code Ocean, authors can maximize the impact of their research, ensure compliance with many funding agency open access requirements, and align with the principles of openness, transparency, and equity in the research and scholarly environment. More information. [Top]

Electronic Submission

Electronic submission of manuscripts is required for both initial review and for publication. To submit a manuscript electronically for review, please go to IEEE Author Portal website.

In the initial submission, authors are required to submit their manuscript in a pdf and source file formats with figures and tables included in the text. Only after a manuscript is accepted for publication, electronic files for figures, captions, references, author biographies, etc. are asked. Authors should allow approximately 12 weeks for the initial review cycle. [Top]

IEEE Publication Services and Products Board (PSPB) Operations Manual

Useful information on publication guidelines, review process, appeal arrangement, investigation and adjudication processes of misconducts including plagiarism, inappropriate reuse of previous work, failure to inform editors of previous publications, and multiple submission can be found in the IEEE Publication Services and Products Board (PSPB) Operations Manual. [Top]

Authors Obligation

The author must ascertain that any clearance, company or foundation release, necessary for publication of the manuscript in this TRANSACTIONS has been obtained. If the manuscript or any modification of it has been published in the public literature, the author must indicate this in the letter of transmittal accompanying the submitted manuscript. [Top]

Plagiarism

IEEE defines plagiarism as the use of another’s ideas, processes, results, or words without explicitly acknowledging the original author and source. Plagiarism in any form is unacceptable and is considered a serious breach of professional conduct, with potentially severe ethical and legal consequences. (IEEE Publication Services and Products Board (PSPB) Operations Manual, Section 8.2.4.D.)

All articles are screened for plagiarism before publication. If the similarity is not acceptable, the manuscript can be rejected, even if the manuscript was acceptable on a technical level. [Top]

Keep your Reviewers and Editors Happy

Follow the instructions given above.
Make changes recommended by reviewers. Describe these changes and rebut any others that you do not agree with (provide reasons) in a cover letter. Failure to respond to comments can hinder the publication of your article.
Follow directions given by the Editor-in-Chief, Track Editor, or Associate Editor. [Top]

Stay Connected

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