Four kinds of work,
one standard.

Copy-editing held across a whole issue rather than applied paper by paper, so that a reader moving between articles finds one voice and one set of conventions.

What it covers

• Copy-editing for accuracy, register and internal consistency
• Reference handling in the title’s own citation style
• Consistency of terminology and notation across many authors
• Front and back matter, running heads, article metadata
• Queries raised to the editorial office rather than resolved silently

Working to your style

Where a title has a documented house style we work to it. Where the style lives in practice rather than in a document, we read what has already been published and follow it — and, if it is useful, write down what we found so the office has it in future.

Accepted manuscripts set to the journal’s template and returned as files ready for release.

What it covers

• Composition to the title’s existing template and page geometry
• Mathematics, tables and figures set to the standard the title holds
• Figure preparation: resolution, labelling, placement
• Final files in the formats the publication workflow requires

Source, not screenshots

We work from editable source wherever it exists. Where a manuscript arrives only as a fixed-format file, we say so before starting rather than absorbing the cost silently and passing on the errors that rebuilding introduces.

The proof round with the corresponding author, taken off the editorial office’s desk and run on a system built for exactly this step.

How it runs

The author opens a link and sees the typeset article. Corrections are marked against the text itself rather than described in an email, which removes the round of interpretation that normally follows.

Every correction the author asks for is then put to the editorial office as a separate decision. Nothing reaches the final file without having been accepted, and nothing the author asked for disappears without having been seen.

Why it matters

The proof round is where most late damage is done: a correction missed, a correction applied that should not have been, a version that nobody can afterwards account for. Handled properly it is also the last moment at which an error can be caught for nothing.

What the office receives

A clean final file, together with the record of what was requested, what was accepted and what was declined.

Language work for manuscripts by authors writing in English as a second language — as part of production, or as a service an editorial office can refer authors to before submission.

Two levels

Proofreading. Grammar, punctuation, tense and agreement, for manuscripts that are already clear.

Substantive editing. Sentence structure, paragraph order, transitions and terminology, for papers where the science is sound but the reader has to work too hard to see it.

Translation

Research rendered into English by translators who read the subject, so that terminology, notation and disciplinary convention arrive intact — then edited as English rather than left as a faithful rendering of the original sentence order.

Referred authors

Where a journal sends an author to us directly, the arrangement is between the author and ourselves, and the editorial office is not involved in it unless it wishes to be.