
CHECKLIST FOR SUBMITTING
A NEW MANUSCRIPT TO
ANY AGU JOURNAL
Submitting a new manuscript: The process
For your convenience, we encourage you to use our LaTeX or Word templates. You can also submit papers directly using cloud-based authoring tools Overleaf or Curvenote, which are LaTeX-based, and Authorea. If you use any of these templates, the metadata, including title and abstract, from the paper will be automatically loaded into our submission system when you upload the file.
Following our guidelines will ensure that we can immediately proceed with publication, if your manuscript is accepted. Our other author resources can help guide you along your publishing journey.
If you are submitting a revised or resubmitted manuscript that has already undergone peer review, please follow the checklist for revisions and resubmissions.

What you need for a new submission
You will need to provide the following items with your submission. For new submissions, please upload one complete Word or PDF manuscript file containing text, figures, and tables a part of the main text. For LaTeX, convert to PDF. Any supporting information should be uploaded separately for review purposes. Revisions including resubmissions of previous rejected manuscripts need separate, production-ready files and must follow the revision submission checklist.
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1A list of authors, their emails, and affiliations. Individual author contributions can be indicated using the CRediT taxonomy.
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2
ORCID for all authors (required for corresponding author).
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3
Three or more suggested reviewers.
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4
Permissions to reuse any figures that were previously published by a non-AGU journal.
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5
Open Research Section: For data that support your research, a data availability statement must be present. This data must be deposited in a community-accepted, trusted repository and cited in the References section. For papers where software is central to the research, include a software availability statement and citation in the References section. Please see detailed information, templates, and examples in our Data and Software for Authors guidance.
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6
Copies of articles cited as unpublished and an explanation of need in your cover letter. This includes companion and special collection manuscripts submitted to this or other journals.
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7
Optional cover letter identifying any conflicts of interest (please enter in submission form).

We encourage all authors to register for an ORCID. Published contributions and reviews are automatically registered to your ORCID when you enable auto-updates from Crossref and DataCite. We encourage using International Geo Sample Numbers (IGSNs) to identify all relevant samples. IGSNs should be identified in your paper by including them in the relevant dataset.

Checklist: New manuscripts
Title page
Your title page should include the title, authors with their affiliations, and three key points of your research.
Abstract
Your abstract should be less than 250 words for all AGU journals, except Geophysical Research Letters (GRL). For Geophysical Research Letters (GRL), your abstract should be less than 150 words.
Data & Software
Availability Statement: For data and software that support your research, citation information and an availability Statement in the Open Research section, indicating where readers can access the data and software, must be present. Statements implying that data are available from authors are not allowed. Refer to Data and Software for Authors for citation and Availability Statement templates and examples.
Plain language summary
Your plain language summary should be written for a broad audience that includes journalists and the science-interested public. It should state the general problem, describe what research was conducted, the result, and why the findings are important. The plain language summary improves article discoverability and allows your paper to be more widely accessible. For tips, learn how to write a plain language summary.
This is required for the following journals: Geophysical Research Letters; Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems (G-Cubed); Journal of Advances in Modeling of Earth Systems (JAMES); JGR: Biogeosciences; JGR: Oceans; JGR: Planets; JGR: Solid Earth; and Reviews of Geophysics. For all other journals, this is optional.
Descriptive headings
Ensure all key sections have descriptive headings throughout the text for organization.
Line numbers & spacing
Ensure that you have continuous line numbers throughout the text for organization. Lines should be spaced 1.5-2 lines.
Length
Check the length of your paper. Papers submitted to Geophysical Research Letters must be 12 publication units (PUs) or less, or they will be returned to the author. AGU assesses excess fees for papers longer than 25 PUs in all other journals, except Reviews of Geophysics. At the time of your submission, be prepared to enter word, table, and figure counts for an automatic PU calculation. More information on publication units and fees, is available on our Publication Fee Table.
Figures and tables
Figures and tables should have captions. Both should be placed near where they are cited in the text.
No Footnotes
There should be no footnotes in the text.
References
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All references must be cited in the main text and reference list for indexing. If they appear elsewhere, your submission will be returned.
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References should be formatted according to AGU’s publications style. Every reference must be available publicly online or in print before a paper can be accepted; there should be no “submitted” or “in press” references (unless the “in press” reference has a DOI and is available online). Exceptions are considered by the editor.
Acknowledgements section
Your acknowledgements section should include the following items:
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All funding information from each author pertaining to this work.
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Any conflicts of interest for any author that are not apparent from their affiliations or funding.
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Any additional information on author contributions.
Checklist: Supporting information
Data files that are uploaded as Supporting Information MUST ALSO be deposited in an appropriate repository. Supporting information may include other images or figures, methods text, and resources needed to explain the results presented in your paper. It should not include discussion or key analysis. Data sets, software, and sample information should be deposited in repositories practicing the FAIR principles and cited in the references.
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1Use our supporting information template and include text, captions, and figures as part of one supporting information file, saved in PDF format.
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2Please upload the PDF file. Production staff will not convert, edit, or modify your supporting information files. They will be published as-is.
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3
Deposit data and software to repositories and cite them as part of the Availability Statement and References according to AGU’s data and software guidance.
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4Include any analysis or discussion as part of the main manuscript, not supporting information.
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5References in supporting information should be included in a separate reference list below the main text under the heading "References From the Supporting Information" so that they will be discovered, linked, and indexed.
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6Do not include appendices. Appendix text and figures should be included in the main article file.
