AMS style guide

1
AMS style guide

• Some things to highlight

2
Overall

• 8.5 by 11 paper
• Double-spaced on one side only
• At least 1 margins on all sides
• 12 point font
• All pages numbered (starting with the title page)

3
Structure

• Abstract
• 250 words or less (short!)
• No math symbols or formulae
• No citations/references
• No acronyms (with a tiny few exceptions)

4
Structure

• Main text
• Use a logical heading sub-heading structure,
  and keep it throughout
• New paragraphs are indented
• Acknowledgments
• OK if short

5
Structure

• Appendices
• OK for extended math derivations
• OK for detailed data information e.g., site
  locations names
• OK for a list of symbols

6
Structure

• References
• More below
• Figure table captions
• Each figure must have a caption that makes the
  figure understandable without the text
• Figure captions go BELOW the figure - Table
  captions go ABOVE the table
• Figure captions are single spaced!

7
Structure

• Units
• We use the SI system 99.9 of the time
• So instead of 500 mb, we write 500 hPa
• Write this as 500 hPa, not 500hPa (note the
  space)
• Spell out the words day and month
• Use n mi for nautical mile (used to be nm)
• When writing meters per second, we write m
  s-1, NOT m/s and NOT ms-1.
• Wind speeds can be given in knots as kt, but
  should give the equivalent speed in m/s too.

8
Style

• In terms of style, we remember
• Brevity clarity (dont use six words if two
  will do)
• Must be well-written (else rejected, even if good
  science)
• Avoid use of first person (I).
• Rather, use the passive construction (the data
  were measured)

9
Style

• Remember the hyphen!
• Some terms should be hyphenated!
• When writing numbers, dont use commas (boo).
• Instead, insert spaces
• 4000, 10 000, 0.123 456 789
• Acronyms
• You FIRST introduce them in longhand (LH)
• Only VERY common ones can be used w/o
  introduction (NCAR, NASA)

10
Style

• References/citations in the text
• Here are examplessingle author
• according to Smith (1990)
• after sunset (Smith 1990).
• Two authorsSmith and Wesson (1880) or (Smith and
  Wesson 1880)
• Three or more authorsNOT Smith and Jones and
  Tran (2001) or Smith, Jones and Tran
  (2001)rather, Smith et al. 2001

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Extra things

• No contractions, ever
• (NOT the phenomenon wasnt seen)
• The first figure you reference in the text MUST
  be figure 1, and the next figure 2 and so on.
• Ditto for tables.
• Numbers 0-9 are spelled out (four, rather than
  4), except at the start of a sentence.
• Write May 23rd 2007 as 23 May 2007

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Extra things

• Use the word Figure at the start of a
  sentenceotherwise, use Fig., and note that it
  is capitalized.
• I dont think Table is abbreviated!
• Be careful to keep tenses consistent!