About Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical
Scope
Research papers published in Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical™ are categorised into one of six subject sections, defined below. To be acceptable for publication in the journal, papers must make significant, original and correct contributions to one or more of the topics within these sections. Mathematical papers should be clearly motivated by actual or potential application to physical phenomena. Algorithmic papers are encouraged and should contain clear physical background and theoretical motivations.
Statistical physics: nonequilibrium systems, computational methods and modern equilibrium theory
- nonequilibrium systems
- large deviation theory and fluctuation theorems
- stochastic processes
- network theory
- quantum condensed matter theory
- strongly correlated electron systems
- quantum spin chains and Bethe ansatz
- disordered systems, spin glasses and neural networks
- artificial neural networks, statistical learning and inference
- Bayesian inference and machine learning methods in statistical data
- statistical mechanics, phase transitions and critical phenomena
- field-theoretical models in statistical mechanics
- exactly solvable models in statistical mechanics
- numerical and computational methods, analysis of algorithms
- lattice models, random walks and combinatorics
Biological modelling
- active systems
- interactions and dynamics in single molecules
- stochastic modelling
- fluctuations (including fluctuation theorems) in biological and biochemical systems
- intra- and intercellular signalling including gene regulation and quorum sensing
- search processes
- biological networks and their dynamics
- modelling of systems and synthetic biology
- populations dynamics, disease spreading and movement ecology
- population genetics and evolution
Nonlinear physics and waves
- dynamical systems (discrete or continuous)
- chaos (classical or quantum)
- nonlinear waves and solitons
- instabilities
- pattern formation
- fundamental fluid mechanics
- fundamental plasma physics
- astrophysical and dusty plasmas
- magnetohydrodynamics
- quantum fluids and superfluid flow
- turbulence
- dynamics and networks
- cellular automata
- granular systems and self-organization
- noise
- kinetic theory
Mathematical physics
- physical combinatorics
- physical asymptotics
- algebraic structures and number theory
- random matrices
- classical and quantum groups, symmetry and representation theory
- Lie algebras, special functions and orthogonal polynomials
- ordinary and partial differential equations
- difference and functional equations
- classical and quantum integrable systems
- soliton theory
- functional analysis and operator theory
- inverse problems
- geometry, differential geometry and topology
- numerical approximation and analysis
- computational methods
Quantum mechanics and quantum information theory
- foundations of quantum mechanics
- quantum correlations
- quantum cryptography and communication
- quantum computation and algorithms
- quantum simulation
- quantum metrology
- quantum optics and coherent states
- Bose–Einstein condensation and cold gases
- quantum measurements and tomography
- open quantum systems and decoherence
- semiclassical approximations
- geometric phases in quantum mechanics
- supersymmetric quantum mechanics
- relativistic quantum mechanics
- scattering theory and eigenvalue problems
Field theory and string theory
- general methods of quantum field theory
- gauge theories and their applications
- scattering amplitudes
- supersymmetric field theories in various dimensions
- conformal field theories
- integrable field theories
- solitonic solutions and semiclassical techniques
- general string theory and its applications
- string theory – gauge theory interface
Why should you publish in Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical?
- High quality standards: authoritative, constructive and fair peer review.
- Fast publication: we are committed to providing you with a quick, professional service to ensure rapid first decision, acceptance and publication. Once accepted, your article will be accessible to readers within 24 hours and will include a citable DOI.
- International Boards: world class Executive Editorial Board, Editorial Board and Peer Review Advisory Panel.
- Society owned: IOP Publishing is a leading society publisher of advanced physics research. Any profits generated by IOP Publishing are invested in the Institute of Physics, helping to support research, education and outreach around the world.
Article types
Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical welcomes submissions of the following article types:
- Papers: reports of high-quality original research with conclusions representing a significant advance in the field; usually approximately 10000 words (18 journal pages).
- Letters: outstanding concise articles, reporting important, new and timely developments. These articles should be deserving of priority review, and you are required to upload a justification statement along with your submission. Letters should not exceed nine pages in length or 6500 words.
- Topical reviews: written by leading researchers in their fields, these articles present the background to and overview of a particular field and the current state of the art. Topical review articles are normally invited by the Editorial Board.
- Comments: comment or criticism on work previously published in the journal. These are where possible published with an associated reply. Comments should be timely and should have a direct bearing on the significance of the results in the paper being commented on. For example, they may: 1) point out and/or correct a significant error or misinterpretation in the results. 2) significantly extend or generalise a result of the paper in some way. 3) point out relevant prior literature that significantly affects the novelty or priority of the results.
This journal also publishes Focus Issues which are special collections of papers (including any of the article types above) on a specific theme. A selection of focus issues can be found in a drop-down box on the submission form.
Peer review
The following summary describes the peer review process for Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical, using the ANSI/NISO Standard Terminology for Peer Review:
- Identity transparency: single-anonymous, double-anonymous (author choice)
- Reviewer interacts with: Editor
- Review information published: review reports (author and reviewer opt in), author/editor communication, reviewer identities (reviewer opt in)
Our Publishing Support website provides more information on our reviewing process as well as checklists in both English and Chinese language to help authors prepare their manuscripts for submission.
If an article is not accepted for publication, we may offer the author the opportunity to transfer their submission to other suitable journals we publish.
Inclusivity and diversity
IOP Publishing recognises that there are inequalities within the scientific publishing and research ecosystems. We are committed to a progressive approach to inclusivity and diversity, and are working hard to eliminate discrimination to foster an equitable and welcoming publishing environment for all.
IOP Publishing follows Guidelines on Inclusive Language and Images in Scholarly Communication to ensure that journal articles use bias-free and culturally sensitive communication. We ask authors to please follow these guidelines in their manuscript submissions.
More information about our work on inclusivity is available on our Open Physics hub.
Ethics
Research data
Please note that this policy requires authors to include a data availability statement in their article.
For any questions about the policy please contact the journal.
Many research funders now require authors to make all data related to their research available in an online repository. Please refer to the policy for further information about research data, data repositories and data citation.
Open access
Alternatively authors who do not select the gold open access option can choose a green open access route to publication.
For more information on IOP Publishing’s open access policies please see our Open access page. For our author rights policies please see our Author rights page.
Publication charges
Publication on a subscription-access basis is free of charge.
Authors have the option to pay the following article publication charge (APC) to publish their article on an open access basis under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence.
GBP | EUR | USD | |
Article publication charge* | £2295 | €2635 | $3165 |
Reduced article publication charge* for Group B countries** | £500 | €575 | $675 |
Reduced article publication charge for Group A countries** | £0 | €0 | $0 |
*excluding VAT where applicable
**eligibility criteria can be found here
APCs only apply to articles accepted for publication; there are no submission charges.
There are no other charges for publishing in Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical.
Transformative Agreements
Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical is included in our transformative agreements which allow authors from some institutions to publish open access without paying an APC.Find out if you’re covered by an agreement
If you are covered by an agreement, use our author guide to help you submit your paper.
Countries where we have transformative agreements include:
Austria, Canada, Croatia, Finland, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Germany, Poland, The Netherlands, United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia, Slovenia, Sweden and Switzerland.
Paying for open access
Various discounts, waivers and funding arrangements are available to support our authors. Visit our Paying for open access page for further details.
Abstracting and indexing services
We work with our authors to help make their work as easy to discover as possible. Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical is currently included in the following abstracting and discovery services:
- Chemical Abstracts
- GeoRef
- INIS Atomindex (International Nuclear Information System)
- Inspec
- ISI (Science Citation Index®, SciSearch®, ISI Alerting Services, Current Contents®/Physical, Chemical and Earth Sciences)
- MathSciNet
- NASA Astrophysics Data System
- PASCAL Database
- Scopus
- VINITI Abstracts Journal (Referativnyi Zhurnal)
- Zentralblatt MATH