IGARSS 2020 Paper Submission Kit

Announcing a New, More Agile Format for Oral Sessions

The IGARSS 2020 team is excited to announce a new and more agile format for the Oral Sessions following numerous requests to increase discussion time and foster interactions.

Each Invited Oral Session will be composed of 8 papers; a 20-minute, theme oriented introductory talk and 7 short oral presentations of 5 minutes each. Every 5-minute presentation will be associated with a poster presentation in the same room, and there will be 45 minutes at the end of the oral presentations to further discuss the short talks just presented. In cases when the Invited Oral Sessions for the same topic cover more than one time block, the introductory talk will be presented only at the beginning of the first block, and the additional time in the second time block will be allocated to 4 additional 5-minute talks.

Each Regular Oral Session will be composed of oral presentations of 5 minutes each. Every 5-minute presentation will be associated with a poster presentation in the same room, and there will be 50 minutes at the end of the oral presentations to further discuss the short talks just presented.

The format for the interactive Poster Sessions will remain unchanged from the past IGARSS symposia.


Part I: General Information

Procedure

The submission and review process is handled similar to past IGARSS events. However, a significant change has been made to the Oral presentation format.

  • Initial Submission
    • Authors who wish to participate in the conference must submit a manuscript (minimum of two pages; maximum of four pages) consisting of a complete description of their ideas and applicable research results. Detailed specifications for the submission content and format are provided below.
    • The manuscript is to be submitted electronically through the website and copyright form is to be submitted through the IEEE e-Copyright Form system. The link is provided in the paper submission process. This abstract must be submitted by 15 January 2020 20 January 2020.
    • The status of all submissions will be available on the IGARSS 2020 website. The status page indicates successful receipt of a submission and electronic copyright form, whether the submission has passed formatting inspection, and whether the submission is accepted.
    • Submissions will be reviewed by experts selected by the conference committee for their demonstrated knowledge of particular topics. The progress and results of the review process will be posted on this website and authors will also be notified of the review results by email.
    • If your manuscript is accepted, you must: register to attend the conference by 29 May 2020; and present the paper. If these qualifactions are met, the manuscript will be published in the official proceedings distributed at the conference, and online through IEEE Xplore.
    • If you wish that the manuscript is not published please check the checkbox for EXCLUDING the manuscript from the publication in IEEE Xplore.
  • Revision of Manuscript
    • Accepted submissions may be revised to address specific reviewer and Program Committee concerns until 29 May 2020.

The review process is being conducted entirely online. To expedite the review process, and to assure that the paper submissions will be readable through the online review system, we request that authors submit manuscripts that are formatted according to the Paper Kit instructions included here. For similar reasons, authors are strongly encouraged, though not required, to format the submissions using these tools as well.


Format Requirements for all Submissions

  • Submission deadline for all manuscripts is 15 January 2020 20 January 2020 for both contributed and invited submissions.
  • All manuscripts must be written in English.
  • The minimum page limit for all manuscripts is two pages. The maximum page limit is 4 pages. Use Times New Roman font, 10, 11 or 12 point, and anywhere between 1.0 and 1.5 line spacing.
  • All manuscripts must be formatted in IEEE two-column format.
  • Manuscripts should state clearly and concisely the problem, methodology used and central conclusions, and may include figures and graphs.
  • Manuscripts must include a bibliography to help reviewers place the contributions of the work into context.
  • A maximum of two submissions may be submitted by each presenting author, including both general and invited sessions.
  • Every author is responsible for checking the status of their submission by visiting the symposium website, https://igarss2020.org/Papers.asp. Acceptance notices will be sent via email only, and the results posted on the website.
  • Authors of accepted papers will have an opportunity to revise the reviewed paper by 29 May 2020.
  • Papers must be presented at the conference in order to be published. To be presented means that an author or other person significantly familiar with the subject matter and research described in the paper is physically present at the symposium venue at the time scheduled by the program chairs and must discuss the content of the paper verbally (allowing for accommodation of disability) and answer questions from the audience.
  • Pre-recorded video and/or audio or remote presentation over the Internet or other means will not be considered an appropriate presentation.
  • Papers must be formatted according to the directions below, in order to be published.
  • Students paying a reduced student registration may register one presentation at the symposium. Regular delegates will be allowed to register up to two presentations.

Requirements for Student Paper Contest

  • Students are required to submit by the initial submission deadline of 15 January 2020 20 January 2020:
    1. Publish-ready 2 column manuscript (2-4 pages): This document will be judged for the SPC. This will be the same manuscript/document published in the proceedings if the submission is accepted into the technical program and presented at the conference.
    2. Proof of Student Status: Image of your student ID or a letter from your University or school stating that you are a student currently enrolled in a degree program.
    3. Advisor Letter: A signed letter from your advisor stating that you: are a candidate for a degree; will personally present the paper (if accepted); will have a higher contribution to the presented paper than 60% (if the contribution is less than 60%, the paper is not suitable for a student paper competition and can be submitted to the normal track); will publish in the IGARSS 2020 Proceedings; will register and participate in the symposium; and can attend the Awards Banquet.
  • All of these files MUST be submitted by the deadline of 15 January 2020 20 January 2020 in order to be considered for the Student Paper Competition. If any parts are missing when the deadline arrives, the paper will NOT be considered for the student paper competition.
  • Students paying a reduced student registration may register one presentation at the symposium. Regular delegates will be allowed to register up to two presentations.

Deadlines and Important Dates

Manuscript Submission Deadline 15 January 2020
20 January 2020
Student Paper Competition Deadline 15 January 2020
20 January 2020 (For ALL required documents)
Submission Status Available On-line (Accept/Reject Decisions) 17 April 2020
Author Registration Deadline 29 May 2020
Accepted Manuscript Revision Submission Deadline 29 May 2020

Correspondence

Please make sure to put the conference name (IGARSS 2020) and the paper number that is assigned to you on all correspondence.

Additional questions regarding submission of papers should be directed to the following address:

IGARSS 2020
Conference Management Services, Inc.
2711 Pierre Place
College Station, Texas, USA
Phone: +1-979-846-6800
Fax: +1-979-846-6900
Email: info@igarss2020.org

Part II: Preparation of the Manuscript

Document Formatting

Use the following guidelines when preparing your manuscript:

LENGTH: You are allowed a minimum of 2 pages and maximum of 4 pages for your manuscript. These limits include all figures, tables, and references. Any documents that exceed the 4 page limit or fail to meet the 2 page minimum will be rejected.

LANGUAGE: All proposals must be in English.

MARGINS: Documents should be formatted for standard letter-size (8.5 in. by 11.0 in.) or A4 (210mm by 297mm) paper

  • All text and figures should be contained in a 178 mm x 229 mm (7 inch x 9 inch) image area.
  • The left margin must be 19mm (0.75 inches).
  • The top margin must be 25mm (1.0 inch), except for the title page where it must be 35mm (1.375 inches).
  • On the first page, the top 50mm (2 inches) is reserved for the title, author(s), and affiliation(s). These items should be centered on the page, starting at 35mm (1.375 inches) from the top of the page.

COLUMNS: Manuscripts should be in 2-column format. The title and author block on the first page should span across the two columns. Wide figures may span across two columns. However, the use of wide figures should be limited if possible.

A format sheet with the margins and placement guides is available in PDF format:

  • PDF file (When you print this file, make sure the "shrink to fit" box is not checked!)

These files contain lines and boxes showing the margins and print areas. If you print one of these files, then stack it atop your printed page and hold it up to the light, you can easily check your margins to see if your print area fits within the space allowed.

TYPE:

Face: To achieve the best viewing experience for the review process and conference proceedings, we strongly encourage authors to use Times-Roman or Computer Modern fonts. If a font face is used that is not recognized by the submission system, your proposal will not be reproduced correctly.

Size: Use a font size that is no smaller than 10 points and no larger than 12 points throughout the paper, including figure captions.

TITLE: The paper title should appear in boldface letters and should be in ALL CAPITALS. Do not use LaTeX math notation ($x_y$) in the title; the title should be representable in the Unicode character set. Also try to avoid uncommon acronyms in the title.

AUTHOR LIST: The authors’ name(s) and affiliation(s) appear below the title in capital and lower case letters. Proposals with multiple authors and affiliations may require two or more lines for this information. The order of the authors on the document should exactly match in number and order the authors typed into the online submission form.

BODY: Major headings appear in boldface CAPITAL letters, centered on the page. Subheadings appear in capital and lower case, either underlined or in boldface. They start at the left margin of the page on a separate line. Sub-subheadings are discouraged, but if they must be used, they should appear in capital and lower case, and start at the left margin on a separate line. They may be underlined or in italics.

REFERENCES: List and number all references at the end of the document. The references can be numbered in alphabetical order or in order of appearance in the paper. When referring to them in the text, type the corresponding reference number in square brackets as shown at the end of this sentence [1]. The end of the document should include a list of references containing information similar to the following example:

[1] J. P. Kerekes and J. E. Baum, "Full-Spectrum Spectral Imaging System Analytical Model," IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote Sens., vol. 43, no. 3, pp. 571-580, Mar. 2005.

[2] A. B. Tarokh and E. L. Miller, "Subsurface Sensing under Sensor Positional Uncertainty," IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote Sens., vol. 45, no. 3, pp. 675-688, Mar. 2007.

ILLUSTRATIONS & COLOR: Illustrations must appear within the designated margins. If possible, position illustrations at the top of pages, rather than in the middle or at the bottom. Caption and number every illustration. All illustrations should be clear when printed on a black-only printer. Be sure that your images are acceptable when printed in black and white (the USB and online IEEE Xplore proceedings will retain the colors in your document).

PAGE NUMBERS: Do not put page numbers on your document. Appropriate page numbers will be added to accepted papers when the conference proceedings are assembled.


Templates

The following style files and templates are available for users of LaTeX and Microsoft Word:

We recommend that you use the Word file or LaTeX files to produce your document, since they have been set up to meet the formatting guidelines listed above. When using these files, double-check the paper size in your page setup to make sure you are using the letter-size (8.5 in. by 11 in.) or A4 (210mm by 297mm) paper layout. The LaTeX environment files specify suitable margins, page layout, text and a bibliography style.

In particular, with LaTeX, there are cases where the top-margin of the resulting PDF file does not meet the specified parameters. In this case, you may need to add a \topmargin=0mm command just after the \begin{document} command in your .tex file. The spacing of the top margin is not critical, as the page contents will be adjusted on the proceedings. The critical dimensions are the actual width and height of the page content.


Part III: Submission of the Manuscript

The review process will be performed from the electronic submission of your manuscript. To ensure that your document is compatible with the review system, please adhere to the following compatibility requirements:

File Format

Papers must be submitted in Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF) format.

Please make sure that you submit a valid PDF to the submission system. Adobe Acrobat is the prefered way of generating a PDF file, but there are many other options which produce quality PDFs as well.

PDF files:

  • must not have Adobe Document Protection or Document Security enabled,
  • must have either US Letter or A4 sized pages,
  • must be in first-page-first order, and
  • must have ALL FONTS embedded and subset.

ALL FONTS MUST be embedded in the PDF or PostScript file. There is no guarantee that the reviewers of the abstract have the same fonts used in the document. If fonts are not embedded in the submission, you will be contacted by CMS and asked to submit a file that has all fonts embedded. Please refer to your PDF file generation tool’s user guide to find out how to embed all fonts.

Information for LaTeX users

Generating a PostScript file is straightforward for all LaTeX packages we are aware of. When preparing the proposal under LaTeX, it is preferable to use scalable fonts such as Type I, Computer Modern. However, quite good results can be obtained with the fonts defined in the style file recommended above (spconf.sty).

PDF files with Postscript Type 3 fonts are highly discouraged. PDF and PostScript files utilizing Type 3 fonts are typically produced by the LaTeX system and are lower-resolution bitmapped versions of the letters and figures. It is possible to perform a few simple changes to the configuration or command-line to produce files that use PostScript Type 1 fonts, which are a vector representation of the letters and figures.

For most installations of LaTeX, you can cause dvips to output Type 1 fonts instead of Type 3 fonts by including -Ppdf option to dvips. The resulting PDF file will reference the Type 1 Computer Modern fonts, rather than embedding the bitmapped Type 3 versions, which cause problems with printers.

You may also need to tell dvips to force letter sized paper with the option: -t letter.

Most current LaTeX installations also include pdflatex, which produces acceptable PDF files as well.


File Size Limit

Authors will be permitted to submit a document file up to 5 MB (megabytes) in size. To request an exception, contact the paper submission technical support at: papers@igarss2020.org.


File Name

The filename of the document file should be the first author’s last name, followed by the appropriate extension (.pdf). For example, if the first author’s name is Johan Smith, you would submit your file as ”smith.pdf“.

The paper submission process will append the filename with a unique identifier when it is stored on our system, so multiple submissions with the same name will not overwrite each other and will be distinguishable.


Electronic Paper Submission

When you have your document file ready, gather the following information before entering the submission system:

  • Manuscript in PDF format
  • Affiliation, email address, and mailing address for each author
  • Paper title

To submit your document and author information, go to the Paper Submission link on the IGARSS 2020 homepage:

https://igarss2020.org/Papers.asp

The submission system will present an entry form to allow you to enter the paper title, paper topic, and author contact information.

ALL authors must be entered in the online form, and must appear in the online form in the same order in which the authors appear on the PDF.

After you submit this information, the system will display a page with the data that you entered so that you may verify its accuracy. If you need to change the data to fix a mistake, you may use the back button on your browser to return to the information entry form. Once you approve of the data that you have entered, you may choose your document file for upload at the bottom of the verification page. When you click on the button labeled 'Continue' at the bottom of this page, the page will check the filename extension to make sure it matches the submission criteria, then your browser will upload your file to our server. Depending on the size of your file and your internet connection speed, this upload may take a few minutes. At the end of a successful upload, you will see a confirmation page displaying the paper number that is assigned to you, and and email message will be sent to the corresponding authors' email addresses to confirm that the file has been uploaded. If you do not see the confirmation page after uploading your file, we may not have successfully received your file upload. If you encounter trouble, contact the paper submission support at: papers@igarss2020.org.


Online Review Process

Your submitted manuscript will be visually inspected by our submission system staff to assure that the document is readable and meets all formatting requirements to be included in a visually pleasing and consistant proceedings publication for IGARSS 2020. If our submission inspectors encounter errors with your submitted file, they will contact you to resolve the issue. If your paper passes inspection, it will be entered into the review process. A committee of reviewers selected by the conference committee will review the manuscripts and rate them according to quality, relevence, and correctness. The conference technical committee will use these reviews to determine which papers will be accepted for presentation in the conference. The result of the technical committee’s decision will be communicated to the submitting authors by email, along with any program committee comments, if any.


Monitor Your Submission Status

After you submit your document, you may monitor the status of your paper as it progresses through the submission and review process by using the Paper Status website available at:

https://igarss2020.org/Papers.asp


Notification of Acceptance

Authors will be notified of paper acceptance or non-acceptance by email as close as possible to the published author notification date. The email notification will include the presentation format chosen for your paper (oral or poster) and may also include the presentation date and time, if available.

The notification email may include comments from the reviewers and/or program committee members. The conference cannot guarantee that all of the reviewers will provide the level of detail desired by you. However, reviewers are encouraged to submit as detailed comments as possible.

Because of the short amount of time between paper acceptance decisions and the beginning of the publication process, IGARSS 2020 is not able to allow for a two-way discourse between the authors and the reviewers of a paper. If there appears to be a logistical error in the reviewer comments, such as the reviewer commenting on the wrong paper, etc., please contact IGARSS 2020 at papers@igarss2020.org.

Publication in the Proceedings: All accepted submissions, with an author registered, and which are presented on-site, will be published in the proceedings (IEEE XPlore). Except in the case where the authors have indicated to exclude the manuscript from the submission to IEEE Xplore.


Required Author Registration

Be sure that at least one author registers to attend the conference using the online registration system available through the conference website. Each accepted paper being presented must have at least one author registered, with the payment received by the author registration deadline (see above) to avoid being withdrawn from the conference.

https://igarss2020.org/


Copyright Issues for Web Publication

If you plan to publish a copy of an accepted paper on the Internet by any means, you MUST display the following IEEE copyright notice on the first page that displays IEEE published (and copyrighted) material:

Copyright 2020 IEEE. Published in the IEEE 2020 International Geoscience & Remote Sensing Symposium (IGARSS 2020), scheduled for July 19 – 24, 2020 in Waikoloa, Hawaii, USA. Personal use of this material is permitted. However, permission to reprint/republish this material for advertising or promotional purposes or for creating new collective works for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or to reuse any copyrighted component of this work in other works, must be obtained from the IEEE. Contact: Manager, Copyrights and Permissions / IEEE Service Center / 445 Hoes Lane / P.O. Box 1331 / Piscataway, NJ 08855-1331, USA. Telephone: + Intl. 908-562-3966.

If you post an electronic version of an accepted paper, you must provide the IEEE with the electronic address (URL, FTP address, etc.) of the posting.


Part IV: Preparation of the Presentation

When we send the review results for your paper by email, that email message will specify whether accepted papers have been assigned for presentation in a poster session or oral session. To help authors prepare for oral and poster presentations, the following suggestions have been created:

Oral Presentations

The IGARSS 2020 team is excited to announce a new and more agile format for the Oral Sessions following numerous requests to increase discussion time and foster interactions. For IGARSS 2020, each Oral Session will be composed of 8 papers; a 20-minute, theme oriented introductory talk and 7 short oral presentations of 5 minutes each. Each 5-minute presentation will be associated with a poster presentation in the same room, and there will be 45 minutes at the end of the oral presentations to further discuss the short talks just presented. In cases when the Oral Sessions for the same topic cover more than one time block, the introductory talk will be presented only at the beginning of the first block, and the additional time in the second time block will be allocated to 4 additional 5-minute talks. The format for the interactive Poster Sessions will remain unchanged from the past IGARSS symposia.

More detailed instructions about how to prepare for the new Oral presentation format will be provided in due time.

Poster Presentations

Poster sessions are a good medium for authors to present papers and meet with interested attendees for in-depth technical discussions. In addition, attendees find the poster sessions a good way to sample many papers in parallel sessions. Thus it is important that you display your message clearly and noticeably to attract people who might have an interest in your paper.

Your poster should cover the key points of your work. It need not, and should not, attempt to include all the details; you can describe them in person to people who are interested. The ideal poster is designed to attract attention, provide a brief overview of your work, and initiate discussion. Carefully and completely prepare your poster well in advance of the conference. Try tacking up the poster before you leave for the conference to see what it will look like and to make sure that you have all of the necessary pieces.

For each paper, some amount of space will be reserved on a board. The exact maximum dimensions will be posted here at a later date.

IMPORTANT: There MUST be a presenter standing at the poster during the entire scheduled poster time. A poster that is mounted to the board, but without any person presenting it will be considered a no-show!

Posters shall be on display during the part of the day dedicated to your specific poster session. Authors are invited to be on stand-by near their posters during the session breaks and must be near their poster during the dedicated poster session time.

The title of your poster should appear at the top in CAPITAL letters about 25mm high. Below the title put the author(s)' name(s) and affiliation(s). The flow of your poster should be from the top left to the bottom right. Use arrows to lead your viewer through the poster. Use color for highlighting and to make your poster more attractive. Use pictures, diagrams, cartoons, figures, etc., rather than text wherever possible. Try to state your main result in 6 lines or less, in lettering about 15mm high so that people can read the poster from a distance. The smallest text on your poster should be at least 9mm high, and the important points should be in a larger size. Use a sans-serif font (such as "cmss" in the Computer Modern family or the "Helvetica" PostScript font) to make the print easier to read from a distance.

Make your poster as self-explanatory as possible. This will save your efforts for technical discussions. There will not be any summaries given at the beginning of the poster sessions at IGARSS 2020, so authors need not prepare any overhead slides for their poster presentations. You may bring additional battery-operated audio or visual aids to enhance your presentation.

Prepare a short presentation of about 5 minutes that you can periodically give to those assembled around your poster throughout the 2 hour poster session. If possible, more than one author should attend the session to aid in presentations and discussions, and to provide the presenters with the chance to rest or briefly view other posters.