Tips for correct affiliation

Recommendations for the standardised indication of affiliation in publications in English and German

FAU is recognised as one of Germany’s strongest universities in terms of research and publications. In order for this to remain the case, publications and their authors must be clearly linked to FAU. This is the only way to ensure that achievements are recognised, for example in international rankings.

Please always state the official name of the University

Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg

The university name will no longer be translated into English: Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg is used in English and German publications.

Indication of additional affiliation

  • The indication of additional affiliations is optional
  • In addition to the University name, you can list the faculty, school, department, institute, chair and professor.
  • Usually, when listing the various levels of affiliation, at least the highest and the lowest are included
  • FAU ought to be mentioned first in all instances.

Example

Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg,
Engineering Design, Martensstraße 9, 91058 Erlangen, Germany

oder

Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg,
Faculty of Engineering, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Engineering Design,
Martensstraße 9, 91058 Erlangen, Germany

Further information

Further information can be found in our recommendations for standardising affiliation.

If the publisher has a character limit, the University name should not be omitted or shortened in order to make room for other information such as department or institute. Please use the full version ‘Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg’ as far as possible, even if there is a character limit. In cases where the full name exceeds the character limit, the following version is recommended:

Maximum 30 characters: FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg

If you wish to indicate affiliation with multiple institutions within or outside of FAU, we recommend the following format:

A.N. Other1,2,

1 Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, Engineering Design, Martensstraße 9, 91058 Erlangen, Germany

2 Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Systems and Device Technology (IISB), 91058 Erlangen, Germany

An equivalent procedure is recommended for publications in German.

If umlauts cannot be used for technical reasons, please use a instead of ä, u instead of ü and o instead of ö.

FAU recommends that researchers decide on a standardised way of writing their own name in publications at the beginning of their academic careers. This is particularly relevant to names with prefixes or conjunctions, double names or names that show family relationships (for example Mac, Ibn, Abu). Please contact the University Library for more information.

Furthermore, allocating unique (alpha)numeric identifiers for authors is becoming increasingly common. Please refer to the Open Researcher and Contributor ID (ORCID) and the ResearcherID on Publons.

Furthermore, where possible, all authors should create a personal profile in relevant databases which indicates the various ways in which their name may be written (usually under the fields ‘Variants of name’ or ‘Other names’) and link their publications to their personal profile.

For several disciplines, ensuring that work appears in scientific search engines such as Google Scholar in addition to entries in databases is crucial. If you wish to increase your visibility here, a Google account is required and a profile must be requested.

(Alpha)numeric identifiers to enable unique identification of institutions such as FAU or funding organisations such as DFG already exist. Please include these identifiers during the submission process if the publisher provides the relevant entry fields for your affiliation or your funding organisation:

When designing academic posters and posters that are to be published, please be aware that only the current faculty logos should be used. These can be found on the FAU corporate identity website. Please refrain from using old logos. Otherwise, the same recommendations apply to the use of the University name, indication of additional affiliation and identifiers as described above.

Do not use copyrighted content as part of the graphic design. This may also include fonts which require a licence.

In certain cases, there may be additional specifications set by your specific organisational unit or by the publisher that must also be adhered to. Please consult the contact person at your organisational unit or at the publisher if this is the case.

Many researchers present their research findings or projects on various social media channels. FAU also has a profile of its own on a number of social networks. It therefore makes sense to mention the connection to FAU when communicating publications and projects relating to FAU.

You can tag FAU in your post as follows:

@UniFAU (Twitter)
@Uni.Erlangen.Nuernberg (Facebook)
@uni_fau (Instagram)
@fau-erlangen-nürnberg (LinkedIn)

If you use hashtags, please feel free to use the following that FAU itself uses on our central channels:

#FAU (alle Netzwerke)
#FAUproud (Twitter)
#1innovator (Twitter)
#meineFAU (Twitter, Instagram)
#FAU_Germany (Instagram)
#uniFAU (Instagram)

Further information on social media is available on our website.

The central research information system CRIS stores all information about researchers, research projects and publications at FAU. In order to ensure that information about publications can be automatically imported, affiliation to FAU and the organisational unit (chair, professorship, central institution) must be stated correctly.

The names of funding organisations, for example in funding acknowledgements, often have to be cited in a standard form and following the standards issued by the funding organisation such as the DFG guidelines for the use of funds. See DFG form 2.00 – 01/22:

Publications must credit the DFG for funding the project (known as a funding acknowledgement) as follows: ‘Funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) – Project number(s).’

The required acknowledgements may differ for collaborative research centres, research training groups and the like.

In publications in languages other than English, the name of the DFG ought to be translated into the target language, ‘funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, Translation) – project number(s)’.

The recommendations apply to all publications in the context of FAU, including publications from academic and non-academic staff:

  • doctoral candidates and students
  • guest researchers
  • retired professors
  • teaching staff
  • scholarship holders
  • alumni