Elements FAQs

Getting Started

Elements works alongside SRO 

Sussex Research Online is still the University's institutional repository. Elements is now the user interface system where publication records should be claimed or created and then deposited to SRO. It is important to still deposit publication records to SRO, now via Elements, to ensure eligibility for the next REF submission.

Elements can also be used for updating your staff profile, recording your professional and teaching activities and tracking grant information. 

• Accessing Elements

  Elements can be accessed here: elements.sussex.ac.uk

  You will need to sign in using your University login details (e.g. aa001@sussex.ac.uk) and password.

  BSMS users will need to sign in using their BSMS username (e.g. BSMS####@sussex.ac.uk) and password.

  Problems logging into Elements

  If you have successfully logged in previously:

  Firstly, make sure you are using the correct username (e.g. aa001@sussex.ac.uk) and password.

  If you are still unable to log in, your account may have become inactive. The user information is pulled from the University's central HR feed, and contract information may sometimes be outdated or incorrect, particularly if you have recently changed roles. Please contact your school or divisional HR officer to ensure your details are up-to-date.

  If you have left the University, access to your Elements account will have finished on your contract end date. 

  If this is your first time logging in:

  The feed is pulled across nightly so, if you have just started, it may take a short while before your account appears. 

  Access to Elements is currently restricted to academic roles and select professional services staff.

• Elements & preparations for REF exercises 

  Elements will positively improve the University's REF submission by allowing individuals to upload a variety of evidence easily and in a standardised manner.

Your Profile

Staff profiles are now hosted by, and editable in, Elements

You can now edit all sections of your staff profile in Elements, including adding information on Teaching and Professional Activities, Research & Scholarship as well as a comprehensive About section. 

• Get access to Elements

  If you would like to deposit publications but do not yet have an Elements profile, please contact us (elements@sussex.ac.uk) with the details of your publication (including the DOI where possible) and we will advise.

• Editing your profile 

  Click on EDIT MY PROFILE. Once on your profile page, you can edit each section either by clicking on the ‘edit’ button, or the ‘Add…’ options.

  Your photo will automatically pull across from Sussex Direct, depending on the settings you have previously set. To add or change your photo, click on the 'Manage photo' option at the bottom of the profile picture. You can then select, or drag and drop, a new image of your choice to upload to Elements. 

  Data in Elements refreshes at intervals, so any changes you make may not be immediately visible.

  A daily data synchronisation is auto-run by the system every morning, alongside these smaller data refreshes.

  If the change has still not appeared after 24 hours, please contact us and we will investigate further.

• Profiles for PhD students

  PhD students have profiles in Elements that are hidden, or ‘Internal’ only. This is the default for non-staff members.

  If you wish to make your profile externally visible, this can be done easily within Elements:

  Go to EDIT MY PROFILE. Select the privacy level you wish from the top of the page. Selecting ‘Public’ will make the profile externally visible.

• Profiles for Professional Services staff 

  Access to Elements is currently restricted to academic roles and select professional services staff.

  If you have published work since the move to Elements, but do not have an Elements login, please contact us at: elements@sussex.ac.uk

• Making your profile private 

  The ability to change the privacy settings for an entire profile is dependent upon an individual’s role within the University:

  • Staff profiles will always be set to public, and be visible externally
  • Research Student profiles will be private by default, but can be changed to public by the individual. To do this, go to EDIT MY PROFILE. Select the privacy level you wish from the top of the page.

  Individuals who have previously informed the University that they wish their profiles to not be visible externally will also be hidden by default.

  All users will have the option to change the privacy settings for separate sections of the profile:

  Click on EDIT MY PROFILE

  Scroll to the section of the page you want to change. Next to the edit button, there will be a second button which says either 'private' or 'internal' (depending on your page privacy settings). Click this, and you will be presented the option to match the page privacy settings or set the section as 'private'. Click 'save'.

• Incorrect title, job role, department or multiple roles

  Your details on Elements are pulled in from the University's HR feed, and cannot be changed via Elements.

  If any of your personal details are incorrect, please contact your school or divisional HR officer to ensure your details are up-to-date.

  If you have multiple roles the HR feed will determine which one shows as your primary role and if you are registered as a student alongside your professional role, this will be your primary role.

  Forthcoming updates from IT Services around identity management system should mean that, in the future, you will be able to select your most appropriate role for display. In the meantime, we recommend you add text outlining your roles in the Overview box in the About section.

  If any of your personal details are incorrect, please contact your school or divisional HR officer.

  Any changes made by HR will reflect on your Elements profile within 24 hours.

• Hyperlinks & videos

  Hyperlinks

  Elements does not currently allow you to embed hyperlinks into the body text of your profile. Instead, you can add links to websites and social media under the ‘Web addresses and social media’ section of your profile.

  Publications are linked in the Publications section.

  Videos

  At the moment, Elements can only support videos hosted on YouTube. 

  Go to EDIT MY PROFILE and scroll down to the Media section to embed YouTube videos on your profile. For videos hosted on other platforms, you can add links under the ‘Web addresses and social media’ section of your profile.

• Generating a CV

  Click on Menu > Reporting > CV and Reports. Specify the date range that you wish the CV to encompass, and select if you want the CV in PDF or Word format. Click 'Download'.

  Alternatively, go to your profile page, and click on the 'CV and Reports' button in the top right corner.

• Publications histogram

  To appear in your publications histogram, your publications have to be claimed. Your graph will then update following the daily data synchronisation that is auto-run by the system.

  The publication histogram/graph is not something that can be hidden within Elements. It is only visible on your internal profile, however, and will not display on your external profile pages.

• Missing sections

  If any of the main profile sections have not been populated with information, they will not appear on your public facing profile. 

  To add more information click EDIT MY PROFILE on your Elements homepage and populate the Teaching, Research and Professional Activities sections. 

• Information for staff leaving Sussex

  Your publication records will not be deleted if you leave Sussex. The University's aim is to create and maintain a full historical record of research output. You can, of course, add your full publications record to your new institution's repository.

  To get a copy of your Elements profile information:

  Log into Elements and select EDIT MY PROFILE. Click into the CV and Reports button at the top right of the screen. From here you can generate and export a CV document that will contain the information from your Elements profile.

  To minimise the need to duplicate publication information if you move to a new institution, make sure you connect your ORCiD profile to Elements. This will ensure that bibliographic information is automatically copied from Elements to ORCiD for you. To register for an ORCID iD, go to orcid.org and fill in the online registration form

Adding Publications

Depositing records from Elements to SRO 

You should now use Elements to create and claim publication records before depositing them to SRO. Records will not have a repository record or be eligible for the next REF submission if they are not deposited to SRO via Elements. 

Elements integrates with other databases to pull details of your already-published publications into your Elements account, so you can claim and manage existing publications. You should add details of new publications as soon as possible after acceptance and deposit the records along with your accepted manuscripts to SRO. Elements will not harvest publication information until the work has been published, so it is important to create and deposit records for newly accepted publications yourself. 

• Harvesting publications 

  Elements will locate (or harvest) your already published publications on external databases using various identifiers. Elements will pull details of identified publications into your pending publications list, where you can claim or reject them as required. It is important that you check and modify your identifier settings before you begin adding publications as this will give Elements the best chance of identifying your publications correctly and minimise the need to manually add records for already published works. See 'Identifiers' below.

  Elements is not able to retrieve details of publications which have just been accepted and not yet published. To add a record on acceptance, you will need to create a manual record of the publication and deposit it to SRO. This should be done within 3 months of acceptance to satisfy REF and funder Open Access policies. 

• Accepted publications

  You should create a manual record for any publications which have been accepted for publication, and deposit the record to SRO within 3 months of the acceptance date to satisfy REF and funder Open Access policies. 

  This is especially important for article and conference proceeding records, which should be deposited to SRO with the author accepted manuscript (the version post-peer review but prior to any copyediting or layout work). 

  If you are updating your profile to include older material that has already been published it is unlikely you will need to create a manual record unless it is a publication type that is not included in the data sources Elements searches, for example a newspaper article, a blog post, an exhibition or performance, or an article from a journal that is not widely indexed. If you are not sure if you should add a manual record contact the SRO team at sro@sussex.ac.uk.

• Published publications

  It is unlikely that you will need to create a manual record for an output that has already been published, unless it is a publication type that is not included in the data sources Elements searches, for example a newspaper article, a blog post, an exhibition or performance, or an article from a journal that is not widely indexed. If you are not sure if you should add a manual record, contact the SRO team at sro@sussex.ac.uk.

  Records that have been harvested from online databases by Elements should be deposited to SRO. 

• Preprints

  At the moment, preprint records should not be deposited from Elements to SRO. 

  Preprint records are welcome in Elements, and will show up on your staff profile without being deposited to SRO. 

• Adding publications

  If your paper has already been published, Elements may have already harvested the publication details. To check if a record already exists, you can search Elements by title, navigate to your claimed and pending publications, or search by title or DOI during the record creation process. 

  If a record does not already exist in Elements, or the publication is not yet published, follow the steps below to add a new record:

  • Navigate to your Elements homepage and click the +ADD NEW button in the Publications box
  • Select the publication type
  • On the next page you can search by title or DOI to check if Elements has already harvested the publication details. Elements will not already hold the publication details if the publication has not yet been published. If the publication is not found in Elements, click the skip button
  • Enter the publication details on the form. The fields with an asterisk (*) are mandatory
  • Click Save
  • Link the publication to a grant if desired/appropriate
  • The final page allows you to upload a file to the record. To select the desired file, click choose file, then select the version type and click use this file. You can upload multiple files. Article and conference proceeding records must be deposited with the author accepted manuscript
  • Complete by clicking deposit, which will lead to a confirmation screen. This last step is vital, even if you are not uploading a file 
• Depositing claimed records

  All records should be deposited from Elements to the University's repository, SRO (except preprint records) after they have been created or claimed. Once you have claimed a record, please deposit it to SRO with the accepted manuscript attached (the version after peer review but prior to any copyediting or layout work being completed by the publisher). See the Adding Publications section above for guidance. 

  If you have a large number of older publications which haven't been deposited to SRO, please contact sro@sussex.ac.uk so we can advise if all of the records should be deposited. 

• Attaching a manuscript to your record

  We recommend you upload the author's accepted manuscript (or AAM; sometimes referred to as a 'postprint') with your record. This is the version after peer-review but before any layout or copyediting work is completed by the publisher. Most publishers allow this version to be uploaded to an institutional repository, often with an embargo period specified. With a few exceptions, publishers do not allow the use of the final PDF, unless Gold open access has been paid for.

  The AAM is the version required as a minimum to fulfil a number of funder open access requirements. The document should be free from comments, highlighting or tracked changes. You can deposit the AAM in Word or PDF format. 

• Large-scale collaboration publications (e.g., ATLAS)

  Due to the extensive list of authors included on large-scale collaboration publications, these records are difficult to manage within SRO when they are deposited from Elements. A workflow for this process is currently in development.

  If you need to submit a large-scale collaboration publication please contact the SRO team: sro@sussex.ac.uk 

• Linking a publication to a research group

  If your publication is connected to a Sussex research group, you must record this when you deposit your work.

  When adding a new record, use the research group dropdown menu to link your publication to the appropriate group.

  To add a research group to a claimed record, navigate to the record page and click Add a manual record. The manual record will auto populate with the publication metadata, and you can add any additional information and select the research group before clicking Save and depositing the record. 

• Copyright & embargoes

  Library staff will check the copyright status of all full-text items deposited to SRO, and will apply the appropriate restrictions to the full-text of your paper, whether this is applying an embargo period or restricting access completely.

  You do not need to check publisher permissions yourself when depositing records from Elements to SRO. 

• Editing a record

  Once a record has been deposited from Elements to SRO, it can only be edited by the Elements/SRO teams. Email any amendments or updates to sro@sussex.ac.uk. 

• Depositing research data

  You should continue depositing research data to Figshare. Please see the Figshare support pages for further information.

Claiming Records & Pending Publications

Elements harvests publication information for you

Elements will locate your already published publications on external databases using various identifiers. Elements will pull publication details into your pending publications list, where you can claim or reject them as required. It's important that you check and modify your identifier settings before you begin adding publications as this will give Elements the best chance of identifying your publications correctly and minimise the need to manually add records for already published works. See 'Identifiers' below.

Elements is not able to retrieve details of publications which have just been accepted and not yet published. Accepted papers should be added to Elements manually - see the Accepted publications section above. 

• Pending publications

  Elements locates your publications on external data sources using your identifiers. The more information you add to the identifiers section of Elements, the more accurate Elements' search will be. 

  If Elements is certain you have authored a publication, it will automatically claim it for you, and the record will appear in your claimed records list. This will happen if, for example, the publication is linked to your Scopus ID, ResearchID or ORCiD: 

   

  If Elements isn't sure you authored the publication, it will appear in your pending list. You should check your pending list periodically and claim or reject the publications there as appropriate:

  

  You can claim or reject publications by clicking the blue REJECT or CLAIM buttons on each record in the list, or by selecting multiple records using the checkboxes. 

  If no items show in your pending publications and you think there should be records there, please check and modify your identifier settings. (See 'Identifiers' below.)

  If select publications are still not showing, you may need to add them manually as they might not be on external data sources, and therefore Elements will not harvest them. 

  If you have numerous pending publications which are not yours, you should check your identifier settings, and add or modify settings to improve the suggestions in pending. This is particularly important if you have a common name. (See 'Identifiers' below.)

• Identifiers (ResearchID, Scopus ID, ORCID iD etc)

  Name-based

  You can amend how Elements performs name-based searches for you; if you publish under more than one name/name variation, you can make sure Elements searches for them all. Items located through a name based search will be placed in your pending publications list, for you to claim or reject. The default name-based searches have been set up as 'Family name, First name' and 'Family name, Initials'. If you only ever publish with your full name and  are being offered too many publications that are not yours, remove the broader option. You can also narrow the results returned by name-based searches by including additional information, such as addresses.

  To modify your settings click on Menu > My Profile > Settings> Name-Based Search . Use the green plus icon to add a new name variant.

  Save changes. Note that you'll need to select Run searches in order for the changes to have an effect on the search results. 

  Unique identifiers

  Throughout your publishing career you may have created or been given one or more unique author identifiers. These distinct codes help avoid the problems that can come from publishing under different name variants and different authors having the same name. Elements integrates with ResearcherID (Web of Science) and Scopus IDs; if your work is included on these databases you are likely to have a corresponding identifier. Elements also integrates with ORCID, this is a unique identifier that is not affiliated with any particular database and can be used across a number of different research systems. See 'Get an ORCID iD' below.

  To add a unique identifier, click on Menu > My Profile > Settings > Automatic Claiming. Under 'Add external profiles', you will be given the option to add in your identifiers.

  Save changes. Note that you will need to select Run searches for the changes to have an effect on the search results.

  For each individual identifier, select the 'manage' button to change the settings for that identifier. Alternatively, if the identifier is not correct for you, select 'remove profile' to get rid of it.

• Get an ORCID ID 

  ORCID provides a persistent digital identifier (an ORCID iD) that you own and control, and that distinguishes you from every other researcher. To register for an ORCID iD, go to orcid.org and fill in the online registration form.

• Elements harvesting sources

  Elements searches several databases to identify your work. You can modify these data sources according to your own preference. You may wish to do this if Elements is not identifying a lot of your work.

  Click on Menu > My Profile> Settings > Name-Based Search. At the bottom of the page you will find a list of the databases Elements supports. You can select or deselect the sources to reflect your field.

  Once you have chosen your sources, click save to apply the changes.

• Automatic claiming

  You can change your settings to enable Elements to auto-claim publications that meet certain criteria. This can save you time, but we recommend you consider the reliability of the criteria you use. A unique identifier such as ORCID will correctly claim your work, while setting up an auto-claim for your name could lead to incorrect claiming of work by authors with the same name.

  See the user guide to auto-claiming on the Elements Support pages.

Managing Publications

• Rejected publications

  Elements uses your rejected list to ensure the same publications do not appear again in your pending items. For this reason, you can't clear your rejected list. 

  If you have incorrectly rejected a publication, you can locate it in your rejected list and claim it. 

• Move a publication to the top of your profile publications list

  You can select publications to feature at the top of your publications list on your staff profile.

  From the homepage, navigate to the Publications section, locate the publication you want to feature and click the heart icon:

  

• Hide a publication/make a publication private

  From the homepage, navigate to the Publications section, locate the publication you want to hide and click the globe icon. You will then be able to select the desired privacy settings for that publication:

  

• Duplicate records

  The SRO team can merge records to eliminate duplicates, whether Elements has identified & harvested more than one record for the same item or you/a co-author have created multiple manual records. Please contact sro@sussex.ac.uk and we will be happy to remedy this. 

• Correcting errors on a publication record

  Once a record has been deposited from Elements to SRO, you will not be able to edit it. If a record contains errors, do not create a new record with the correct information, instead please contact us at sro@sussex.ac.uk.

  We may not be able to amend data held in external sources, but we can advise on possible resolutions.

• Can't find a record a co-author created

  If your co-author has already created a record in Elements for your publication but you can't find it, firstly check your list of pending publications. If it is showing in the pending list, click ‘Claim’ to add it to your profile.

  If the publication is not showing in your pending list, check that your name-based identifiers match the name on the publication (see 'Identifiers' section above). If you modify your search settings, re-check your pending publication list and claim the publication if it has appeared.

  If your identifiers are correct and the publication still does not show, you will need to manually add the publication to your profile:

  On your homepage, click on ‘+ADD NEW’ in the Publications box, then select the publication type. Search for the publication using the DOI or the exact title. Once you click search, the publication should appear, and allow you to claim it. 

• Citation metrics

  The citation count is informed by the Dimensions database, while Altmetric tracks an item's DOI to generate a score. Both metrics offer a useful indication of the reach of your work, but no single metric source can offer a complete picture. These metrics cannot be removed or hidden. 

Grants & Impacts

You can now link grants to publications and manage records of impact in Elements. 

For Sussex authors, Elements is the only place you'll be required to enter publication details. However, your funder may have additional requirements for making outputs available externally, such as ensuring additional deposit in Europe PMC or Researchfish. Contact your funder for more information. 

• Grants on your profile 

  Grant information is supplied by a feed from the Research & Enterprise team. Only the Research & Enterprise team can add or edit grant information.

  Grants will show in the Research & Scholarship section of your public facing profile. If you wish to hide your connection to a grant, log into Elements, navigate to the Grants section and locate the relevant grant. Click the globe icon next to the grant you wish to hide to change the privacy settings. 

• Missing grants

  Grants are fed into Elements from the Research & Enterprise team. 

  If you can't locate your grant on Elements, this could be due to one of two factors:

  • A missing project code
  • A partial restriction, relating to confidentiality

  If you believe your missing grant is not impacted by any of the above factors, please contact us at elements@sussex.ac.uk.

• Linking a publication to a grant

  When you create a new record in Elements, or add a manual record to a harvest record, the third step in the process is to link the publication to the funding source. 

  You can scroll through the grants or filter by title or grant number etc. If your publication is not linked to a grant, you can skip this step by clicking Not externally funded. 

  If you can't locate your grant, please see the Missing grants section above. 

• Recording an impact

  Click +ADD NEW in the Records of impact box on your Elements homepage, or click the menu button in the top left, select My Profile > My Work > Records of Impact.

  This will lead you to a form which you should fill in with as much detail as possible. Click Save when the form is complete. 

  Impact data added to Elements will not appear in your public facing profile.

Accessibility

Elements conforms to a good level of accessibility across the site, and is easily usable by most people. 

Please see the Accessibility Statement for further information.

• Keyboard navigation

  Elements is keyboard navigable

• Screen reader

  Elements can mostly be used with a screen reader. 

  There are a few issues encountered when using a screen reader with Elements. Although these do not prevent usage of Elements, they do cause some unnecessary barriers.

  Those using a screen reader with a keyboard should set 'My Actions' to list view, whilst those using a cursor should view 'My Actions' as a slider.

• Tablet & mobile devices

  Elements can be used on a table or mobile device but we advise using a computer for the best experience.

Support

Get in touch with us with any queries at elements@sussex.ac.uk.

• School/department support

  Departmental procedure for adding records to Elements varies. Check the process for your department below, and contact your Research & Enterprise Co-ordinator for further information.

  Brighton and Sussex Medical School

  If you are a researcher at BSMS your Divisional Assistant may be able to upload your publications on your behalf.

  Education & Social Work 

  Researchers should email eswresearch@sussex.ac.uk with details of their publication, and it will be added to Elements on their behalf.

  Engineering & Informatics

  Researchers should add their own publications.

  Global Studies

  Researchers should add their own publications. Details of newly-accepted articles (only) may be forwarded for deposit on researcher's behalf, if preferred. On request, assistance is offered to new staff in adding their publication history. Email globalsro@sussex.ac.uk.

  Life Sciences

  Researchers should add their own publications.

  Law, Politics & Sociology

  Researchers should add their own publications.

  Mathematics & Physical Science

  For recently accepted publications, researchers should follow the process explained here. Researchers should add earlier publications themselves. Assistance may be offered to new staff in adding their publication history. Email mpsresearchsupport@sussex.ac.uk.

  Media, Arts and Humanities

  Researchers should upload their own publications but the Research Support Team can offer assistance with this where needed; please contact mah-research@sussex.ac.uk. 

  Psychology

  Research faculty can email PsychologySROupload@sussex.ac.uk with details of their publication, and it will be added to Elements on their behalf. Students and other faculty should add their own publications.

  University of Sussex Business School

  Researchers should add their own publications. Assistance is offered to new staff in adding their publication history.