How does one indicate the corresponding author when using the authblk package?

Question

This question is not a duplicate of How to print the corresponding author, because that question is asking specifically how to make the corresponding author's name appear to the left of the complete list of authors, while also appearing in the complete list of authors.

I'd like to know the simplest, most standard way to indicate the corresponding author when using the authblk package. I've googled a fair amount and have not found the answer. If it's relevant, I'll be using the titlepage option, as in \documentclass[titlepage]{article}.

Here's a minimal example where the corresponding author is not indicated. So I'd like to know how to alter this to indicate the corresponding author.

\documentclass[titlepage]{article}
\usepackage[affil-it]{authblk}
\usepackage[english]{babel}
\usepackage{blindtext}

\title{An efficient method for exploiting midichlorians in weak life-forms}

\author[1]{Darth Vader}
\author[2]{Darth Sidious}

\affil[1]{%
  Office of the Supreme Commander of the Imperial Forces, 
  The Galactic Empire, The Bridge, Executor}
\affil[2]{%
  Order of the Sith Lords, LiMerge Power Building, The Works, Coruscant}

\begin{document}

\maketitle
\blindtext
\end{document}

---

The following code produces the screenshot later on, a screen of the log is attached as well.

\listfiles
\documentclass[titlepage]{article}
\usepackage[affil-it]{authblk}
\usepackage[english]{babel}
\usepackage{blindtext}

\title{An efficient method for exploiting midichlorians in weak
life-forms}

\author[1]{Darth Vader\thanks{corresponding author}}
\author[2]{Darth Sidious}

\affil[1]{%
    Office of the Supreme Commander of the Imperial Forces, 
The Galactic Empire, The Bridge, Executor}
\affil[2]{%
    Order of the Sith Lords, LiMerge Power
Building, The Works, Coruscant}

\begin{document}

\maketitle
\blindtext
\end{document}

You can see the number 1 is repeated as a superscript.

If I add \listfiles to the document, here is the log I get:

Answer 1

This is more a workaround than an official solution I guess. But depending on the journal's author-guidelines for your manuscript this formatting might look more appropriate. It includes the indicator for the corresponding author as an affiliation.

Example code:

\listfiles
\documentclass[titlepage]{article}
\usepackage[affil-it]{authblk}
\usepackage[english]{babel}
\usepackage{blindtext}

\title{An efficient method for exploiting midichlorians in weak life-forms}

\author[1,*]{Darth Vader}
\author[2]{Darth Sidious}

\affil[1]{Office of the Supreme Commander of the Imperial Forces, The Galactic Empire, The Bridge, Executor}
\affil[2]{Order of the Sith Lords, LiMerge Power Building, The Works, Coruscant}
\affil[*]{Corresponding author: Darth Vader, darth@vader.deathstar}

\begin{document}

\maketitle
\blindtext
\end{document}

Example picture:

Answer 2

You can do it using \thanks , but if you are using the titlepage option (as in \documentclass[titlepage]{article}) then you should include the line \renewcommand{\thefootnote}{\fnsymbol{footnote}} in the header to make the footnote marker be an asterisk. We can also place the line \renewcommand{\thefootnote}{\arabic{footnote}} after \maketitle, to undo the global change. Here is a MWE:

\documentclass[titlepage]{article}
\usepackage[affil-it]{authblk}
\usepackage[english]{babel}
\usepackage{blindtext}

\renewcommand{\thefootnote}{\fnsymbol{footnote}}
\title{An efficient method for exploiting midichlorians in weak life-forms}

\author[1]{Darth Vader \thanks{Corresponding author}}
\author[2]{Darth Sidious}

\affil[1]{%
  Office of the Supreme Commander of the Imperial Forces, 
  The Galactic Empire, The Bridge, Executor}
\affil[2]{%
  Order of the Sith Lords, LiMerge Power Building, The Works, Coruscant}

\begin{document}

\maketitle
\renewcommand{\thefootnote}{\arabic{footnote}}
\blindtext
\end{document}

Answer 3

I found this question when googling for setting corresponding authors in ACM templates. This is how to set corresponding authors in an ACM template:

\author{Author 1}
\affiliation{\institution{Affiliation}}
\email{email}
\authornote{Corresponding authors}

\author{Author 2}
\affiliation{\institution{Affiliation}}
\email{email}
\authornotemark[1]

\author{Author 3}
\affiliation{\institution{Affiliation}}
\email{email}

Here, author 1 and 2 are both set as corresponding authors, but author 3 isn't. Further explanation can be found here: https://www.acm.org/binaries/content/assets/publications/consolidated-tex-template/acmart.pdf