How to format your references using the GigaScience citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for GigaScience. For a complete guide how to prepare your manuscript refer to the journal's instructions to authors.

Using reference management software

Typically you don't format your citations and bibliography by hand. The easiest way is to use a reference manager:

PaperpileThe citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNoteDownload the output style file
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and othersThe style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most references management programs.
BibTeXBibTeX syles are usually part of a LaTeX template. Check the instructions to authors if the publisher offers a LaTeX template for this journal.

Journal articles

Those examples are references to articles in scholarly journals and how they are supposed to appear in your bibliography.

Not all journals organize their published articles in volumes and issues, so these fields are optional. Some electronic journals do not provide a page range, but instead list an article identifier. In a case like this it's safe to use the article identifier instead of the page range.

A journal article with 1 author
1. Horvitz HR. Obituary: Stanley J. Korsmeyer (1950-2005). Nature. 2005;435:161.
A journal article with 2 authors
1. Ketting RF, Plasterk RH. A genetic link between co-suppression and RNA interference in C. elegans. Nature. 2000;404:296–8.
A journal article with 3 authors
1. Percec V, Ungar G, Peterca M. Chemistry. Self-assembly in action. Science. 2006;313:55–6.
A journal article with 7 or more authors
1. Nam K-H, Jamilpour N, Mfoumou E, Wang F-Y, Zhang DD, Wong PK. Probing mechanoregulation of neuronal differentiation by plasma lithography patterned elastomeric substrates. Sci Rep. 2014;4:6965.

Books and book chapters

Here are examples of references for authored and edited books as well as book chapters.

An authored book
1. Khanlari R, Fard MS. FIDIC Plant and Design-Build Form of Contract Illustrated. Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd; 2015.
An edited book
1. Wooldridge D. The Business of iPhone App Development: Making and Marketing Apps that Succeed. Schneider M, Andres C, Anglin S, Beckner M, Buckingham E, Cornell G, et al., editors. Berkeley, CA: Apress; 2010.
A chapter in an edited book
1. Liang J. Study of University Students’ Psychological Warning Prevention and Control Based on Automatic Control. In: Yang Y, Ma M, editors. Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Green Communications and Networks 2012 (GCN 2012): Volume 3. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer; 2013. p. 27–34.

Web sites

Sometimes references to web sites should appear directly in the text rather than in the bibliography. Refer to the Instructions to authors for GigaScience.

Blog post
1. Davis J. Roman Empire May Have Extended Further West In Britain Than Previously Thought [Internet]. IFLScience. IFLScience; 2016 [cited 2018 Oct 30]. Available from: https://www.iflscience.com/editors-blog/roman-empire-may-have-extended-further-west-in-britain-than-previously-thought/

Reports

This example shows the general structure used for government reports, technical reports, and scientific reports. If you can't locate the report number then it might be better to cite the report as a book. For reports it is usually not individual people that are credited as authors, but a governmental department or agency like "U. S. Food and Drug Administration" or "National Cancer Institute".

Government report
1. Government Accountability Office. Supplemental Security Income Computerized System Development Process. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 1979 Oct. Report No.: HRD-80-5.

Theses and dissertations

Theses including Ph.D. dissertations, Master's theses or Bachelor theses follow the basic format outlined below.

Doctoral dissertation
1. Starkenberg LI. Health science student’s knowledge of oral health and preventive practices [Doctoral dissertation]. [Long Beach, CA]: California State University, Long Beach; 2015.

News paper articles

Unlike scholarly journals, news papers do not usually have a volume and issue number. Instead, the full date and page number is required for a correct reference.

New York Times article
1. Angelos J. The French Defection. New York Times. 2017 Jan 24;MM44.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by sequential numbers in square brackets:

This sentence cites one reference [1].
This sentence cites two references [1,2].
This sentence cites four references [1–4].

About the journal

Full journal titleGigaScience
AbbreviationGigascience
ISSN (online)2047-217X
Scope

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