How to format your references using the BMC Chemical Biology citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for BMC Chemical Biology. 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:

Paperpile	The citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNote	Download the output style file
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and others	The style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most reference managers.
BibTeX	BibTeX styles 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. Ellis GFR. Physics, complexity and causality. Nature. 2005;435:743.

A journal article with 2 authors

1. Niessing J, Friedrich RW. Olfactory pattern classification by discrete neuronal network states. Nature. 2010;465:47–52.

A journal article with 3 authors

1. Alford RA, Bradfield KS, Richards SJ. Ecology: global warming and amphibian losses. Nature. 2007;447:E3-4; discussion E5-6.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

1. Hermosura MC, Takeuchi H, Fleig A, Riley AM, Potter BV, Hirata M, et al. InsP4 facilitates store-operated calcium influx by inhibition of InsP3 5-phosphatase. Nature. 2000;408:735–40.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

1. Maidl B, Herrenknecht M, Maidl U, Wehrmeyer G. Maschineller Tunnelbau im Schildvortrieb. Weinheim, Germany: Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA; 2011.

An edited book

1. Rieves RA. Investor Relations for the Emerging Company. Second Edition. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan US; 2012.

A chapter in an edited book

1. Fossorier MPC, Mihaljević MJ, Imai H, Cui Y, Matsuura K. An Algorithm for Solving the LPN Problem and Its Application to Security Evaluation of the HB Protocols for RFID Authentication. In: Barua R, Lange T, editors. Progress in Cryptology - INDOCRYPT 2006: 7th International Conference on Cryptology in India, Kolkata, India, December 11-13, 2006. Proceedings. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer; 2006. p. 48–62.

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 BMC Chemical Biology.

Blog post

1. Davis J. Scientists Have Figured Out Why Your Eyes Move When You Sleep. IFLScience. 2015. https://www.iflscience.com/brain/rapid-eye-movements-during-sleep-could-denote-change-scene/. Accessed 30 Oct 2018.

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. Space Situational Awareness: Status of Efforts and Planned Budgets. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 2015.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

1. Tucker TN. Virtual K-12 leadership: A postmodern paradigm. Doctoral dissertation. Florida Atlantic University; 2014.

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. Feeney K. Baked by Hand, With Heart. New York Times. 2009;:NJ8.

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 title	BMC Chemical Biology
ISSN (print)	1472-6769
Scope