How to format your references using the Current Opinion in Biotechnology citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Current Opinion in Biotechnology. 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

Al-Gazali L: Genome-sequencing anniversary. Human genome sequencing: celebrating 10 years. Science 2011, 331:873.

A journal article with 2 authors

Brockmann D, Helbing D: The hidden geometry of complex, network-driven contagion phenomena. Science 2013, 342:1337–1342.

A journal article with 3 authors

Walker J, Cliff RA, Latham AG: U-Pb isotopic age of the StW 573 hominid from Sterkfontein, South Africa. Science 2006, 314:1592–1594.

A journal article with 11 or more authors

Jaworski T, Dewachter I, Lechat B, Gees M, Kremer A, Demedts D, Borghgraef P, Devijver H, Kügler S, Patel S, et al.: GSK-3α/β kinases and amyloid production in vivo. Nature 2011, 480:E4-5; discussion E6.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Cheremisinoff NP, Davletshin A: A Guide to Safe Material and Chemical Handling. John Wiley & Sons, Inc.; 2010.

An edited book

vom Brocke J, Rosemann M (Eds): Handbook on Business Process Management 2: Strategic Alignment, Governance, People and Culture. Springer; 2010.

A chapter in an edited book

Bronfman R: ENVIRONMENTAL SECURITY AND ENVIRONMENTAL REGULATIONS IN ISRAEL. In Environmental Security in Harbors and Coastal Areas: Management Using Comparative Risk Assessment and Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis. Edited by Linkov I, Kiker GA, Wenning RJ. Springer Netherlands; 2007:81–84.

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 Current Opinion in Biotechnology.

Blog post

Andrew E: Hardest Synthetic Diamond Yet Created. IFLScience 2014,

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

Government Accountability Office: Commuter Rail: Information and Guidance Could Help Facilitate Commuter and Freight Rail Access Negotiations. U.S. Government Printing Office; 2004.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

Katavic I: Corporate social responsibility and sustainable competitive advantage: A case study of the cement industry. 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

Reinhart MK: Kathryn Bertine and George Varhola Jr. New York Times 2010,

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	Current Opinion in Biotechnology
Abbreviation	Curr. Opin. Biotechnol.
ISSN (print)	0958-1669
ISSN (online)	1879-0429
Scope	Biotechnology Bioengineering Biomedical Engineering