How to format your references using the Genetics citation style

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

Smaglik P. 2002. Corridor at the crossroads: Michigan. Nature. 420(6913):4–5

A journal article with 2 authors

Ollerton J, Coulthard E. 2009. Paleontology. Evolution of animal pollination. Science. 326(5954):808–809

A journal article with 3 authors

Sansom RS, Gabbott SE, Purnell MA. 2010. Non-random decay of chordate characters causes bias in fossil interpretation. Nature. 463(7282):797–800

A journal article with 11 or more authors

Chao W et al. 2002. CTCF, a candidate trans-acting factor for X-inactivation choice. Science. 295(5553):345–347

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Abdul-Rahman Y. 2014. The Art of RF (Riba-Free) Islamic Banking and Finance. John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

An edited book

Zheng K, Li M, Jiang H, editors. 2013. Mobile and Ubiquitous Systems: Computing, Networking, and Services: 9th International Conference, MobiQuitous 2012, Beijing, China, December 12-14, 2012. Revised Selected Papers. Vol 120 Springer. (Lecture Notes of the Institute for Computer Sciences, Social Informatics and Telecommunications Engineering).

A chapter in an edited book

Nagoshi JL, Nagoshi CT, Brzuzy S. 2014. The Qualitative Approach to Socially Constructed Identities. In: Nagoshi CT, Brzuzy S, editors. Gender and Sexual Identity: Transcending Feminist and Queer Theory. Springer; p 55–72

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 Genetics.

Blog post

Andrew E. 2014. IFLScience; [accessed 2018 Oct 30]. https://www.iflscience.com/space/curiosity-catches-whiff-methane-mars-and-possibility-past-life/

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. 1986. Biotechnology: Analysis of Federally Funded Research. U.S. Government Printing Office. Report No.: RCED-86-187.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

Witvorapong N. 2011. The Dynamics of Living Arrangements Among the Elderly [Doctoral dissertation]. University of North Carolina.

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

Stewart JB. 2016. For Now, Investors Go Back to Buying. New York Times. B1

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by name and year in parentheses:

This sentence cites one reference (Smaglik 2002).
This sentence cites two references (Smaglik 2002; Ollerton and Coulthard 2009).

Here are examples of in-text citations with multiple authors:

Two authors: (Ollerton and Coulthard 2009)
Three or more authors: (Chao et al. 2002)

About the journal

Full journal title	Genetics
Abbreviation	Genetics
ISSN (print)	0016-6731
ISSN (online)	1943-2631
Scope	Genetics