How to format your references using the Genome Biology and Evolution citation style

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

Laxminarayan R. 2014. Antibiotic effectiveness: balancing conservation against innovation. Science. 345:1299–1301.

A journal article with 2 authors

Tuomisto H, Ruokolainen K. 2012. Comment on ‘Disentangling the drivers of β diversity along latitudinal and elevational gradients’. Science. 335:1573; author reply 1573.

A journal article with 3 authors

Chen D-B, Xiao R, Zeng A. 2014. Predicting the evolution of spreading on complex networks. Sci. Rep. 4:6108.

A journal article with 6 or more authors

Meléndez A et al. 2003. Autophagy genes are essential for dauer development and life-span extension in C. elegans. Science. 301:1387–1391.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Girmscheid G. 2013. Bauprozesse und Bauverfahren des Tunnelbaus. Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA: Weinheim, Germany.

An edited book

Aspray W. 2014. Formal and Informal Approaches to Food Policy. Springer International Publishing: Cham.

A chapter in an edited book

Coppedè F. 2013. Advances in the Genetics of Human Tremor. In: Mechanisms and Emerging Therapies in Tremor Disorders. Grimaldi, G & Manto, M, editors. Springer: New York, NY pp. 53–78.

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 Genome Biology and Evolution.

Blog post

Andrew E. 2015. Human Head Transplants Could Become A Reality By 2017. IFLScience. https://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/human-head-transplants-could-become-reality-2017/ (Accessed October 30, 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

Government Accountability Office. 1989. Automated Systems: Legislative Branch Opportunity for Sharing Payroll/Personnel Systems. U.S. Government Printing Office: Washington, DC.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

Ward D. 2014. Teaching with the End in Mind: A Teacher’s Life History as a Legacy of Educational Leaders. Doctoral dissertation, University of South Florida: Tampa, FL.

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

Rothenberg B. 2016. Bouchard Is Out, but Her Concussion Suit From the 2015 Open Goes On. New York Times, August 31.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Laxminarayan 2014).
This sentence cites two references (Laxminarayan 2014; Tuomisto & Ruokolainen 2012).

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

Two authors: (Tuomisto & Ruokolainen 2012)
Three or more authors: (Meléndez et al. 2003)

About the journal

Full journal title	Genome Biology and Evolution
Abbreviation	Genome Biol. Evol.
ISSN (online)	1759-6653
Scope	Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics Genetics