How to format your references using the Journal of Cardiothoracic Surgery citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Journal of Cardiothoracic Surgery. 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	Find the style here: output styles overview
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. Reynolds CR. The evolution of sensibility. Nature. 2005;434:316–9.

A journal article with 2 authors

1. Helffrich GR, Wood BJ. The Earth’s mantle. Nature. 2001;412:501–7.

A journal article with 3 authors

1. Jedema FJ, Filip AT, Van Wees BJ. Spintronics (Communication arising): Spin accumulation in mesoscopic systems. Nature. 2002;416:810.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

1. Yamaguchi N, Oyama M, Kozuka-Hata H, Inoue J-I. Involvement of A20 in the molecular switch that activates the non-canonical NF-кB pathway. Sci Rep. 2013;3:2568.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

1. Smirnov BM. Fundamentals of Ionized Gases. Weinheim, Germany: Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA; 2011.

An edited book

1. Curaj A, Scott P, Vlasceanu L, Wilson L, editors. European Higher Education at the Crossroads: Between the Bologna Process and National Reforms. Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands; 2012.

A chapter in an edited book

1. Duarte E. Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave.” In: Duarte EM, editor. Being and Learning: A Poetic Phenomenology of Education. Rotterdam: SensePublishers; 2012. p. 69–106.

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 Journal of Cardiothoracic Surgery.

Blog post

1. O`Callaghan J. Could Life Survive In The TRAPPIST-1 System? [Internet]. IFLScience. IFLScience; 2017 [cited 2018 Oct 30]. https://www.iflscience.com/space/could-life-survive-in-the-trappist1-system/. 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. Longer Combination Trucks: Driver Controls and Equipment Inspection Should Be Improved. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 1993 Nov. Report No.: RCED-94-21.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

1. Pierce ZD. The relationship between nursing instructors’ transformational leadership behaviors in the clinical learning environment and associate degree nursing students’ communication apprehension [Doctoral dissertation]. [Minneapolis, MN]: Capella University; 2016.

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. Howe SH. Mandan Territory, U.S.A. New York Times. 1904 Aug 6;PART TWO SATURDAY REVIEW OF BOOKSBR534.

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	Journal of Cardiothoracic Surgery
Abbreviation	J. Cardiothorac. Surg.
ISSN (online)	1749-8090
Scope	General Medicine Cardiology and Cardiovascular Medicine Surgery