How to format your references using the BMC Infectious Diseases citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for BMC Infectious Diseases. 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 references management programs.
BibTeX	BibTeX syles 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. Hatfull GF. Microbiology. A tail of two specifi-cities. Science. 2002;295:2031–2.

A journal article with 2 authors

1. Meacham CE, Morrison SJ. Tumour heterogeneity and cancer cell plasticity. Nature. 2013;501:328–37.

A journal article with 3 authors

1. McQuibban GA, Saurya S, Freeman M. Mitochondrial membrane remodelling regulated by a conserved rhomboid protease. Nature. 2003;423:537–41.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

1. Kleiven HKF, Kissel C, Laj C, Ninnemann US, Richter TO, Cortijo E. Reduced North Atlantic deep water coeval with the glacial Lake Agassiz freshwater outburst. Science. 2008;319:60–4.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

1. Meier HB, Marthinsen JE, Gantenbein PA. Swiss Finance. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.; 2012.

An edited book

1. Goemans M, Correa J, editors. Integer Programming and Combinatorial Optimization: 16th International Conference, IPCO 2013, Valparaíso, Chile, March 18-20, 2013. Proceedings. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer; 2013.

A chapter in an edited book

1. Kaya Y, Jocic S, Miladinovic D. Sunflower. In: Gupta SK, editor. Technological Innovations in Major World Oil Crops, Volume 1: Breeding. New York, NY: Springer; 2012. p. 85–129.

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 Infectious Diseases.

Blog post

1. Davis J. Growing Up With A Dog Could Lower Risk Of Developing Asthma. IFLScience. 2015. https://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/growing-dog-child-could-lower-their-risk-developing-asthma/. 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. Screening Partnership Program: TSA Should Issue More Guidance to Airports and Monitor Private versus Federal Screener Performance. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 2012.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

1. Robey AM. The Benefits of Testing: Individual Differences Based on Student Factors. Doctoral dissertation. University of Maryland, College Park; 2017.

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. Hodara S. Scenic Lakes and, Soon, a Town Center. New York Times. 2017;:RE7.

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 Infectious Diseases
Abbreviation	BMC Infect. Dis.
ISSN (online)	1471-2334
Scope	Infectious Diseases

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