How to format your references using the BMC Sports Science, Medicine and Rehabilitation citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for BMC Sports Science, Medicine and Rehabilitation. 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 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. Macklis RM. Portrait of Science. Scientist, technologist, proto-feminist, superstar. Science. 2002;295:1647–8.

A journal article with 2 authors

1. Head JJ, Polly PD. Evolution of the snake body form reveals homoplasy in amniote Hox gene function. Nature. 2015;520:86–9.

A journal article with 3 authors

1. Buehler MJ, Abraham FF, Gao H. Hyperelasticity governs dynamic fracture at a critical length scale. Nature. 2003;426:141–6.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

1. Meier MF, Dyurgerov MB, Rick UK, O’neel S, Pfeffer WT, Anderson RS, et al. Glaciers dominate eustatic sea-level rise in the 21st century. Science. 2007;317:1064–7.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

1. Russell DL. Practical Wastewater Treatment. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.; 2006.

An edited book

1. Ranganathan N, Sivaciyan V, Saksena FB, editors. The Art and Science of Cardiac Physical Examination: With Heart Sounds and Pulse Wave Forms on CD. Totowa, NJ: Humana Press; 2007.

A chapter in an edited book

1. Yadav A, Chan H, Jiang A, Rice E, Kamar E, Grosz B, et al. POMDPs for Assisting Homeless Shelters – Computational and Deployment Challenges. In: Osman N, Sierra C, editors. Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems: AAMAS 2016 Workshops, Visionary Papers, Singapore, Singapore, May 9-10, 2016, Revised Selected Papers. Cham: Springer International Publishing; 2016. p. 67–87.

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 Sports Science, Medicine and Rehabilitation.

Blog post

1. Andrew E. New Synthetic Platelets Capable Of Rapidly Stopping Bleeding. IFLScience. 2014. https://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/new-synthetic-platelets-capable-rapidly-stopping-bleeding/. 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. Information Technology: Demand for the Social Security Administration’s Electronic Data Exchanges Is Growing and Presents Future Challenges. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 2008.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

1. Selph CS. Origins of Music Programs in Liberal Arts Institutions: The Story of Three Florida Catholic Universities. Doctoral dissertation. University of South Florida; 2015.

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. Kelly M. THE 1992 CAMPAIGN: Undeclared Candidate; Perot Stresses Homey Image, But the Image Is No Accident. New York Times. 1992;:A1.

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 Sports Science, Medicine and Rehabilitation
Abbreviation	BMC Sports Sci. Med. Rehabil.
ISSN (online)	2052-1847
Scope	Orthopedics and Sports Medicine Rehabilitation Physical Therapy, Sports Therapy and Rehabilitation