How to format your references using the Diagnostics citation style

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

Macilwain, C. Science Should Be Ready to Jump off “the Cliff.” Nature 2012, 491, 639.

A journal article with 2 authors

Kane, C.L.; Mele, E.J. Physics. A New Spin on the Insulating State. Science 2006, 314, 1692–1693.

A journal article with 3 authors

Wilkinson, J.J.; Simmons, S.F.; Stoffell, B. How Metalliferous Brines Line Mexican Epithermal Veins with Silver. Sci. Rep. 2013, 3, 2057.

A journal article with 4 or more authors

Burke, K.A.; Franz, T.M.; Miller, D.N.; Schoenbaum, G. The Role of the Orbitofrontal Cortex in the Pursuit of Happiness and More Specific Rewards. Nature 2008, 454, 340–344.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Silvia, J.E. Dynamic Economic Decision Making; John Wiley & Sons, Inc.: Hoboken, NJ, 2011; ISBN 9781118273197.

An edited book

Letfullin, R.R. Computational Nanomedicine and Nanotechnology: Lectures with Computer Practicums; George, T.F., Ed.; Springer International Publishing: Cham, 2016; ISBN 9783319435756.

A chapter in an edited book

Seybold, J.; Kessler, U.; Fritz, K.-P.; Kück, H. Precision Micro Assembly of Optical Components on MID and PCB. In Precision Assembly Technologies and Systems: 7th IFIP WG 5.5 International Precision Assembly Seminar, IPAS 2014, Chamonix, France, February 16-18, 2014, Revised Selected Papers; Ratchev, S., Ed.; IFIP Advances in Information and Communication Technology; Springer: Berlin, Heidelberg, 2014; pp. 30–36 ISBN 9783662455852.

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 Diagnostics.

Blog post

Andrew, D. ‘Canary Species’ Can Sing Songs That Warn Of Ecosystem Collapse Available online: https://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/canary-species-can-sing-songs-that-warn-of-ecosystem-collapse/ (accessed on 30 October 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 Surface Transportation: Department of Transportation Should Measure the Overall Performance and Outcomes of the TIGER Discretionary Grant Program; U.S. Government Printing Office: Washington, DC, 2014;

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

Nespoli, G. Impact of Supervisor Support on Employee Job Satisfaction Among Fundraising Staff Within Higher Education. Doctoral dissertation, Pepperdine University: Malibu, CA, 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

Kenigsberg, B. Film Series. New York Times 2017, C23.

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	Diagnostics
Abbreviation	Diagnostics (Basel)
ISSN (online)	2075-4418
Scope