How to format your references using the Forensic Science International: Genetics citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Forensic Science International: Genetics. 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]

P. Smaglik, Shareholder sues Celera over loss, Nature 405 (2000) 3.

A journal article with 2 authors

[1]

J. Hanrieder, A.G. Ewing, Spatial elucidation of spinal cord lipid- and metabolite- regulations in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, Sci. Rep. 4 (2014) 5266.

A journal article with 3 authors

[1]

B.Z. Foreman, P.L. Heller, M.T. Clementz, Fluvial response to abrupt global warming at the Palaeocene/Eocene boundary, Nature 491 (2012) 92–95.

A journal article with 4 or more authors

[1]

Z. Luo, Q. Zhang, Y. Oderaotoshi, D.P. Curran, Fluorous mixture synthesis: a fluorous-tagging strategy for the synthesis and separation of mixtures of organic compounds, Science 291 (2001) 1766–1769.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

[1]

C.M. Rittereiser, L.E. Kochard, Top Hedge Fund Investors, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, NJ, 2010.

An edited book

[1]

B. Duncan, Please God Send Me a Wreck: Responses to Shipwreck in a 19th Century Australian Community, Springer, New York, NY, 2015.

A chapter in an edited book

[1]

C. Hentschel, A. Czinki, Taming Complex Problems by Systematic Innovation, in: L. Chechurin (Ed.), Research and Practice on the Theory of Inventive Problem Solving (TRIZ): Linking Creativity, Engineering and Innovation, Springer International Publishing, Cham, 2016: pp. 77–93.

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 Forensic Science International: Genetics.

Blog post

[1]

S. Luntz, Greenland Shark Takes Record As Oldest Vertebrate By Living Up To 400 Years, IFLScience (2016). https://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/greenland-shark-takes-record-as-oldest-vertebrate-by-living-up-to-400-years/ (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

[1]

Government Accountability Office, Department of Transportation: Experts Identified Areas for Operational Improvements without Implementing Organizational Changes, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC, 2017.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

[1]

B.G. Kim, Mercury-containing species and carbon dioxide adsorption studies on inorganic compounds using density functional theory, Doctoral dissertation, University of Arizona, 2010.

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]

I.B. Jones, Article 8 -- No Title, New York Times (1903) The New York Times SATURDAY REVIEW OF BOOKS AND ARTBR10.

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	Forensic Science International: Genetics
Abbreviation	Forensic Sci. Int. Genet.
ISSN (print)	1872-4973
Scope	Genetics Pathology and Forensic Medicine