How to format your references using the Microbial Cell Factories citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Microbial Cell Factories. 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 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. Marshall CR. ECOLOGY/PALEONTOLOGY. How stable are food webs during a mass extinction? Science. 2015;350:38–9.

A journal article with 2 authors

1. Arthur R, Diamond J. Geography. Understanding tribal fates. Science. 2011;334:911–2.

A journal article with 3 authors

1. Melcák I, Hoelz A, Blobel G. Structure of Nup58/45 suggests flexible nuclear pore diameter by intermolecular sliding. Science. 2007;315:1729–32.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

1. Tumlinson J, Thom C, Werk JK, Prochaska JX, Tripp TM, Weinberg DH, et al. The large, oxygen-rich halos of star-forming galaxies are a major reservoir of galactic metals. Science. 2011;334:948–52.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

1. Anthony B, Boudnik K, Adams C, Shao B, Lee C, Sasaki K. Professional Hadoop®. Indianapolis, IN, USA: John Wiley & Sons, Inc; 2016.

An edited book

1. Li H, editor. Radiology of HIV/AIDS: A Practical Approach. Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands; 2014.

A chapter in an edited book

1. Henzell RG, Jordan DR. Grain Sorghum. In: Carena MJ, editor. Cereals. New York, NY: Springer US; 2009. p. 183–97.

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 Microbial Cell Factories.

Blog post

1. Andrew D. Scientific Theories Aren’t Mere Conjecture – to Survive They Must Work. IFLScience. IFLScience; 2017.

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. Deactivating Research Vessels: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Use of Private Ships. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 1986 Jun. Report No.: RCED-86-133.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

1. Fertig BM. Stable nitrogen isotopes (delta-nitrogen-15) in the eastern oyster (Crassostrea virginica) as an indicator of nitrogen source [Doctoral dissertation]. [College Park, MD]: University of Maryland, College Park; 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. Nagourney A. ‘Everyone Has a Game Plan Until You Punch them in the Mouth.’ New York Times. 2014 Feb 26;MM20.

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	Microbial Cell Factories
Abbreviation	Microb. Cell Fact.
ISSN (online)	1475-2859
Scope	Biotechnology Bioengineering Applied Microbiology and Biotechnology