How to format your references using the OPSEARCH citation style

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

Dermitzakis, E.T.: Genome-sequencing anniversary. Genome literacy. Science. 331, 689–690 (2011)

A journal article with 2 authors

Kuncel, N.R., Hezlett, S.A.: Assessment. Standardized tests predict graduate students’ success. Science. 315, 1080–1081 (2007)

A journal article with 3 authors

Li, Y., Yi, M., Zou, X.: The linear interplay of intrinsic and extrinsic noises ensures a high accuracy of cell fate selection in budding yeast. Sci. Rep. 4, 5764 (2014)

A journal article with 4 or more authors

Li, J., Bursten, B.E., Liang, B., Andrews, L.: Noble gas-actinide compounds: complexation of the CUO molecule by Ar, Kr, and Xe atoms in noble gas matrices. Science. 295, 2242–2245 (2002)

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Hopkins, B.R.: Starting and Managing a Nonprofit Organization. John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, NJ (2009)

An edited book

Shibasaki, M., Iino, M., Osada, H. eds: Chembiomolecular Science: At the Frontier of Chemistry and Biology. Springer Japan, Tokyo (2013)

A chapter in an edited book

Nagashima, Y., Kunihiro, N.: Faster Algorithm for Solving Hard Knapsacks for Moderate Message Length. In: Susilo, W., Mu, Y., and Seberry, J. (eds.) Information Security and Privacy: 17th Australasian Conference, ACISP 2012, Wollongong, NSW, Australia, July 9-11, 2012. Proceedings. pp. 43–56. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg (2012)

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 OPSEARCH.

Blog post

Hamilton, K.: “Supermoon” Will Be Visible Tonight, https://www.iflscience.com/space/first-supermoon-year-weekend/

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: Measuring Performance: Strengths and Limitations of Research Indicators. U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC (1997)

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

Motala, S.: Siblings caring for elderly parents with dementia, (2009)

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

Koblin, J.: Early Emmy Leads For ‘S.N.L.’ and HBO, (2017)

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	OPSEARCH
Abbreviation	Opsearch
ISSN (print)	0030-3887
ISSN (online)	0975-0320
Scope	Management Information Systems Computer Science Applications Information Systems Management Science and Operations Research

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