How to format your references using the Rice citation style

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

PaperpileThe citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNoteFind the style here: output styles overview
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and othersThe style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most references management programs.
BibTeXBibTeX 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
McMullen K (2005) Experimental physics, experimental art. Nature 434:310–311
A journal article with 2 authors
Hoehler TM, Alperin MJ (2014) Biogeochemistry: Methane minimalism. Nature 507:436–437
A journal article with 3 authors
Bhalla US, Ram PT, Iyengar R (2002) MAP kinase phosphatase as a locus of flexibility in a mitogen-activated protein kinase signaling network. Science 297:1018–1023
A journal article with 5 or more authors
Jensen T, van de Bildt M, Dietz HH, et al (2002) Another phocine distemper outbreak in Europe. Science 297:209

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book
Bonneau D, Fatu A, Souchet D (2014) Thermo-Hydrodynamic Lubrication in Hydrodynamic Bearings. John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, NJ
An edited book
Brooks AJ, Clasper J, Midwinter M, et al (eds) (2011) Ryan’s Ballistic Trauma: A Practical Guide. Springer, London
A chapter in an edited book
Giorgi E (2013) 1995. In: Betti R, Guerraggio A, Termini S (eds) Storie e protagonisti della matematica italiana: per raccontare 20 anni di «Lettera Matematica Pristem». Springer, Milano, pp 65–78

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 Rice.

Blog post
Hale T (2016) Archaeologists Dig Up Britain’s Oldest Handwritten Document In Central London. In: IFLScience. https://www.iflscience.com/editors-blog/archaeologists-dig-britains-oldest-handwritten-document-central-london/. 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
Government Accountability Office (2016) Hazardous Materials Rail Shipments: A Review of Emergency Response Information in Selected Train Documents. U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation
Carrier TH (2017) Using Grunig’s Situational Theory for Analysis of Frames in Human Trafficking Awareness Organizations’ YouTube Videos. Doctoral dissertation, University of Louisiana

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
Kepner T (2017) A World Series Twist: First Loves Become the Enemy. New York Times D2

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by name and year in parentheses:

This sentence cites one reference (McMullen 2005).
This sentence cites two references (McMullen 2005; Hoehler and Alperin 2014).

Here are examples of in-text citations with multiple authors:

  • Two authors: (Hoehler and Alperin 2014)
  • Three or more authors: (Jensen et al. 2002)

About the journal

Full journal titleRice
AbbreviationRice (N. Y.)
ISSN (print)1939-8425
ISSN (online)1939-8433
ScopeAgronomy and Crop Science
Plant Science
Soil Science

Other styles