How to format your references using the Systems and Synthetic Biology citation style

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

Klasse PJ (2013) Structural biology. A new bundle of prospects for blocking HIV-1 entry. Science 341:1347–1348

A journal article with 2 authors

Pielke RA Sr, Chase TN (2004) Comment on “Contributions of anthropogenic and natural forcing to recent tropopause height changes.” Science 303:1771; author reply 1771

A journal article with 3 authors

Sakakura A, Ukai A, Ishihara K (2007) Enantioselective halocyclization of polyprenoids induced by nucleophilic phosphoramidites. Nature 445:900–903

A journal article with 5 or more authors

Behar DM, Yunusbayev B, Metspalu M, et al (2010) The genome-wide structure of the Jewish people. Nature 466:238–242

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Kivy P (2011) Once-Told Tales. Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford, UK

An edited book

Hoogeboom HJ, Păun G, Rozenberg G, Salomaa A (eds) (2006) Membrane Computing: 7th International Workshop, WMC 2006, Leiden, The Netherlands, July 17-21, 2006, Revised, Selected, and Invited Papers. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

A chapter in an edited book

Aguirre M, Baillion Y, Berruti B, Drinkwater M (2009) Operational Oceanography and the Sentinel-3 System. In: Olla P (ed) Space Technologies for the Benefit of Human Society and Earth. Springer Netherlands, Dordrecht, pp 75–98

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 Systems and Synthetic Biology.

Blog post

Andrew E (2014) Single Atom Detected With High-Powered MRI. In: IFLScience. 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 (2003) Joint Strike Fighter Acquisition: Managing Competing Pressures Is Critical to Achieving Program Goals. 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

BenVau L (2014) Effects of larval Nosema ceranae infection on adult honey bee (Apis mellifera) morphology and physiology. Doctoral dissertation, University of California San Diego

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

Grynbaum MM, Rogers K (2017) Army-McCarthy Hearings. Anita Hill. Comey Testimony. New York Times A17

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Klasse 2013).
This sentence cites two references (Pielke and Chase 2004; Klasse 2013).

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

Two authors: (Pielke and Chase 2004)
Three or more authors: (Behar et al. 2010)

About the journal

Full journal title	Systems and Synthetic Biology
Abbreviation	Syst. Synth. Biol.
ISSN (print)	1872-5325
ISSN (online)	1872-5333
Scope	Biotechnology Molecular Biology Bioengineering