How to format your references using the The Surgeon citation style

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

Muindi F. Tell the negative committee to shut up. Science. 2014 Jul 18;345(6194):350.

A journal article with 2 authors

Campbell IH, O’Neill HSC. Evidence against a chondritic Earth. Nature. 2012 Mar 28;483(7391):553–8.

A journal article with 3 authors

Marshall CH, Pielke RA Sr, Steyaert LT. Wetlands: crop freezes and land-use change in Florida. Nature. 2003 Nov 6;426(6962):29–30.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

Fuller DQ, Qin L, Zheng Y, Zhao Z, Chen X, Hosoya LA, et al. The domestication process and domestication rate in rice: spikelet bases from the Lower Yangtze. Science. 2009 Mar 20;323(5921):1607–10.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Etheridge D. Excel® Data Analysis. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.; 2010.

An edited book

Sibilia C, Benson TM, Marciniak M, Szoplik T, editors. Photonic Crystals: Physics and Technology. Milano: Springer; 2008. X, 284 p.

A chapter in an edited book

Kallenbach E, Schinköthe W, Furchert HJ. Drives with Limited Motion. In: Kallenbach E, Stölting HD, Amrhein W, editors. Handbook of Fractional-Horsepower Drives. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer; 2008. p. 205–316.

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 The Surgeon.

Blog post

Fang J. Male Worm Brains are Wired to Choose Sex Over Food [Internet]. IFLScience. IFLScience; 2014 [cited 2018 Oct 30]. Available from: https://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/male-worm-brains-are-wired-choose-sex-over-food/

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. Federal Vehicle Collisions and Aftermarket Collision Avoidance Technologies. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 2014 Apr. Report No.: GAO-14-408R.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

Butts P. Green Roof Vegetable Production in Three Different Growth Media [Doctoral dissertation]. [Edwardsville, IL]: Southern Illinois University; 2017.

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

Kelly D. Fear and Loathing in San Juan. New York Times. 1998 Nov 29;710.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by sequential numbers in superscript:

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	The Surgeon
Abbreviation	Surgeon
ISSN (print)	1479-666X
Scope	Surgery

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