When writing scientific papers, it is inevitable to cite the findings of previous people, especially in the preface and discussion. So how do you write the author's name when referring to other people's research ? In fact, the rules are very simple, usually only need to write the last name of the first author (last name) . For example, the following example sentence:
Hiemer et al. (2015) observed that the transcriptional regulator YAP abnormally accumulated in the nucleus in pre-malignant oral tissues .
Most articles have multiple authors, so add et al. After the first author ’s surname, which means that other authors ’names are not listed. Here "et al." Can be written in italics or without punctuation, so there are four ways to write: "et al." "Et al" "et al." "Et al". Which method to choose depends on whether the target journal you are preparing for submission has any regulations in this regard. If there is, write according to the requirements of the journal; if not, you can choose one. It should be noted that the article should be consistent before and after. The whole article can only be written in one way, not in the middle. Also be careful not to use et to replace et al. Etc is generally used to list things, et al is used to represent the author.
Of course, if there is only one author, et al is not needed. If the article you cite has two authors, it is generally accepted that both authors ’last names should be written: Smith and Zhang (2008) reported… When there are three or more authors, unless the journal lists several There are special rules, only need to write the first author + et al.
It can also be seen from the example sentence above that if you mention the author's name when citing a document, you must also add the year of publication, regardless of the format of the document.
One error that Chinese authors are prone to in this regard is to use the full name, especially when referring to the name of the Chinese author. This method may be generally accepted when writing papers in Chinese, but remember that only the last name is enough when writing in English.
Another common mistake is the confusion of surname and first name , which may be caused by the first name in English, the last name in the back, contrary to Chinese habits. For example, John Smith , John is the first name, Smith is the last name. But sometimes it is written as "Smith, John" with a comma in the middle, that is, the surname in front and the first name in the back . When reviewing the literature, if you see the full text of the document and the author's name is completely displayed, then the first name is usually the last name; if you retrieve the abstract in a database, such as Pubmed, it is usually The surname is spelled out completely, and the name has only abbreviations (Smith J).
In fact, citations do not necessarily mention the author's name. If the author's name is added to each sentence, it will affect the fluency of the article. It is more recommended to use less or not as much as possible, which saves the number of words and does not have to worry about writing the author ’s name incorrectly. As long as you cite the document correctly, the author's name does not have to appear in the paper.
(This article is reproduced from LetPub Chinese official website: www.letpub.com.cn/index.php?page=sci_writing_32)
