The preferred style for undergraduate students studying Physics is Harvard.

Please check with your lecturer or unit coordinator if you are unsure.

AIP referencing style is based on the AIP Style manual (American Institute of Physics, New York, 1990-1997).See particularly Part II, Preparing a scientific paper for publication.

AIP  referencing  is a numbered style with references numbered in the order of appearance in the article and listed in that order at the end of the article.

AIP style manual endorses the use of superscript to indicate citations within text, with numbers running sequentially throughout the article i.e. ¹,², ³.

" As valuable multifunctional materials, ferromagnetic shape memory alloys (FSMAs) have been investigated for several years. Following the discovery of magnetic-field induced strain in the Ni2MnGa alloy,¹ extensive research has been carried out with the focus on discovering new FSMAs."

J. Appl. Phys. 112, 083902 (2012); doi: 10.1063/1.4758180

In text Citation - General Rules

• Cite references in numerical order
• Numerals are to be placed after punctuation
  
• Refer to authors in text by Surname / Family only
  
• Use all authors names for a maximum of three authors. Where there are four or more authors use the first authors name and the expression "et al." ('et al'  is a Latin phrase meaning 'and others' ) eg. Smith et al.
  
• Place citation numbers where they will not be confused for a different meaning:

                     A recent measurement² of rv

                           not

                     A recent measurement of rv ²

Reference List - General Rules

• References in the Reference list are ordered as they appear in the paper
• The Reference list should start on a new page and should be a double-spaced numerical list
• All references in the list must appear in the paper
• Authors names are notated as they appear in their work
• The use of "et al" is not used in the Reference list, here all authors are to be listed.

NB. Individual AIP journals allow variation to the style of Referencing, including the use of square bracket numbering (instead of superscript) and the inclusion of article titles. See the advice to authors pages and sample manuscripts in individual journals for specific journal requirements.