How to format your references using the Frontiers in Cancer Molecular Targets and Therapeutics citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Frontiers in Cancer Molecular Targets and Therapeutics. 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

Marx, V. (2012). Epigenetics: Reading the second genomic code. Nature 491, 143–147.

A journal article with 2 authors

Lucadamo, G., and Medlin, D. L. (2003). Geometric origin of hexagonal close packing at a grain boundary in gold. Science 300, 1272–1275.

A journal article with 3 authors

Hanna, J. B., Schmitt, D., and Griffin, T. M. (2008). The energetic cost of climbing in primates. Science 320, 898.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

Floyd, J. S., Tolstoy, M., Mutter, J. C., and Scholz, C. H. (2002). Seismotectonics of mid-ocean ridge propagation in Hess Deep. Science 298, 1765–1768.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Hood, D., and Trojer, E. (2012). Gigabit-Capable Passive Optical Networks. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

An edited book

Bundi, U. ed. (2010). Alpine Waters. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer.

A chapter in an edited book

Dawson, D. A., and Greven, A. (2014). “A Basic Tool: Dual Representations,” in Spatial Fleming-Viot Models with Selection and Mutation Lecture Notes in Mathematics., ed. A. Greven (Cham: Springer International Publishing), 105–145.

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 Frontiers in Cancer Molecular Targets and Therapeutics.

Blog post

Hamilton, K. (2015). Hypnotic Time-Lapse Videos Showcase The Seldom Seen Movements of Nature. IFLScience. Available at: https://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/hypnotic-timelapse-videos-nature/ [Accessed October 30, 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 (2005). Aviation Security: Better Planning Needed to Optimize Deployment of Checked Baggage Screening Systems. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

Narayanan, B. C. (2008). Structure function diversity within the phosphoenolpyruvate mutase/isocitrate lyase superfamily as revealed by the enzymes oxaloacetate decarboxylase and 2,3-dimethylmalate lyase.

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

Schwirtz, M., and Turkewitz, J. (2014). Charred Body of Kidnapped Man Is Found on Long Island. New York Times, A4.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Marx, 2012).
This sentence cites two references (Lucadamo and Medlin, 2003; Marx, 2012).

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

Two authors: (Lucadamo and Medlin, 2003)
Three or more authors: (Floyd et al., 2002)

About the journal

Full journal title	Frontiers in Cancer Molecular Targets and Therapeutics
Abbreviation	Front. Oncol.
ISSN (online)	2234-943X
Scope	Cancer Research Oncology