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

Frierson, D. M. W. (2012). Atmospheric science. Frictional dissipation--blame it on the rain. Science 335, 925–926.

A journal article with 2 authors

Nacher, J. C., and Akutsu, T. (2013). Structural controllability of unidirectional bipartite networks. Sci. Rep. 3, 1647.

A journal article with 3 authors

Heimpel, M., Aurnou, J., and Wicht, J. (2005). Simulation of equatorial and high-latitude jets on Jupiter in a deep convection model. Nature 438, 193–196.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

He, J.-X., Gendron, J. M., Sun, Y., Gampala, S. S. L., Gendron, N., Sun, C. Q., et al. (2005). BZR1 is a transcriptional repressor with dual roles in brassinosteroid homeostasis and growth responses. Science 307, 1634–1638.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Kassapoglou, C. (2013). Design and Analysis of Composite Structures. Oxford, UK: John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

An edited book

Jorgensen, P. (2016). Extensions of Positive Definite Functions: Applications and Their Harmonic Analysis. , eds. S. Pedersen and F. Tian Cham: Springer International Publishing.

A chapter in an edited book

Akoumianakis, D., and Mavraki, D. (2016). “Using Conversational Knowledge Management as a Lens for Virtual Collaboration in the Course of Small Group Activities,” in Intelligent Computing Systems: Emerging Application Areas Studies in Computational Intelligence., eds. G. A. Tsihrintzis, M. Virvou, and L. C. Jain (Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer), 115–131.

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

Luntz, S. (2016). Contraceptive Pill Could Help Recovery From Flu. IFLScience. Available at: https://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/contraceptive-pill-could-help-recovery-from-flu/ [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 (1989). Computer Procurement: FAA’s $1.5-Billion Computer Resources Nucleus Project. 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

Nash, M. C. (2017). Reading Achievement: A Study of Perceptions of First-Grade Teachers and the Relationship Between Attendance and Reading Achievement.

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

Crow, K. (2000). As if Poe Had Written Their Tale, Tenants’ Windows Are Bricked Up. New York Times, 147.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Frierson, 2012).
This sentence cites two references (Frierson, 2012; Nacher and Akutsu, 2013).

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

Two authors: (Nacher and Akutsu, 2013)
Three or more authors: (He et al., 2005)

About the journal

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

Research and Writing Guides