How to format your references using the Frontiers in Cellular Neuroscience citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Frontiers in Cellular Neuroscience. 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:

PaperpileThe citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNoteFind the style here: output styles overview
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and othersThe style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most references management programs.
BibTeXBibTeX 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
Bohannon, J. (2008). The Gonzo Scientist. Slaying monsters for science. Science 320, 1592.
A journal article with 2 authors
Foustoukos, D. I., and Seyfried, W. E., Jr (2004). Hydrocarbons in hydrothermal vent fluids: the role of chromium-bearing catalysts. Science 304, 1002–1005.
A journal article with 3 authors
Schätz, T., Schramm, U., and Habs, D. (2001). Crystalline ion beams. Nature 412, 717–720.
A journal article with 7 or more authors
Thibault, P., Dierolf, M., Menzel, A., Bunk, O., David, C., and Pfeiffer, F. (2008). High-resolution scanning x-ray diffraction microscopy. Science 321, 379–382.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book
Phillips, J. J., Brantley, W., and Phillips, P. P. (2011). Project Management ROI. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
An edited book
Melin, P., and Castillo, O. eds. (2013). Soft Computing Applications in Optimization, Control, and Recognition. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer.
A chapter in an edited book
Pezzella, A. M. (2016). “Intersubjectivity and Community in Edith Stein’s Thought,” in Edith Stein: Women, Social-Political Philosophy, Theology, Metaphysics and Public History: New Approaches and Applications Boston Studies in Philosophy, Religion and Public Life., ed. A. Calcagno (Cham: Springer International Publishing), 49–63.

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 Cellular Neuroscience.

Blog post
Andrews, R. (2017). The Earth’s Mantle Is Hotter Than Anyone Previously Thought. IFLScience.

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 (2004). Surface Transportation: Many Factors Affect Investment Decisions. 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
Muniyappa, V. K. (2012). Performance analysis of IPv4 versus IPv6 in a simple campus network.

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
Liptak, A., and Walsh, M. W. (2015). Top Court Will Decide Puerto Rico Debt Cases. New York Times, B3.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Bohannon, 2008).
This sentence cites two references (Foustoukos and Seyfried, 2004; Bohannon, 2008).

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

  • Two authors: (Foustoukos and Seyfried, 2004)
  • Three or more authors: (Thibault et al., 2008)

About the journal

Full journal titleFrontiers in Cellular Neuroscience
AbbreviationFront. Cell. Neurosci.
ISSN (online)1662-5102
ScopeCellular and Molecular Neuroscience

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