How to format your references using the Frontiers in Crop Science and Horticulture citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Frontiers in Crop Science and Horticulture. 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
Gomory, R. (2010). Benoît Mandelbrot (1924-2010). Nature 468, 378.
A journal article with 2 authors
Nash, J. D., and Moum, J. N. (2005). River plumes as a source of large-amplitude internal waves in the coastal ocean. Nature 437, 400–403.
A journal article with 3 authors
Maier, T., Jenni, S., and Ban, N. (2006). Architecture of mammalian fatty acid synthase at 4.5 A resolution. Science 311, 1258–1262.
A journal article with 7 or more authors
Li, W. K. W., McLaughlin, F. A., Lovejoy, C., and Carmack, E. C. (2009). Smallest algae thrive as the Arctic Ocean freshens. Science 326, 539.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book
Hitz, B., Ewing, J. J., and Hecht, J. (2005). Introduction to Laser Technology. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
An edited book
Makin, H. L. J., and Gower, D. B. eds. (2010). Steroid Analysis. Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands.
A chapter in an edited book
Tarantino, U., and Resmini, G. (2011). “Diagnosi,” in La gestione delle fratture da fragilità ossea: Raccomandazioni per chirurghi ortopedici, ed. G. Resmini (Milano: Springer), 9–17.

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 Crop Science and Horticulture.

Blog post
Hale, T. (2016). Fossil Proteins 3.8 Million Years Old Found On Ancient Ostrich Eggshells. 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 (1974). The Cost Of Aerospace Ground Equipment Could Be Reduced. 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
Wetherington, J. M. (2010). The relationship between learning organization dimensions and performance in the nonprofit sector.

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
McKINLEY, J. C., Jr (2017). Witness Lays Out Events Ending in Brazen Killing. New York Times, A20.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Gomory, 2010).
This sentence cites two references (Nash and Moum, 2005; Gomory, 2010).

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

  • Two authors: (Nash and Moum, 2005)
  • Three or more authors: (Li et al., 2009)

About the journal

Full journal titleFrontiers in Crop Science and Horticulture
AbbreviationFront. Plant Sci.
ISSN (online)1664-462X
ScopePlant Science

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