How to format your references using the Frontiers in Microbial Physiology and Metabolism citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Frontiers in Microbial Physiology and Metabolism. 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 reference managers.
BibTeX	BibTeX styles 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

Abbott, A. (2000). Art imitating high-energy physics. Nature 404, 219.

A journal article with 2 authors

Pascual, A., and Préat, T. (2001). Localization of long-term memory within the Drosophila mushroom body. Science 294, 1115–1117.

A journal article with 3 authors

Pearson, D. G., Parman, S. W., and Nowell, G. M. (2007). A link between large mantle melting events and continent growth seen in osmium isotopes. Nature 449, 202–205.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

Sugiura, R., Kita, A., Shimizu, Y., Shuntoh, H., Sio, S. O., and Kuno, T. (2003). Feedback regulation of MAPK signalling by an RNA-binding protein. Nature 424, 961–965.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

New, T. R. (2012). Hymenoptera and Conservation. Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

An edited book

Rousseau, C. (2009). Mathématiques et Technologie., ed. Y. Saint-Aubin. New York, NY: Springer.

A chapter in an edited book

Singh, Z. N., and Gulley, M. L. (2012). “Myelodysplasia and Myeloid Proliferations,” in Pediatric Neoplasia: Advances in Molecular Pathology and Translational Medicine, ed. A. C. Mackinnon Jr (Totowa, NJ: Humana Press), 75–100.

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 Microbial Physiology and Metabolism.

Blog post

Hale, T. (2016). 11 Science Facts That Will Make You Feel Uneasy. 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 (2010). Integration of Current Implementation Efforts with Long-term Planning for the Next Generation Air Transportation System. 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

Watson, K. F. (2014). Persons and how we trace them: What Johnston got wrong. Long Beach, CA: California State University, Long Beach.

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

Vecsey, G. (2010). Super Bowl Champion Jets Ignited A Sporting Revival in the Big Town. New York Times, SP3.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Abbott, 2000).
This sentence cites two references (Abbott, 2000; Pascual and Préat, 2001).

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

Two authors: (Pascual and Préat, 2001)
Three or more authors: (Sugiura et al., 2003)

About the journal

Full journal title	Frontiers in Microbial Physiology and Metabolism
Abbreviation	Front. Microbiol.
ISSN (online)	1664-302X
Scope	Microbiology Microbiology (medical)