How to format your references using the Frontiers in Plant Genetics and Genomics citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Frontiers in Plant Genetics and Genomics. 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
Treutlein, P. (2012). Physics. A single spin feels the vibrations. Science 335, 1584–1585.
A journal article with 2 authors
Stelter, P., and Ulrich, H. D. (2003). Control of spontaneous and damage-induced mutagenesis by SUMO and ubiquitin conjugation. Nature 425, 188–191.
A journal article with 3 authors
Lai, C. S. W., Franke, T. F., and Gan, W.-B. (2012). Opposite effects of fear conditioning and extinction on dendritic spine remodelling. Nature 483, 87–91.
A journal article with 7 or more authors
Gallup, C. D., Cheng, H., Taylor, F. W., and Edwards, R. L. (2002). Direct determination of the timing of sea level change during termination II. Science 295, 310–313.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book
Davino, C., Furno, M., and Vistocco, D. (2014). Quantile Regression: Theory and Applications. Oxford: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
An edited book
Park, Y. I., and Lee, S. K. eds. (2006). New Perspectives on Aloe. Boston, MA: Springer US.
A chapter in an edited book
Cheli, F., and Diana, G. (2015). “Introduction to the Finite Element Method,” in Advanced Dynamics of Mechanical Systems, ed. G. Diana (Cham: Springer International Publishing), 311–412.

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 Plant Genetics and Genomics.

Blog post
Andrew, E. (2015). Battery Costs Drop Even Faster As Electric Car Sales Continue To Rise. IFLScience. Available at: https://www.iflscience.com/technology/battery-costs-drop-even-faster-electric-car-sales-continue-rise/ (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 (1987). Department of Transportation: Enhancing Policy and Program Effectiveness Through Improved Management. 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
Jackson, M. (2013). Creating community in a dual immersion program: A grant writing project. 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
Wagner, J. (2016). Yankees Trade McCann to the Astros. New York Times, B10.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Treutlein, 2012).
This sentence cites two references (Stelter and Ulrich, 2003; Treutlein, 2012).

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

  • Two authors: (Stelter and Ulrich, 2003)
  • Three or more authors: (Gallup et al., 2002)

About the journal

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

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