How to format your references using the Frontiers in Public Health citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Frontiers in Public Health. 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

Dobson JE. Big Brother has evolved. Nature (2009) 458:968.

A journal article with 2 authors

Diaz RJ, Rosenberg R. Spreading dead zones and consequences for marine ecosystems. Science (2008) 321:926–929.

A journal article with 3 authors

Poulton SW, Fralick PW, Canfield DE. The transition to a sulphidic ocean approximately 1.84 billion years ago. Nature (2004) 431:173–177.

A journal article with 11 or more authors

Ostapcuk V, Mohn F, Carl SH, Basters A, Hess D, Iesmantavicius V, Lampersberger L, Flemr M, Pandey A, Thomä NH, et al. Activity-dependent neuroprotective protein recruits HP1 and CHD4 to control lineage-specifying genes. Nature (2018) 557:739–743.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Lam J. Enterprise Risk Management. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (2014).

An edited book

Gupta PK, Khare R eds. Laser Physics and Technology: Proceedings of the School on Laser Physics & Technology, Indore, India, March 12-30, 2012. New Delhi: Springer India. (2015). XIII, 345 p. 194 illus., 1 illus. in color p.

A chapter in an edited book

Magdaong ET, Yamano H, Fujii M. “Development of a Large-Scale, Long-Term Coral Cover and Disturbance Database in the Philippines.,” In: Nakano S-I, Yahara T, Nakashizuka T, editors. Integrative Observations and Assessments. Ecological Research Monographs. Tokyo: Springer Japan (2014). p. 83–109

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 Public Health.

Blog post

Luntz S. Stalagmites Help Scientists Trace Ancient Wildfires. IFLScience (2016) https://www.iflscience.com/physics/stalagmites-help-scientists-trace-ancient-wildfires/ [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. Tax Systems Modernization: Input Processing Strategy is Risky and Lacks a Sound Analytical Basis. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office. (1992).

Theses and dissertations

Theses including Ph.D. dissertations, Master's theses or Bachelor theses follow the basic format outlined below.

Doctoral dissertation

Guzman F. Terra Forming with You and Me. [Doctoral dissertation]. Long Beach, CA: California State University, Long Beach. (2013).

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

Brantley B. Awaiting Execution, a Prophet Holds Forth. New York Times (2016)C5.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by sequential numbers in parentheses:

This sentence cites one reference (1).
This sentence cites two references (1,2).
This sentence cites four references (1–4).

About the journal

Full journal title	Frontiers in Public Health
Abbreviation	Front. Public Health
ISSN (online)	2296-2565
Scope