How to format your references using the Frontiers in Spinal Cord Medicine citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Frontiers in Spinal Cord Medicine. 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

Zeilinger, A. (2000). QUANTUM COMPUTING: Quantum Entangled Bits Step Closer to IT. Science 289, 405–406.

A journal article with 2 authors

Ngai, J. T., and Srivastava, D. S. (2006). Predators accelerate nutrient cycling in a bromeliad ecosystem. Science 314, 963.

A journal article with 3 authors

Wichterle, H., Gifford, D., and Mazzoni, E. (2013). Neuroscience. Mapping neuronal diversity one cell at a time. Science 341, 726–727.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

Kaláb, P., Pralle, A., Isacoff, E. Y., Heald, R., and Weis, K. (2006). Analysis of a RanGTP-regulated gradient in mitotic somatic cells. Nature 440, 697–701.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Callahan, K. R., Stetz, G. S., and Brooks, L. M. (2011). Project Management Accounting. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

An edited book

Bakker, C., and Montessori, N. M. eds. (2016). Complexity in Education: From Horror to Passion. Rotterdam: SensePublishers.

A chapter in an edited book

Anshakov, O. M., and Gergely, T. (2010). “Cognitive Reasoning Framework,” in Cognitive Reasoning: A Formal Approach, ed. O. M. Anshakov (Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer), 51–68.

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 Spinal Cord Medicine.

Blog post

O`Callaghan, J. (2017). Incredible New Image Shows Earth From Mars. 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 (2012). Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Education: Survey of Federal Programs (GAO-12-110SP, January 2012), an E-supplement to GAO-12-108. 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

Ferris, R. J. (2014). Numerical investigations of flow past a partially rotating stepped cylinder. 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

Tankersley, J. (2017). Federal Debt Is Not Reduced By Gains in Market. New York Times, B2.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Zeilinger, 2000).
This sentence cites two references (Zeilinger, 2000; Ngai and Srivastava, 2006).

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

Two authors: (Ngai and Srivastava, 2006)
Three or more authors: (Kaláb et al., 2006)

About the journal

Full journal title	Frontiers in Spinal Cord Medicine
Abbreviation	Front. Neurol.
ISSN (online)	1664-2295
Scope	Clinical Neurology Neurology