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

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

Hyman, S. E. (2008). A glimmer of light for neuropsychiatric disorders. Nature 455, 890–893.

A journal article with 2 authors

Lyon, B. E., and Eadie, J. M. (2004). An obligate brood parasite trapped in the intraspecific arms race of its hosts. Nature 432, 390–393.

A journal article with 3 authors

Fontana, L., Partridge, L., and Longo, V. D. (2010). Extending healthy life span--from yeast to humans. Science 328, 321–326.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

Reith, F., Rogers, S. L., McPhail, D. C., and Webb, D. (2006). Biomineralization of gold: biofilms on bacterioform gold. Science 313, 233–236.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Allen, M. W. (2016). Michael Allen’s Guide to e-Learning. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

An edited book

Olsthoorn, X., and Wieczorek, A. J. eds. (2006). Understanding Industrial Transformation: Views from Different Disciplines. Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands.

A chapter in an edited book

Kahya, E. (2011). “The Impacts of NAO on the Hydrology of the Eastern Mediterranean,” in Hydrological, Socioeconomic and Ecological Impacts of the North Atlantic Oscillation in the Mediterranean Region, eds. S. M. Vicente-Serrano and R. M. Trigo (Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands), 57–71.

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 Genetics.

Blog post

O`Callaghan, J. (2017). Does Drinking Wine Seriously Engage Your Brain More Than A Math Problem? IFLScience. Available at: https://www.iflscience.com/brain/is-wine-tasting-really-more-engaging-than-solving-a-maths-problem/ (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 (1980). The Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975. 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

Poudel, S. R. (2017). Models and Algorithms to Solve a Reliable and Congested Biomass Supply Chain Network Designing Problem under Uncertainty. Mississippi State, MS: Mississippi State University.

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

Kepner, T. (2017). Cubs Seize Control as Bloop Cancels Out Blunder. New York Times, B12.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Hyman, 2008).
This sentence cites two references (Lyon and Eadie, 2004; Hyman, 2008).

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

Two authors: (Lyon and Eadie, 2004)
Three or more authors: (Reith et al., 2006)

About the journal

Full journal title	Frontiers in Genetics
Abbreviation	Front. Genet.
ISSN (online)	1664-8021
Scope	Genetics Molecular Medicine Genetics(clinical)