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Citations

Council of Science Editors (CSE)

CSE stands for Council of Science Editors. In Biology, the most commonly used style is CSE. CSE uses three different formats: citation-sequence, citation-name, and name-year -- you will want to check with your professor to see which format they prefer.

  • Citation-sequence: Citations are included in a numbered list at the end of the paper, in the order in which they appear in the text. Within the text of your paper, use superscript numbers to refer to the corresponding citation in your citation list. 
  • Citation-name: Citations are included in a numbered list at the end of the paper in a numbered list, in alphabetical order by author last name. Within the text of your paper, use superscript numbers to refer to the corresponding citation in your list. 
  • Name-year: Citations are listed at the end of the paper in alphabetical order by author last name, but not numbered. Within the text of your paper, cite sources by using the author's last name followed by the year of publication in parentheses. For example: Jones (2005). 
You can review the below examples for basic information on how to cite in CSE, but we recommend consulting the complete manual for other specific types of citation formatting.

CSE Tips

CSE uses journal title abbreviations:

  • To find the abbreviation, go to the NLM Catalog.
  • Search for your journal title by name
  • Click on the record for your journal and copy/paste the ISO 4 abbreviation.

See below for examples:

BOOK: GENERAL FORMAT

Author AA, Author BB. Title. Edition. Place of publication: Publisher; date. Pages.

BOOK WITHOUT AN EDITOR

Le Couteur P, Burreson J. Napoleon’s buttons: how 17 molecules changed history. New York (NY): Putnam; 2003.

BOOK WITH AN EDITOR

Leeper FJ, Vederas JC, editors. Biosynthesis: polyketides and vitamins. New York (NY): Springer; 2000. 304 p.

CHAPTER FROM AN EDITED BOOK

Anderson RJ, Schrier RW. Acute renal failure. In: Braunwald E, Isselbacher KJ, Petersdorf RG, editors. Harrison’s principles of internal medicine. 15th ed. New York (NY): McGraw-Hill; 2001. p. 1149- 1155.

E-BOOK

Griffiths AJF, Miller JH. Introduction to genetic analysis. 7th ed. New York (NY): W.H. Freeman & Co; 2000 [accessed 2005 Aug 31]. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK21766/.

JOURNAL: GENERAL FORMAT

Author AA. Article title. Newspaper Title. Year Mo Date. URL.

SINGLE AUTHOR

Le Couteur P, Burreson J. Napoleon’s buttons: how 17 molecules changed history. New York (NY): Putnam; 2003. 

MULTIPLE AUTHORS

For 2-10 authors, list all names. For 10+ authors, list the first 10 followed by “et al.”

Smart N, Fang ZY, Marwick TH. A practical guide to exercise training for heart failure patients. J Card Fail. 2003;9(1):49-58.

JOURNAL ARTICLE FOUND ONLINE

Zepeda A, Texier AC, Gomez J. Benzene transformation in nitrifying batch cultures. Biotechnol Prog. 2003 [accessed 2007 May 23];35:789-793. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/ 10.1021/bp0201408/abstract. doi:10.1021/bp0201408.

WEBSITE: GENERAL FORMAT

Author AA, Author BB. Title of homepage/website. Place of publication: Publisher; Date of publication [dated updated; date accessed]. URL. 

WEBSITE WITHOUT AN AUTHOR

Public health response to biological and chemical weapons. Geneva (Switzerland): World Health Organization; 2004 [updated 2004 Aug 2; accessed 2005 May 31]. http://www.who.int/csr/delibepidemics/biochemguide/en.

 

CSE Helpful Guides and Resources:

Subjects: General Education