Cell referencing is an author/date style of referencing designed for the journal Cell. This tutorial details the Cell style of referencing based on the advice given by Cell Publications Information for Authors.
It is essential that you use a consistent style in your own work.
Referencing in the Cell style is a two-part process:
It is important to be consistent and accurate when citing references. The same set of rules should be followed every time you cite a reference.
In academic writing it is important to read around the subject to gather ideas, theories and facts about your assignment topic. It is not about making statements which are not backed up by evidence.
Referencing correctly is important for a number of reasons:
Referencing is also known as citing, the two words can be used interchangeably.
Each time you introduce an idea, thought, or theory in your work that belongs to another person, you should cite the author of the original work and the date of publication.
For multiple authors follow the table.
No. of Authors | In text citation | Example |
---|---|---|
One author or creator | Author Surname (Year) or (Author Surname, Year) |
Smith (1987) found that wide variations in temperature reduced egg viability. Wide fluctuations in temperature reduce egg viability (Smith, 1987). |
Two authors or creators | Author Surname and Author Surname (Year) or (Author Surname and Author Surname, Year) |
Johanssen and Rowe (1999) altered larval perceptions by introducing a light regime. Larval perceptions were altered by introducing a light regime (Johannsen and Rowe, 1999). |
Three or more authors or creators | First Author Surname et al. (Year) or (First Author Surname et al., Year) |
Kingsolver et al. (2001) concluded that more than 80% of estimates were morphological traits. It was found that more than 80% of estimates were morphological traits (Kingsolver et al., 2001). |
Smith (1987a), Smith (1987b)
The behaviour is generally considered to be a display of male quality (Fredenholm, 1978; Agassiz and Moore, 1980; Summers, 1991).
A quotation is where you use the exact phrase or words of the original author. Indicate quotations by typing quotation marks around the exact words, phrase or sentence followed by the author's surname, year of publication and the page number of the quote in brackets. A full reference should be given in your reference list at the end.
It is unusual for science students to quote significant amounts of materials directly. You should read the literature - making notes in your own words and recording the sources of information - and then write, in your own words, a synthesis of the material based on your understanding of the subject. Longer quotations should only be used to emphasise key points in their original context.
Short quotations, up to two lines in length, can be included in the body of the text:
Kingsolver et al. (2001, p.254) found that, "selection via survival tends to be weaker than selection via fecundity or mating success". Similar studies also suggest that...
Longer quotations should be indented in a separate paragraph:
"Linkage analysis can reveal the chromosomal location of the genes of interest by identifying polymorphic genetic markers of known location that are coinherited with the disease in families."
(Hall et al. 1990, p.1684)
Try not to over-rely on quotations as this may show a lack of understanding of the information. You should summarise the key points you wish to make in your assignment in your own words.
Secondary referencing is when one author is referring to the work of another author and the primary source is not available. Secondary referencing should be avoided if at all possible.
If you've only read the later publication you are accepting someone else's opinion and interpretation of the original author's intention. You cannot have formed your own view or critically appraised whether the second author has adequately presented the original material. You must make it clear to your reader which author you have read whilst giving the details of the original, e.g.:
(Jones, 1928 cited in Smith, 1987, p.239)
In the bibliography or reference list you need to give the full reference for both sources, the one you have read and the one you have read about, indicating which is which in the following manner, e.g.:
Jones, 1928. Cited in: Smith, A. J. (1987). The effect of temperature on egg development and survival in the damselfly Calopteryx virgo. Journal of Zoology 47, 231-243.
The reference list must list all of the sources you have cited in your assignment that have been published or are in press.
If you have referred to any unpublished data, submitted manuscripts, abstracts, or personal communications in your work, these should be cited within the text only and not included in your reference list.
If you are not citing specific information or a specific page from a website you do not need to create an in-text citation or reference for it. When mentioning a website within your text, provide the name of the website followed by the URL in parentheses, e.g.
The BLAT Search Genome (https://genome.ucsc.edu/cgi-bin/hgBlat) was used to find similar sequences...
Include up to ten authors for an item in the reference list. If there are more than ten, list the first ten authors followed by "et al".
For an edited book, place the editor's names in the author position and put ed. or eds. after the last editor's name.
The author may be a corporate body or organisation. Spell out the full name of a corporate author rather than using an acronym or abbreviation.
The reference list gives the full citations for those works cited briefly within your text. For journal articles and book chapters, you must provide the page numbers for the full page range.
All of the references must be listed in alphabetical order by author's surname, and then by date (most recent first) if there is more than one reference for the same author. If more than one item by the same author has been published during a specific year they should be listed by letter, e.g. (2013a, 2013b).
Whenever possible, details should be taken from the title page of a publication and not from the front cover, which may be different.
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
Attenborough (2009)...
...(Attenborough, 2009)
Presenter or Director's Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title [Format]. (Place of publication: Publisher/Distributor/Broadcaster).
Attenborough, D. (2009). Life [DVD]. (London: 2 Entertain Video).
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
Allison (2012)...
...(Allison, 2012)
Author Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title of publication, Edition or Series Statement (Place of publication: Publisher).
Allison, L.A. (2012). Fundamental molecular biology, 2nd edition (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley).
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
Rosenberg and Rosenberg (2012)...
...(Rosenberg and Rosenberg, 2012)
Author Surname, Initial(s)., and Author Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title of publication, Edition or Series Statement (Place of publication: Publisher).
Rosenberg, L.E., and Rosenberg, D.D. (2012). Human genes and genomes: science, health, society (Oxford: Academic Press).
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
Alberts et al. (2015)...
...(Alberts et al., 2015)
Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., and Author Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title of publication, Edition or Series Statement (Place of publication: Publisher).
Alberts, B., Johnson, A., Lewis, J., Morgan, D., Raff, M., Roberts, K., and Walter, P. (2015). Molecular biology of the cell, 6th edition (Abingdon: Garland Science).
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
Allendorf and Ryman (2002)...
...(Allendorf and Ryman, 2002)
Author(s) of chapter Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title of chapter. In Title of book, Edition, Editor’s Initial(s). Surname, ed(s). (Place of publication: Publisher), page numbers.
Allendorf, F.W. and Ryman, N. (2002). The role of genetics in population viability analysis. In Population viability analysis, S.R. Beissinger and D.R. McCullough, eds. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press), pp. 50-85.
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
Krebs and Davies (1997)...
...(Krebs and Davies, 1997)
Editor's Surname, Initial(s), and Editor's Surname, Initial(s), ed or eds. (Year). Title of publication, Edition or Series Statement (Place of publication: Publisher).
Krebs, J.R., and Davies, N.B., eds. (1997). Behavioural ecology: An evolutionary approach, 4th edition (Oxford: Blackwell Scientific).
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.
It’s important to acknowledge the source of code just like you would acknowledge the source of any work that is not your own. Referencing correctly will help to distinguish your work from others, give credit to the original author and allow anyone to identify the source.
See Referencing Code for guidance. You will need to adapt the guidance to your referencing style.
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
Ragan (2009)...
...(Ragan, 2009)
Author Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Paper title. In Title of conference including number of the conference, if appropriate, location and date of conference, Editor(s) Initial(s). Surname, ed(s). (Place of publication: Publisher). pp. start page-end page.
Ragan, M.A. (2009). Thinking laterally about genomes. In Genome Informatics 2009: Proceedings of the 20th International Conference, Pacifico Yokohama, Japan, 14 – 16 December 2009, S. Morishita, S.Y. Lee, and Y. Sakakibara, eds. (London: Imperial College Press). pp. 221-222.
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
Feret and Koeppl (2017)...
...(Feret and Koeppl, 2017)
Editor's Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title of conference including number of the conference, if appropriate, location and date of conference. (Place of publication: Publisher).
Feret, J., and Koeppl, H., eds. (2017). Computational Methods in Systems Biology, 15th International Conference, CMSB 2017, Darmstadt, Germany, September 27–29, 2017. (Cham: Springer International Publishing).
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
Andre (2020)...
...(Andre, 2020)
Author's Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title of dataset. Repository name, DOI.
Andre, M. (2020). Thermal proteome profiling of phosphorylated proteoforms. Mendeley Data, http://dx.doi.org/10.17632/4vwzvxfcnd.4
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
Lackie (2013)...
...(Lackie, 2013)
Author/Editor Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title, Edition or Series Statement (Place of publication: Publisher).
Lackie, J.M., ed. (2013). The dictionary of cell and molecular biology, 5th edition (London: Academic Press).
Title (Year). Edition or Series Statement (Place of publication: Publisher).
Merck index (2013). 15th edition (Cambridge: The Royal Society of Chemistry).
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.
For Graphs see Images and Figures.
This guidance is for citing and referencing images and figures that you are referring to in your work. If you have inserted an image or figure into your work please see the "Guidance for taught course students inserting images and figures into university work."
The model in the image (Gathman, 2012)...
Da Vinci's drawing of the aortic valve (c1513)...
The diagram (Tuite, 2016) shows...
...illustrating how the ends can be sealed (Allison, 2012).
Artist/Creator Surname, Initial(s). OR screen name. (Year). Title of image/figure [description]. Name of site. <URL>. Date accessed.
Gathman, A. (2011). DNA space-filling model [digital image]. Flickr. <https://www.flickr.com/photos/agathman/5367748554>. Accessed 11th January 2022.
Artist/Creator Surname, Initials. (Year). Title of image/figure [description]. Name of museum/gallery, City. [If in person] Dated viewed. [If online] <URL>. Date accessed.
Da Vinci, L. (c1513) The aortic valve [drawing]. The Queen’s Gallery, Palace of Holyrood House, Edinburgh. Viewed 1st May 2019.
Artist/Creator Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title of image/figure [description]. In Title of journal article, Author of journal article (if different to Artist/Creator) Initial(s) Surname. Title of Journal, Volume(Issue), Page number.
Tuite, M.F. (2016). Three types of protein-based inheritance described in the yeast saccharomyces cerevisiae [diagram]. In Remembering the past: a new form of protein-based inheritance, Cell 167, 302.
Artist/Creator Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title of image/figure [description]. In Title of book, Author of book (if different to Artist/Creator) Initial(s) Surname (Place of publication: Publisher), Page number.
Allison, L.A. (2012). DNA supercoiling [diagram]. In Fundamental molecular biology, 2nd edition (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley), p. 35.
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.
References should include only articles that are published or in press. For references to in press articles, please confirm with the cited journal that the article is in fact accepted and in press, and include a DOI number and scheduled online publication date. (Information for authors, Cell, 2020)
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
Linghu et al. (2020)...
...(Linghu et al., 2020)
Author(s) Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title of the article. Title of the Journal, DOI
Linghu, C., Johnson, S.L., Valdes, P.A., Shemesh, O.A., Park, W.M., Park, D., Piatkevich, K.D., Wassie, A.T., Liu, Y., An, B., et al. (2020). Spatial multiplexing of fluorescent reporters for imaging signaling network dynamics. Cell, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cell.2020.10.035
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.
Posted preprints may also be included in the References list with appropriate identification information and an independent persistent identifier such as a DOI. (Information for authors, Cell, 2020)
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
Burkhardt et al. (2020)...
...(Burkhardt et al., 2020)
Author(s) Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title of the article. Repository name, DOI
Burkhardt, D.B., Stanley, J.S., Tong, A., Perdigoto, A.L., Gigante, S.A., Herold, K.C., Wolf, G., Giraldez, A.J., van Dijk, D., and Krishnaswamy, S. (2020). Quantifying the effects of experimental perturbations at single-cell resolution. bioRxiv, https://doi.org/10.1101/532846
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
White (2020)...
...(White, 2020)
Author Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title of the article. Title of the Journal Volume, page numbers.
White, M.F. (2020). Bacteria SAVED from viruses. Cell 182, 5-6.
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
Vijg and Dong (2020)...
...(Vijg and Dong, 2020)
Author Surname, Initial(s)., and Author Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title of the article. Title of the Journal Volume, page numbers.
Vijg, J., and Dong, X. (2020). Pathogenic mechanisms of somatic mutation and genome mosaicism in aging. Cell 182, 12-23.
Harvey et al. (2020)...
...(Harvey et al., 2020)
Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., and Author Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title of the article. Title of the Journal Volume, page numbers.
Harvey, Z.H., Chakravarty, A.K, Futia, R.A., and Jarosz, D.F. (2020). A prion epigenetic switch establishes an active chromatin state. Cell 180, 928-940.
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
Anava et al. (2020)...
...(Anava et al., 2020)
Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., Author Surname, Initial(s)., and Author Surname, Initial(s)., et al. (Year). Title of the article. Title of the Journal Volume, page numbers.
Anava, S., Neuhof, M., Gingold, H., Sagy, O., Munters, A., Svensson, E.M., Afshinnekoo, E., Danko, D., Foox, J., Shor, P., et al. (2020). Illuminating genetic mysteries of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Cell 181, 1218-1231.
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.
Citing informal or unpublished materials, such as handouts, lecture recordings and lecture notes is not generally recommended. Instead you should look to cite a primary source (such as a textbook or journal article) which describes or summarises the idea you are referring to. You may wish to ask your lecturer for recommended reading.
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
World Health Organisation (2020)...
...(World Health Organisation, 2020)
Author's Surname, Initial(s). OR Corporate Author. (Year). Title of report, Report number (if available) (Place of publication: Publisher). <URL>
World Health Organisation. (2020). GLASS whole-genome sequencing for surveillance of antimicrobial resistance (Geneva: World Health Organisation). <https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789240011007>
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.
For Tables see Images and Figures.
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
Jajesniak (2019)...
...(Jajesniak, 2019)
Author's Surname, Initial(s). (Year). Title of thesis/dissertation. (Type and level of award, Awarding body).
Jajesniak, P. (2019). Expanding molecular toolbox for synthetic biology. (PhD Thesis, University of Sheffield).
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.
Generally speaking, you should only cite web sites that are recognised by the scientific community such as genome browsers, online analytical tools, etc. Wikipedia is almost never an acceptable or reliable source of information.
For an in-text citation in your work, you would cite the reference as follows:
National Human Genome Research Institute (2020)...
...(National Human Genome Research Institute, 2020)
Author or Editor's Surname, Initial(s) OR Organisation. (Year). Title. <URL>. Date accessed.
National Human Genome Research Institute (2020). Human Genome Project timeline of events. <https://www.genome.gov/human-genome-project/Timeline-of-Events>. Accessed 23rd November 2020.
For more information about in-text citations, quotations, and creating a reference list see Creating in-text citations and references and click on the relevant section.