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Council of Science Editors (CSE) Citation Style Guide

An overview of the CSE citation style used across the sciences.

Preprints

Preprint

Author name. Year of publication. Article title [preprint]. Preprint Server;article or citation number. DOI/URL

Anatomy of a citation
  1. Author name(s): Formatted as last name and initials (no periods) and separated by commas. Do not use & or "and" before the last author. For articles with more than 5 authors, list the first author followed by “et al.”
  2. Date: Year the article was posted to the preprint server.
  3. Title: Use sentence case.
  4. Preprint designation
  5. Name of preprint server or repository: Use title case.
  6. Article or citation number: If one exists.
  7. DOI or URL: Format the DOI as the full URL.

 

Example

Medina M et al. 2025. Surface morphometrics reveals local membrane thickness variation in organellar subcompartments [preprint]. bioRxiv. https://doi.org/10.1101/2025.04.30.651574

Online ahead of print

Article published online ahead of print

Author name. Date of publication. Article title. Journal Title Abbrev. [published online ahead of print]. DOI/URL

Anatomy of a citation
  1. Author name(s): Formatted as last name and initials (no periods) and separated by commas. Do not use & or "and" before the last author. For articles with more than 5 authors, list the first author followed by “et al.”
  2. Date: Formatted as year month (abbreviated) and day. This is the date the article was posted online.
  3. Title: Use sentence case.
  4. Journal name: Use abbreviated form with no periods.*
  5. Content designator: "published online ahead of print" in brackets.
  6. DOI or URL: Format the DOI as the full URL (if published online).

 

Example

March S et al. 2025 Apr 10. Potential global effects of the rise of the far right on public health. Am J Public Health. [published online ahead of print]. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2025.308016

Personal communication

The CSE Manual recommends referring to personal communications within the work's text as opposed to including a reference to it in the bibliography. Describe the nature and source of the personal communication within parentheses and clearly indicate that the citation is not included in the bibliography. Unless the personal communication is accessible to the public (such is the case with some government memos), the authors citing the personal communication must provide the publisher with written consent from the cited person(s) or organization. The permission should be noted in the "Acknowledgements" or "Notes" section.

 
Example

...located and systematic reactions were expected to be stronger after the second dose (2022 letter from TD Perez to author; unreferenced, see "Notes")...