biblatex
Using biblatex, is there a way to format the citations and bibliography to match the style for the Cell family of journals?
Search engines reveal .bst files for bibtex, but nothing for biblatex.
Alternately, is there a good reference for how to format a .bbx, assuming no prior experience with biblatex?
To parse BibTeX format files, Biber uses a C library called "btparse" which is, for all intents and purposes, 99.9% compatible with BibTeX. So, You should rarely have problem using Biber as a drop-in replacement for BibTeX. As mentioned by others, the issue is rather the slightly different data model which biblatex has compared with the data model in BibTeX.
So, your question really relates to the difference in data models between plain BibTeX and BibLaTeX, regardless of whether you are using Biber as the biblatex backend. Be aware that in the future, around BibLaTeX 2.x, BibTeX will no longer be supported as a biblatex backend as it has too many limitations. Of course BibTeX format data files will always be supported.
The more important question is, as you mention, what the advantages of Biber might be even if you are not using any of the biblatex data model specifics. Here are some advantages of Biber in this respect (you can get an idea by searching for the string "Biber only" in the biblatex manual), omitting the features which require data source changes:
.bib (currently RIS, Zotero RDF/XML, Endnote XML).bib files available via ftp or http)biblatex manual for a very good explanation of this with examples..bib data as it is read by Biber, without changing the actual data source itself. YouThis last feature is particularly interesting for you as you can potentially map your pure BibTeX .bib files into the biblatex model on the fly as Biber reads them but without altering the files. It's also very useful for dropping fields like abstract which often cause trouble due to LaTeX reserved characters.
There are also some other features implemented in Biber which are available in BibLaTeX 2.x:
I forgot to mention that Biber automatically applies the BibLaTeX field and entrytype mappings (address -> location etc.) mentioned in the documentation. It does this by implementing some driver-level source mappings (see \DeclareSourcemap and its variants in the biblatex documentation).
This should be what you want. Traditional elsart-num:
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{filecontents}
\begin{filecontents}{\jobname.bib}
@article{Bli74,
author = {Blinder, Alan S.},
year = {1974},
title = {The economics of brushing teeth},
journal = {Journal of Political Economy},
volume = {82},
number = {4},
pages = {887--891},
}
@book{Kop04,
author = {Kopka, Helmut and Daly, Patrick W.},
year = {2004},
title = {Guide to \LaTeX},
edition = {4},
address = {Boston},
publisher = {Addison-Wesley},
}
\end{filecontents}
\begin{document}
\nocite{*}
\bibliographystyle{elsart-num}
\bibliography{\jobname}
\end{document}
biblatex emulation:
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[firstinits=true,abbreviate=false]{biblatex}
\renewcommand*{\multinamedelim}{\addcomma\space}
\renewcommand*{\finalnamedelim}{\addcomma\space}
\renewcommand*{\newunitpunct}{\addcomma\space}
\DeclareFieldFormat*{title}{#1}
\DeclareFieldFormat{journaltitle}{#1}
\renewbibmacro{in:}{%
\ifentrytype{article}{%
}{%
\printtext{\bibstring{in}\intitlepunct}%
}%
}
\renewbibmacro*{volume+number+eid}{%
\printfield{volume}%
\setunit*{\addnbspace}%
\printfield{number}%
\setunit{\addcomma\space}%
\printfield{eid}}
\DeclareFieldFormat[article]{number}{\mkbibparens{#1}}
\renewcommand*{\bibpagespunct}{\addspace}
\DeclareFieldFormat{pages}{#1}
\renewbibmacro*{publisher+location+date}{%
\printlist{publisher}%
\setunit*{\addcomma\space}%
\printlist{location}%
\setunit*{\addcomma\space}%
\usebibmacro{date}%
\newunit}
\usepackage{filecontents}
\begin{filecontents}{\jobname.bib}
@article{Bli74,
author = {Blinder, Alan S.},
year = {1974},
title = {The economics of brushing teeth},
journaltitle = {Journal of Political Economy},
volume = {82},
number = {4},
pages = {887--891},
}
@book{Kop04,
author = {Kopka, Helmut and Daly, Patrick W.},
year = {2004},
title = {Guide to \LaTeX},
edition = {4},
location = {Boston},
publisher = {Addison-Wesley},
}
\end{filecontents}
\addbibresource{\jobname.bib}
\nocite{*}
\begin{document}
\printbibliography
\end{document}
For further information see Guidelines for customizing biblatex styles.
Best Answer
As the Cell instruction for authors only give examples for articles, books, and chapters/proceedings, modifying the standard style is not all that daunting.