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CHEM 101: Orientation to Chemistry: ACS Citations

Guide for CHEM 101 students to learn more about scholarly Chemistry resources

ACS Style Guide Resources

ACS Guide to Scholarly Communication (2020)

ACS Guide to Scholarly Communication 2020

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Links to Commonly Used Sections of ACS Guide to Scholarly Communications

The ACS Style Guide (2006)

ACS Style Guide (2006) 

As you transition to using the latest 2020 ACS Guide for Scholarly Communication, the links below to the 2006 edition may be helpful to also reference:

Links to Commonly Used Sections of 2006 ACS Style Guide

Citing in ACS

Parenthetical Numbering

When to Use It: Parenthetical numbering is the preferred method in the 2020 ACS Guide to Scholarly Communication. It is used for ACS Style submissions (journals/books) and for the HTML versions of ACS publications because the parenthetical numbers make it easier to click from the an article's full text HTML content to view the full references.

Ex: The mineralization of TCE by a pure culture of a methane-oxidizing organism
has been reported (6).
The Basics:
  • Start with 1 and number consecutively for all items referenced
  • Include a SPACE between the text or punctuation and the opening parenthesis
  • The parenthetical number should appear INSIDE the punctuation at the end of the sentence
  • If you're citing the same reference, reuse original number
  • Note: the number is NOT italicized
     
Citing Multiple References:
  • To cite multiple references, list numbers in numerical order separated by commas (NO SPACES).
Ex: Equations have been derived to extract kinetic parameters from these voltammomagrams (2,3).
  • To indicate a range of 3 or more, use a hyphen to list consecutive references.
Ex: Other groups have also devised clever ways to utilize this reaction (18-20).
 
Learn More:

Citation examples are from ACS 4.3.2 Creating References and Chapter 14 of the ACS Style Guide. More examples and specific citation scenarios are also addressed in the ACS 4.3.2 Creating References.

Superscript Numbering

When to Use It: Superscript numbering used to be the most commonly used form of ACS citation so you will still see a lot of articles and examples that use superscript. You may be asked to use superscript numbering to demonstrate that you understand it. It is very similar to parenthetical numbering with a few exceptions.

Crick8 hypothesized ...

The Basics (same as parenthetical numbering):
  • Start with 1 and number consecutively for all items referenced
  • If you're citing the same reference, reuse original number
     
The Basics (how it differs from parenthetical numbering):
  • There are NO PARENTHESIS
  • The number is shown as a SUPERSCRIPT
  • When the citation applies to the whole sentence, the superscript number should appear AFTER the punctuation at the end of the sentence
    • There is NO SPACE between the punctuation and the superscript number
  • When the citation applies to a clause or only a part of the sentence, the superscript number should appear immediately AFTER the word/phrase it is referencing
     
Citing Multiple References (same as parenthetical numbering):
  • To cite multiple references, list numbers in numerical order separated by commas (NO SPACES).
Ex: Equations have been derived to extract kinetic parameters from these voltammomagrams.2,3
  • To indicate a range of 3 or more references, use a hyphen to list consecutive references.
Ex: Other groups have also devised clever ways to utilize this reaction.18-20
 
Learn More:

All citation examples are from ACS 4.3.2 Creating References. More examples and specific citation scenarios are also addressed in that section.

Author-Date

When to Use It: Author-date is not very commonly used in the field of Chemistry and is NOT used by ACS Publications. Because it is not commonly used, it is described in more detail in Chapter 14 of the 2006 ACS Style Guide and only referenced in section 4.3.2 of the 2020 ACS Guide to Scholarly Communications.

Ex: The primary structure of this enzyme has also been determined (Finnegan et al., 2004).

Basics:

  • Lists the author name and year of publication in parentheses INSIDE the punctuation
     
Learn More:

All citation examples are from Chapter 14 of the 2006 ACS Style Guide. More examples and specific citation scenarios are also addressed in that section. Also refer to the "Mentioning Author Names in the Text" section of 4.3.2 of the 2020 ACS Guide to Scholarly Communications.

Reference List

  • Heading: References
  • Citations: Listed in numerical order of first mention in the text
  • Reference Entry: number + [period] + [space] + citation
  • Spacing: Single-spaced
  • Indentions: None

Example

References

1. Brus, L. E. Electron−Electron and Electron−Hole Interactions in Small Semiconductor Crystallites: The Size Dependence of the Lowest Excited Electronic State. J. Chem. Phys. 198480 (9), 4403−4409. DOI: 10.1063/1.447218
2. Empedocles, S. A.; Bawendi, M. G. Quantum-Confined Stark Effect in Single CdSe Nanocrystallite Quantum Dots. Science 1997278, 2114−2117. DOI: 10.1126/science.278.5346.2114
3. Bennett, A. J.; Patel, R. B.; Skiba-Szymanska, J.; Nicoll, C. A.; Farrer, I.; Ritchie, D. A.; Shields, A. J. Giant Stark Effect in the Emission of Single Semiconductor Quantum Dots. Appl. Phys. Lett. 201097 (3), 031104. DOI: 10.1063/1.3460912

Plagiarism basics

"All of the following are considered plagiarism:

  • turning in someone else's work as your own
  • copying words or ideas from someone else without giving credit
  • failing to put a quotation in quotation marks
  • giving incorrect information about the source of a quotation
  • changing words but copying the sentence structure of a source without giving credit
  • copying so many words or ideas from a source that it makes up the majority of your work, whether you give credit or not (see our section on "fair use" rules)

Most cases of plagiarism can be avoided, however, by citing sources. Simply acknowledging that certain material has been borrowed, and providing your audience with the information necessary to find that source, is usually enough to prevent plagiarism." 

Source:  What is plagiarism? (n.d.) Retrieved from <http://www.plagiarism.org/plagiarism-101/what-is-plagiarism>

Review the FHSU policy on Academic Honesty.

Where to Find Citation Information in Chemistry Databases/Articles

Where to Find Citation Information in Reaxys Results

Where to Find Citation Information in ACS Web Editions Results

Where to Find Citation Information within an ACS Publication

Citation Tracing Tools

Reaxys: How to Find Articles that Cited This Article

In Reaxys, the "cited # times" link goes to a tool called SCOPUS. Fort Hays State University does not have full access to SCOPUS but you can see a list of the first 20 results that you can refer to and copy/paste article titles from that list to search using the Library Catalog, Reaxys, or Google Scholar or request via Interlibrary Loan for access.

ACS: How to Find Articles that Cited This Article

In ACS Web Editions, scroll all the way to the bottom of the article detail page to find a list of ACS articles by which this article has been cited. Use the DOI links to navigate to the new article.

Google Scholar: How to Find Articles that Cited This Article

Google Scholar has a fairly robust indexing of scholarly articles to trace articles that are connected through references (articles that cite this article). Click the "Cited by #" link to view a list of results. If you're on campus, or if you've configured your Google Scholar Search to include Forsyth Library results and access, you'll see "View@FHSU-Forsyth" listed in the access column of the results. Otherwise, you can refer to  the list and copy/paste article titles from that list to search using the Library Catalog, Reaxys, or request via Interlibrary Loan for access.

Wiley Publications: How to Find Articles that Cited This Article

For journals published by Wiley, scroll all the way to the bottom of the article detail page to find a list of other articles by which this article has been cited. Use the Crossref or Wiley links to navigate to the new article.

Elsevier Publications: How to Find Articles that Cited This Article

For journals published by Elsevier, click the Citing Articles expanded menu on the right side column of the article detail page to find a brief list of other articles by which this article has been cited. Use the Title/PDF links to navigate to the new article. If you click view more articles, it will take you to SCOPUS which Fort Hays State University does not have full access to, so you'll need to copy/paste any articles from the results list into the library catalog or Google Scholar or request the article via ILL to access to the new article.

Journal Abbreviations

CASSI Journal Abbreviations

ACS Style is unique in that most journal titles are abbreviated in some way. ACS uses an official CASSI list of journal abbreviations for consistency.

  • Use the links below to find the appropriate abbreviation of a journal for your citation
  • One-word journal names are not abbreviated (e.g., Biochemistry, Macromolecules, Nature, Science).
  • Use the complete journal title if it is not in CASSI
  • Also refer to the ACS 4.3.4 Citation Elements section of the 2020 guide

Helpful Links: ACS Style

While it is best to refer directly to the ACS Guide to Scholarly Communications (2020) for information on how to cite in the ACS style, the following websites provide additional information when citing your sources.

Note: These websites utilize the 2006 ACS style in which hanging indents were common practice. The 2020 style does NOT use hanging indents in the reference list.

Print ACS Citation Manual

Print Citation Manuals located in the Reserve Area.

ACS Style Guide:  Effective Communication of Scientific Information (3rd ed 2006)

Reserve  QD 8.5 .A25 2006

Helpful Links: Writing Lab Reports

ACS Writing Tips

Lab Report Writing Tips