CHEM 142 & 143 - General Chemistry II - Annotated Bibliography Project: ACS Style

Check your ACS citations for these details:

• Include all author names in a reference citation. With multiple authors, separate the names from one another by semicolons. Always end the author field with a period. List the names in inverted form: surname first, then first initial, middle initial, and qualifiers (Jr., II).
• Put spaces between the elements and after punctuation, just as you would in a regular sentence.
• For online materials, use a DOI instead of a URL whenever possible. If only a URL is available, remove the hyperlink - it should not be blue or underlined (in Word: right-click on the hyperlink --> remove hyperlink).
• For journals, the year should be in bold.
• For journals, volume numbers are in italics.
• For journals, if there is an issue number, include it in parentheses.
• End the citation with a period.
• In the past, ACS citation style required you to use the CASSI tool to find abbreviations for journal titles. This requirement has been removed, so you can disregard references to CASSI if you find them 

Keep visiting this box for updates!

Question: There's no date on an article from the U.S. Department of Energy website. How do I cite it?

Answer: In place of the date, use (n.d.)

Question: Should I use a URL or a DOI?

Answer: Using the DOI is preferred. If there is no DOI, you can include the URL.

Question: The DOI or URL is very long, and it causes a big gap of white space at the end of the line. Should I break it up?

Answer: No. For the Chemistry 142 annotated bibliography assignment, don't worry about the white space; let the URL or permalink wrap naturally.

Question: Do I include the article title?

Answer: Yes. Although the ACS Style Guide says journal titles are optional information, it also says they can be "desirable to highlight the contents." For CHEM 142, including the article title will make it easier to share annotated bibliographies with classmates.

Question: Do I use title case or sentence case for the article title?

Answer: The most recent ACS style guide says you can use either "Title Case" or "Sentence case" as long as you are consistent. For CHEM 142, use Sentence case, where only the first word in the title, and first word after a colon, are capitalized. This is more similar to APA style, which you will likely use in other classes at Clark. 

Question: What format do I use for the letters DOI? Is it DOI: or doi:? 

Answer: According to the ACS style guide  use upper case letters, followed by a colon and a space, like this: 
DOI: 10.1021/ja047915o 

Question: How do I abbreviate a hyphenated first name, like Jane-Francis Smith?

Answer: Keep the hyphen. Jane-Francis Smith becomes: Smith, J.-F.

Question: How do I treat names with participles, like Michael van der Putten?

Answer: We cannot find a rule in ACS, so we are following this format: Michael van der Putten would be: van der Putten, Michael, alphabetized under "V".