How to format your references using the ACS Nano citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for ACS Nano. For a complete guide how to prepare your manuscript refer to the journal's instructions to authors.

Using reference management software

Typically you don't format your citations and bibliography by hand. The easiest way is to use a reference manager:

Paperpile	The citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNote	Download the output style file
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and others	The style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most references management programs.
BibTeX	BibTeX syles are usually part of a LaTeX template. Check the instructions to authors if the publisher offers a LaTeX template for this journal.

Journal articles

Those examples are references to articles in scholarly journals and how they are supposed to appear in your bibliography.

Not all journals organize their published articles in volumes and issues, so these fields are optional. Some electronic journals do not provide a page range, but instead list an article identifier. In a case like this it's safe to use the article identifier instead of the page range.

A journal article with 1 author

(1)

Smaglik, P. Salaries in the Balance. Nature 2009, 457 (7230), 750–751.

A journal article with 2 authors

(1)

Rowitch, D. H.; Kriegstein, A. R. Developmental Genetics of Vertebrate Glial-Cell Specification. Nature 2010, 468 (7321), 214–222.

A journal article with 3 authors

(1)

Norell, M. A.; Makovicky, P. J.; Currie, P. J. Palaeontology. The Beaks of Ostrich Dinosaurs. Nature 2001, 412 (6850), 873–874.

A journal article with 11 or more authors

(1)

Movshovich, R.; Bianchi, A.; Capan, C.; Jaime, M.; Goodrich, R. G. Electron-Spin Domains: Magnetic Enhancement of Superconductivity. Nature 2004, 427 (6977), 802; discussion 802.

Books and book chapters

Here are examples of references for authored and edited books as well as book chapters.

An authored book

(1)

Bhattacharyya, A. K. Phased Array Antennas; John Wiley & Sons, Inc.: Hoboken, NJ, 2005.

An edited book

(1)

Creating Infrastructures for Latino Mental Health; Buki, L. P., Piedra, L. M., Eds.; Springer: New York, NY, 2011.

A chapter in an edited book

(1)

Chiu, J. L.; Bull, G.; Berry, R. Q.; Kjellstrom, W. R. Teaching Engineering Design with Digital Fabrication: Imagining, Creating, and Refining Ideas. In Emerging Technologies for the Classroom: A Learning Sciences Perspective; Mouza, C., Lavigne, N., Eds.; Springer: New York, NY, 2013; pp 47–62.

Web sites

Sometimes references to web sites should appear directly in the text rather than in the bibliography. Refer to the Instructions to authors for ACS Nano.

Blog post

(1)

Andrew, D. Biggest Map Of Giant Voids And Clusters In The Universe Solves Major Cosmological Puzzle. IFLScience.

Reports

This example shows the general structure used for government reports, technical reports, and scientific reports. If you can't locate the report number then it might be better to cite the report as a book. For reports it is usually not individual people that are credited as authors, but a governmental department or agency like "U. S. Food and Drug Administration" or "National Cancer Institute".

Government report

(1)

Government Accountability Office. Lack of Effective Coordinated or Centralized Management Control of Closed-Circuit Television Used in DOD for Training and Education; B-177350; U.S. Government Printing Office: Washington, DC, 1972.

Theses and dissertations

Theses including Ph.D. dissertations, Master's theses or Bachelor theses follow the basic format outlined below.

Doctoral dissertation

(1)

Hey, S. E. Olivier Messiaen’s “Quartet for the End of Time”: A Look at “The Abyss of the Birds” and Socio-Political Issues, Religion and Performance Practice in Reference to the Bible and the Holocaust. Doctoral dissertation, California State University, Long Beach, Long Beach, CA, 2015.

News paper articles

Unlike scholarly journals, news papers do not usually have a volume and issue number. Instead, the full date and page number is required for a correct reference.

New York Times article

(1)

Haskell, D. G. Nature’s Case for Same-Sex Marriage. New York Times. March 30, 2013, p A19.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by sequential numbers in superscript:

This sentence cites one reference ¹.
This sentence cites two references ^1,2.
This sentence cites four references ^1–4.

About the journal

Full journal title	ACS Nano
Abbreviation	ACS Nano
ISSN (print)	1936-0851
ISSN (online)	1936-086X
Scope	General Engineering General Materials Science General Physics and Astronomy