How to format your references using the Molecules citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Molecules. 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

Lang, T. Ebola: Embed Research in Outbreak Response. Nature 2015, 524, 29–31.

A journal article with 2 authors

Coburn, W.; Boggs, S.E. Polarization of the Prompt Gamma-Ray Emission from the Gamma-Ray Burst of 6 December 2002. Nature 2003, 423, 415–417.

A journal article with 3 authors

Chen, Y.-Z.; Huang, Z.-G.; Lai, Y.-C. Controlling Extreme Events on Complex Networks. Sci. Rep. 2014, 4, 6121.

A journal article with 4 or more authors

Li, M.; Zou, H.; Guan, S.; Gong, X.; Li, K.; Di, Z.; Lai, C.-H. A Coevolving Model Based on Preferential Triadic Closure for Social Media Networks. Sci. Rep. 2013, 3, 2512.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Oden, J.T. An Introduction to Mathematical Modeling; John Wiley & Sons, Inc.: Hoboken, NJ, 2011; ISBN 9781118105733.

An edited book

Schrage, N. Chemical Ocular Burns: New Understanding and Treatments; Burgher, F., Blomet, J., Bodson, L., Gerard, M., Hall, A., Josset, P., Mathieu, L., Merle, H., Eds.; Springer: Berlin, Heidelberg, 2011; ISBN 9783642145490.

A chapter in an edited book

Jacobs, J.W.; Richter, J.E. Role of H2RA and Proton Pump Inhibitor Therapy in Treating Reflux Disease. In Diagnosis and Treatment of Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease; Vaezi, M.F., Ed.; Springer International Publishing: Cham, 2016; pp. 71–91 ISBN 9783319195230.

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 Molecules.

Blog post

Fang, J. Polar Bear DNA Extracted from Footprints in the Snow Available online: https://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/polar-bear-dna-extracted-footprints-snow/ (accessed on 30 October 2018).

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

Government Accountability Office Financial Management Systems: Core Financial Systems at the 24 Chief Financial Officers Act Agencies; U.S. Government Printing Office: Washington, DC, 2003;

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation

Fair, C.L. Structure of the Roberts Mountains Allochthon in the Three Bar Ranch Quadrangle, Roberts Mountains, Eureka County, Nevada. Doctoral dissertation, California State University, Long Beach: Long Beach, CA, 2012.

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

Hartocollis, A. Mental Issues Put 34,500 on New York No-Guns List. New York Times 2014, A1.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by sequential numbers in square brackets:

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	Molecules
Abbreviation	Molecules
ISSN (online)	1420-3049
Scope	Organic Chemistry