1. Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ): This is a fantastic starting point. It lists thousands of peer-reviewed open-access journals across all disciplines.

   • https://doaj.org/

2. PubMed Central (PMC): For biomedical and life sciences, PMC is a free full-text archive of biomedical and life sciences journal literature at the U.S. National Institutes of Health's National Library of Medicine (NIH/NLM).

   • https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/

3. arXiv: A free distribution service and an open-access archive for scholarly articles in physics, mathematics, computer science, quantitative biology, quantitative finance, statistics, electrical engineering and systems science, and economics. Many preprints (pre-peer review versions) are available here, which are often later published in peer-reviewed journals.

   • https://arxiv.org/

4. CORE (COnecting REpositories): Aggregates open access content from institutional and subject repositories worldwide.

   • https://core.ac.uk/

5. Google Scholar: While not exclusively open access, Google Scholar often provides links to open-access versions or preprints if they exist. Look for "PDF" or "HTML" links on the right-hand side of the search results.

   • https://scholar.google.com/

6. Publisher Open Access Initiatives: Many major publishers (e.g., Springer Nature, Wiley, Elsevier, Taylor & Francis) have dedicated open-access journals or sections on their websites. Searching directly on their sites for "open access" can be fruitful.

7. Browser Extensions:

   • Unpaywall: This browser extension helps you find legal, open-access versions of research papers. When you're on a paywalled article page, it checks its database for a free version.

   • Open Access Button: Similar to Unpaywall, it helps find open-access versions and can also request an article from the author if no OA version is found.

1. Materials Science:

   • Nature Communications: Many articles are open access.

     • https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

   • Scientific Reports:

     • https://www.nature.com/srep/

   • RSC Advances (Royal Society of Chemistry):

     • https://pubs.rsc.org/en/journals/journalissues/ra

2. Environmental Engineering:

   • Science of The Total Environment (Open Access option):

     • https://www.sciencedirect.com/journal/science-of-the-total-environment/open-access-articles

   • Environmental Science & Technology Letters:

     • https://pubs.acs.org/journal/estlcu

   • Water Research (Open Access option):

     • https://www.sciencedirect.com/journal/water-research/open-access-articles

   • MDPI journals (e.g., Water, Sustainability):

     • https://www.mdpi.com/journal/water

     • https://www.mdpi.com/journal/sustainability

3. Robotics & AI:

   • IEEE Access:

     • https://ieeeaccess.ieee.org/

   • Frontiers in Robotics and AI:

     • https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/robotics-and-ai

   • PLOS ONE: computer science and AI

     • https://journals.plos.org/plosone/

   • arXiv (Computer Science section): AI and Robotics preprints.

     • https://arxiv.org/archive/cs

4. Biomedical Engineering:

   • Nature Biomedical Engineering (Open Access options):

     • https://www.nature.com/natbiomedeng/

   • IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering (Open Access options):

     • https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/RecentIssue.jsp?punumber=10 (Look for OA articles)

   • Sensors (MDPI):

     • https://www.mdpi.com/journal/sensors

5. Renewable Energy:

   • Nature Energy (Open Access options):

     • https://www.nature.com/nenergy/

   • Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews (Open Access option):

     • https://www.sciencedirect.com/journal/renewable-and-sustainable-energy-reviews/open-access-articles

   • Applied Energy (Open Access option):

     • https://www.sciencedirect.com/journal/applied-energy/open-access-articles

6. Data Science/Machine Learning (Applied):

   • Journal of Machine Learning Research (JMLR):

     • http://www.jmlr.org/

   • Pattern Recognition (Open Access option):

     • https://www.sciencedirect.com/journal/pattern-recognition/open-access-articles

   • IEEE Transactions on Knowledge and Data Engineering (Open Access options):

     • https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/RecentIssue.jsp?punumber=69 (Look for OA articles)

   • arXiv (Computer Science: Machine Learning/Artificial Intelligence sections):

     • https://arxiv.org/archive/cs

7. Food Science & Technology:

   • Food Chemistry (Open Access option):

     • https://www.sciencedirect.com/journal/food-chemistry/open-access-articles

   • Foods (MDPI):

     • https://www.mdpi.com/journal/foods

   • Journal of Food Science (Open Access option):

     • https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/17503841 (Look for OA articles)

8. Civil Engineering:

   • Journal of Traffic and Transportation Engineering (English Edition): An open-access journal.

     • https://www.sciencedirect.com/journal/journal-of-traffic-and-transportation-engineering-english-edition/open-access-articles

   • Transportation Research Part C: Emerging Technologies (Open Access option):

     • https://www.sciencedirect.com/journal/transportation-research-part-c-emerging-technologies/open-access-articles

   • MDPI journals (e.g., Sustainability, Sensors applied to smart cities):

     • https://www.mdpi.com/journal/sustainability

     • https://www.mdpi.com/journal/sensors

Here are some guidelines for nontraditional situations:

1. 個人連絡Personal Interviews / Conversations / Emails

You can refer to these in-text, but not in your final reference list, because readers cannot refer to them. 読者の参照が不可能なので、文章内でしか利用できません。

Format (In-text only):

(First Initial. Last Name, personal communication, Date)

Example:

(T. Kato, personal communication, March 14, 2025)

✅ Use for: face-to-face conversations, Zoom meetings, emails, private messages

2. インタビュー（出版されたもの）Published Interviews

Use the format for a podcast, video, or magazine article, depending on where it's published.

Podcast Example:

Rogan, J. (Host). (2023, January 12). Interview with Elon Musk [Audio podcast]. Spotify. https://spotify.com/example

Magazine Example:

Kondo, M. (2022, July). Sparking joy in everyday life. Mindful Living Monthly, 18(4), 12–15.

3. SNSの投稿Social Media Posts

TypeFormatExampleTweet/PostAuthor/Handle. (Year, Month Day). Full text of post up to first 20 words [Platform]. URL@neiltyson. (2023, June 5). When asked about climate change... [Twitter]. https://twitter.com/neiltyson/status/xxxxInstagramUse same as aboveYouTube VideoAuthor or Org. (Year, Month Day). Title of video [Video]. YouTube. URLNASA. (2023, May 18). Webb reveals new galaxies [Video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/example

✅ Capitalize only the first word and proper nouns in post titles
✅ Use real name if available; if not, use handle

4. AI-Generated Content (e.g., ChatGPT)

これも、読者が参照できないものですが、最後の参考文献には載せられます。APA 7 does not officially cover this, but guidance has emerged (APA Style blog, 2023).

In-text citation:

(OpenAI, 2025)
Narrative:
According to OpenAI (2025)...

Reference entry (recommended style):

ある問い合わせを参照する

OpenAI. (2025, June 5). ChatGPT response to a query about APA formatting [Large language model]. https://chat.openai.com/

AIモデルそのものを参照する

Google. (2025). Gemini (1.5 Pro version) [Large language model]. https://gemini.google.com/

✅ Include date of query and URL
⚠️ Do not list yourself as author if you generated the text — cite OpenAI, Google etc.

5. オンライン記事Blog Posts & Online Articles (non-journalistic)

Author, A. A. (Year, Month Day). Title of post. Site Name. URL
Example:
Nguyen, L. (2024, October 2). How to write your first research poster. GradLife Blog. https://gradlife.blog/poster-tips

6. ウイキペディアなどWikipedia or Crowd-Sourced Pages

Wikipedia contributors. (Year, Month Day). Title of article. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/...

Example:

Wikipedia contributors. (2024, December 15). Heuristic. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heuristic

7. 会議などConference Presentations / Posters / Abstracts

Presenter, A. A. (Year, Month). Title of presentation [Conference presentation]. Conference Name, Location. URL (if available)

Example:

Iwata, H. (2023, March). EFL writing challenges in STEM education [Poster presentation]. AsiaCALL 2023, Tokyo, Japan.

Here are some guidelines for nontraditional situations:

1. 個人連絡Personal Interviews / Conversations / Emails

You can refer to these in-text, but not in your final reference list, because readers cannot refer to them. 読者の参照が不可能なので、文章内でしか利用できません。

Format (In-text only):

(First Initial. Last Name, personal communication, Date)

Example:

(T. Kato, personal communication, March 14, 2025)

✅ Use for: face-to-face conversations, Zoom meetings, emails, private messages

2. インタビュー（出版されたもの）Published Interviews

Use the format for a podcast, video, or magazine article, depending on where it's published.

Podcast Example:

Rogan, J. (Host). (2023, January 12). Interview with Elon Musk [Audio podcast]. Spotify. https://spotify.com/example

Magazine Example:

Kondo, M. (2022, July). Sparking joy in everyday life. Mindful Living Monthly, 18(4), 12–15.

3. SNSの投稿Social Media Posts

TypeFormatExampleTweet/PostAuthor/Handle. (Year, Month Day). Full text of post up to first 20 words [Platform]. URL@neiltyson. (2023, June 5). When asked about climate change... [Twitter]. https://twitter.com/neiltyson/status/xxxxInstagramUse same as aboveYouTube VideoAuthor or Org. (Year, Month Day). Title of video [Video]. YouTube. URLNASA. (2023, May 18). Webb reveals new galaxies [Video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/example

✅ Capitalize only the first word and proper nouns in post titles
✅ Use real name if available; if not, use handle

4. AI-Generated Content (e.g., ChatGPT)

これも、読者が参照できないものですが、最後の参考文献には載せられます。APA 7 does not officially cover this, but guidance has emerged (APA Style blog, 2023).

In-text citation:

(OpenAI, 2025)
Narrative:
According to OpenAI (2025)...

Reference entry (recommended style):

ある問い合わせを参照する

OpenAI. (2025, June 5). ChatGPT response to a query about APA formatting [Large language model]. https://chat.openai.com/

AIモデルそのものを参照する

Google. (2025). Gemini (1.5 Pro version) [Large language model]. https://gemini.google.com/

✅ Include date of query and URL
⚠️ Do not list yourself as author if you generated the text — cite OpenAI, Google etc.

5. オンライン記事Blog Posts & Online Articles (non-journalistic)

Author, A. A. (Year, Month Day). Title of post. Site Name. URL
Example:
Nguyen, L. (2024, October 2). How to write your first research poster. GradLife Blog. https://gradlife.blog/poster-tips

6. ウイキペディアなどWikipedia or Crowd-Sourced Pages

Wikipedia contributors. (Year, Month Day). Title of article. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/...

Example:

Wikipedia contributors. (2024, December 15). Heuristic. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heuristic

7. 会議などConference Presentations / Posters / Abstracts

Presenter, A. A. (Year, Month). Title of presentation [Conference presentation]. Conference Name, Location. URL (if available)

Example:

Iwata, H. (2023, March). EFL writing challenges in STEM education [Poster presentation]. AsiaCALL 2023, Tokyo, Japan.

Context

Purpose or Goal

Approach or Methodology/Methods

Actual or Anticipated Outcomes

Conclusions/Recommendations/Summary

(Belkina et al., 2024)

Reference List Entry:

Belkina, M., Neal, P., Grundy, S., & Hassan, G. M. (2024). Systematic Literature Review of GenAI Integration in Higher Education and Analysis of Opportunities for Engineering Education. Paper presented at AAEE2024. https://research.usc.edu.au/esploro/outputs/conferencePaper/Systematic-Literature-Review-of-GenAI-Integration/991083398802621

This PDF about GenAI in university Engineering courses was analyzed using Voyant Tools. Voyant Tools can help you understand how to use academic language, and how language is used in each part of an IMRaD paper.

https://voyant-tools.org/?corpus=4ebde283d99b15c50c4d7aae7971ea91&panels=cirrus,reader,trends,summary,contexts

1) Team members have completed a questionnaire, an interview, and an observation. Choose one of these, and imagine that you are writing an IMRaD paper about this topic. Write one section in IMRaD format.

2) Imagine that you are writing an IMRaD paper about O. Owl, J. Serow, and S. Wrasse’ｓresearch about O. Otter's proposal to use chocolate or cocoa to increase animal intelligence and flood Tokyo to create an animal-friendly Otter Town.

Write one section in IMRaD format.

The research team have attempted to reproduce O. Otter's claims of using chocolate and cocoa.

Methods & Materials - what did they use? How did they apply chocolate or cocoa?

Results - experiments showed that fish (Sheephead Wrasse コブダイ）cannot breathe in chocolate, Japanese Serow (カモシカ) cannot absorb chocolate or cocoa because of their thick fur, while Owls (フクロウ）were able to use the cocoa dust bath method successfully.

Intelligence testing showed that conventional paper tests are not appropriate for animals, because Owls fall asleep, paper dissolves in water, and the Serow ate the paper tests.

Discussion - what do these results mean for O. Otter's proposals? What future research is necessary?

Citations - find or imagine the kind of resources the research team consulted about this project.

Future research should try different ways to use cocoa for different animals. Fish need water, and Japanese Serow cannot absorb cocoa. Researchers should also make better intelligence tests for animals.

In conclusion, O. Otter’s study shows that cocoa can improve intelligence only under certain conditions. Each species needs a different method, and future research should adapt cocoa use and testing to fit their environments

The experiments using chocolate and the intelligence tests did not yield appropriate results.

For some animals, consuming chocolate or cocoa is physically difficult. Paper tests were also unsuitable for the animals.