How to cite USGS Water Data for the Nation (waterdata.usgs.gov) in a publication

The following is an example of how to cite the USGS Water Data for the Nation (waterdata.usgs.gov) website in a publication.

U.S. Geological Survey, 2016, National Water Information System data available on the World Wide Web (USGS Water Data for the Nation), accessed [June 10, 2012], at URL [http://waterdata.usgs.gov/nwis/].

You would need to substitute the applicable items enclosed in brackets (remove the brackets too) for the date you accessed the data and URL you are referring to within Water Data for the Nation.

The International DOI Foundation (IDF) assigns DOIs (Digital Object Identifier), which provide the system with a technical and social infrastructure for the registration and use of persistent interoperable identifiers for use on digital networks. It is particularly used for electronic documents such as journal articles.

The DOI assigned to Water Data for the Nation is http://dx.doi.org/10.5066/F7P55KJN

An HTML version of the XML OAI metadata associated with this DOI is available here:

While the development team will take considerable effort to maintain the integrity of existing URLs, queries for specific data within Water Data for the Nation may not function in the future if the software or database is substantially changed.