During my undergrad studies, I had to hand-type every single reference into a bib file to be used with $Bib\TeX$. These days are gone! Nowadays, all you need is the doi (digital object identifier) attached to a reference and use an api (application programming interface) found on crossref.org.

For instante, let’s say you want the details of a paper with the following doi:

10.1103/PhysRevB.98.045126

To get the entry in bib format, just type the following string into the address bar of your favorite web browser:

http://api.crossref.org/works/10.1016/0956-716X(95)00357-2/transform/application/x-bibtex

Click on the link above and see the result. All you have to do is copy and paste the result into your bib file and, with little or no tweaking, you’re done.