Medline journal abbreviations

marthoe
I have found an issue with the "use Medline Abbreviations" feature for Journal abbreviations. It is really only a very minor thing ... but nevertheless I wonder why this happens.

I am citing an article from the Journal of Molecular Medicine. I add the record from Pubmed into my Zotero Library.
When I cite, the bibliography (I am using Cell style here, but that doesn´t really matter) shows the entry like this:

1. Kretzschmar, K. (2021). Cancer research using organoid technology. J Mol Med (Berl) 99, 501–515. 10.1007/s00109-020-01990-z.

the journal name is correctly abbreviated as; J Mol Med (Berl)
This is the way it is displayed in Pubmed and also in the Zotero entry.

However, when I activate "Use MEDLINE journal abbreviations", the abbreviation is changed to a "wrong" one.

1. Kretzschmar, K. (2021). Cancer research using organoid technology. J. Mol. Med. Berl. Ger. 99, 501–515. 10.1007/s00109-020-01990-z.

the journal name is (incorrectly) abbreviated as; J. Mol. Med. Berl. Ger.
(the issue is not the "." ,but the (Berl) vs Berl Ger

As stated above, this is really a minor issue, but I wonder why this happens - as far as I know, the abbreviation used by Pubmed IS the MEDLINE abbreviation -- why then is there a difference?
  • DWL-SDCA
    edited October 9, 2023
    Search: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nlmcatalog/journals/ for:

    "J Mol Med (Berl)"[ta]


    I tried to directly link to the page but the forum software objects to the parentheses in the URL.

    edit:
    Zotero is taking the Uniform Title:
    Journal of molecular medicine (Berlin, Germany)

    and abbreviating that without properly dropping the nation.

    This is only one of several Zotero-calculated journal abbreviations with a similar problem (including the nation). Note, however, that sometimes it is correct to include the nation in the abbreviation!
  • marthoe
    Thanks for the pointer to this website. But I believe the issue remains.
    On this website it is stated that the official NLM abbreviation (which is, as far as I understand, the "new" term for Medline abbreviation) is: J Mol Med (Berl)

    However, when I use "Use MEDLINE journal abbreviations" I get: J Mol Med Berl Ger
  • DWL-SDCA
    edited October 9, 2023
    @marthoe
    Yes. The issue remains.

    I felt the problem so significant that I paid @emilianoeheyns to modify the MODS export script to eliminate the Zotero (and the sometimes crazy publisher-provided) abbreviations so that I could provide my own ISSN-linked abbreviation list.

    Please let me say that it was money very well-spent and that literally every day I silently thank him for his skillful work.
  • marthoe
    Good to know that it is not some weird special case with my own library or so ...

    I am really not an expert, but if the "Use Medline journal abbreviation" really links to that NLM site, it should not be too difficult for the experts to read out the field "NLM Title Abbreviation:" --- but I fear that I am too naive here. This is probably not a readout from that website but rather from a table that needs to be updated?

    Anyways, it is not a pressing problem for me. It´s only a few journals that are affected and the damage is minimal IMHO. J Mol Med (Berl) or J Mol Med Berl Ger - who cares?
  • adamsmith
    It doesn't link to that catalog -- it relies on a built in list of journals and their abbreviations that originally came from MEDLINE followed by an algorithm for abbreviating individual words according to ISO standards as used in MEDLINE (which is what's happening here).

    We don't have a good mechanism for fixing errors in that list (e.g., by adding journal names) currently, though one should exist.
  • marthoe
    Thank you for the information @adamsmith. Would it be helpful for the developers to provide a current list/table of medline-listed journals and their official "NLM Title Abbreviations"?
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