How to format your references using the Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta. 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:

PaperpileThe citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNoteDownload the output style file
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and othersThe style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most references management programs.
BibTeXBibTeX 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
Hemingway J. (2004) Taking aim at mosquitoes. Nature 430, 936.
A journal article with 2 authors
Loehlin D. W. and Carroll S. B. (2014) Evolutionary biology: Sex, lies and butterflies. Nature 507, 172–173.
A journal article with 3 authors
Okada D., Ozawa F. and Inokuchi K. (2009) Input-specific spine entry of soma-derived Vesl-1S protein conforms to synaptic tagging. Science 324, 904–909.
A journal article with 4 or more authors
Narymbetov B., Omerzu A., Kabanov V. V., Tokumoto M., Kobayashi H. and Mihailovic D. (2000) Origin of ferromagnetic exchange interactions in a fullerene-organic compound. Nature 407, 883–885.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book
Shover L. (2010) Trading Options in Turbulent Markets., John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, NJ.
An edited book
Olewiler N., Francisco H. A. and Ferrer A. J. G. eds. (2016) Marine and Coastal Ecosystem Valuation, Institutions, and Policy in Southeast Asia. 1st ed. 2016., Springer, Singapore.
A chapter in an edited book
Whaanga H. and Matamua R. (2016) Matariki Tāpuapua: Pools of Traditional Knowledge and Currents of Change. In Everyday Knowledge, Education and Sustainable Futures: Transdisciplinary Approaches in the Asia-Pacific Region (eds. M. Robertson and P. K. E. Tsang). Education in the Asia-Pacific Region: Issues, Concerns and Prospects. Springer, Singapore. pp. 59–70.

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 Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta.

Blog post
Andrew E. (2015) ESA Launched Sentinel Satellite To Monitor Earth. IFLScience.

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 (2004) Information Technology Management: Improvements Needed in Strategic Planning, Performance Measurement, and Investment Management Governmentwide., U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC.

Theses and dissertations

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

Doctoral dissertation
Garcia C. A. (2010) Tracking chemistry self-efficacy and achievement in a preparatory chemistry course. Doctoral dissertation, University of South Florida.

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
Rashbaum W. K. and Schwirtz M. (2017) Amid Rikers Chaos, Jails Chief Often Left Town. New York Times, A1.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by name and year in parentheses:

This sentence cites one reference (Hemingway, 2004).
This sentence cites two references (Hemingway, 2004; Loehlin and Carroll, 2014).

Here are examples of in-text citations with multiple authors:

  • Two authors: (Loehlin and Carroll, 2014)
  • Three or more authors: (Narymbetov et al., 2000)

About the journal

Full journal titleGeochimica et Cosmochimica Acta
AbbreviationGeochim. Cosmochim. Acta
ISSN (print)0016-7037
ScopeGeochemistry and Petrology

Other styles