How to format your references using the Vadose Zone Journal citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Vadose Zone Journal. 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
Seife, C. 2000. PARTICLE PHYSICS: CERN Collider Glimpses Supersymmetry--Maybe. Science 289(5477): 227a–8a.
A journal article with 2 authors
Remondes, M., and E.M. Schuman. 2002. Direct cortical input modulates plasticity and spiking in CA1 pyramidal neurons. Nature 416(6882): 736–740.
A journal article with 3 authors
Labeit, A., F. Peinemann, and A. Kedir. 2013. Cervical cancer screening service utilisation in UK. Sci. Rep. 3: 2362.
A journal article with 6 or more authors
Hoffman, J.E., K. McElroy, D.-H. Lee, K.M. Lang, H. Eisaki, et al. 2002. Imaging quasiparticle interference in Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8+delta. Science 297(5584): 1148–1151.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book
Deutscher Beton- und Bautechnik-Ver. 2015. Beispiele zur Bemessung nach Eurocode 2. Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim, Germany.
An edited book
Liong, M.-T., editor. 2011. Probiotics: Biology, Genetics and Health Aspects. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg.
A chapter in an edited book
Manzon, R.G., J.H. Youson, and J.A. Holmes. 2015. Lamprey Metamorphosis. In: Docker, M.F., editor, Lampreys: Biology, Conservation and Control: Volume 1. Springer Netherlands, Dordrecht. p. 139–214

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 Vadose Zone Journal.

Blog post
Andrews, R. 2017. China Is Now Home To The World’s Largest Floating Solar Power Plant. IFLScience. https://www.iflscience.com/environment/china-home-worlds-largest-floating-solar-power-plant/ (accessed 30 October 2018).

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. 2016. Polar Satellites: NOAA Faces Challenges and Uncertainties that Could Affect the Availability of Critical Weather Data. 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
Eisenberg, D.A. 2012. Effectiveness of an eel curriculum on student achievement for the California earth science standard on ocean currents A comparative analysis.

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
Belson, K., and M. Pilon. 2012. Concern Raised Over Painkiller’s Use in Sports. 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 (Seife, 2000).
This sentence cites two references (Seife, 2000; Remondes and Schuman, 2002).

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

  • Two authors: (Remondes and Schuman, 2002)
  • Three or more authors: (Hoffman et al., 2002)

About the journal

Full journal titleVadose Zone Journal
AbbreviationVadose Zone J.
ISSN (online)1539-1663
ScopeSoil Science

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