"cite a paper" is a correct and usable phrase in written English.
You can use it when you need to refer to or discuss a source you may have mentioned earlier in your work. For example, "Previous studies have suggested XYZ to be true; however, I believe we should cite a paper that provides evidence for the opposite."
Ever since it came out, Obama-bashers have loved to cite a paper by Baker, Bloom, and Davis claiming that policy uncertainty is holding back the recovery.
Republicans also cite a paper published last year by Christina Romer, a former chairwoman of President Obama's Council of Economic Advisers, and her husband, David Romer, which studied tax hikes in the United States since World War II.
The writer goes on to cite a paper by a the Journal of Foodservice Business Research which he says claims Canadian servers make $30 an hour on average when tips are accounted for.
They also cite a paper published in Japan on a brown bear (Ursus arctos) that salivated when presented with snake carcasses or a rope previously housed with snakes.
Authors cite a paper (Ref. [ 48]) (Authors comment: ref. [ 55] in final version) reporting a linear relationship between molecule's length and the strength of enantiomeric discrimination (value of alpha).
7) Introduction: in the sentence discussing heterochromatin islands, the authors should cite a paper by Zofall et al., Science, 335:96, 2012, that discusses dynamic heterochromatin domains in different parts of the genome.
In a new post, Mr Krugman cites a paper by John Irons and Josh Bivens which looks to refute the Reinhart-Rogoff conclusion.
It cites a paper from the Max Planck Institute, released earlier this year, which looks at the "cohort fertility" rates of adult women.
Treasury cites a paper that estimates that the benefits of corporate tax cuts take 20 years to flow through.
The Times recently cited a paper by David Romer (PDF), a professor of political economy at the University of California at Berkeley, that has become "the gospel for the antipunting faction".
He cites a paper he wrote in February last year called 12 Steps To Financial Disaster, "in which every single step is exactly how the crisis unfolded during the past six months.
