On the surface, there is not much difference. Especially in medical journals, it is difficult for editors to distinguish between the two.
"treatise" refers to "argumentative essay" (Ci Hai) and "research work" (Chinese Dictionary); "Argumentative essays and works, later also called argumentative essays" ("etymology thrown out. The definition of "paper" is "an article to discuss and study a certain problem" (Chinese dictionary); An academic paper is an article that systematically and concretely discusses and studies some knowledge "(Teaching Course of Writing, published by East China Normal University Press); Scientific papers should discuss some important experimental, theoretical or observational new knowledge, or the progress of a known principle in practical application "((how to write a scientific paper)), by M O 'Connor and others from the above" theory.
Looking up the national standards of People's Republic of China (PRC), I only saw the writing format of scientific and technological reports, dissertations and academic papers (see international UDC00181GB 771387), but I didn't find the writing format of the journal Thesis. According to "China Academic Journals (CD-ROM Edition) Retrieval and Evaluation Data Specification (Trial)" notified by the State Press and Publication Administration (Xinsheng [65437], the articles in academic journals are divided into "academic papers on theoretical and applied research, reports on practical technical achievements, articles on professional guidance and technical management, general dynamic information and documents". The types of references are "monographs, papers, newspaper articles, periodical articles, dissertations, reports, standards and patents". People's Republic of China (PRC) national standard defines academic papers as: "An academic paper is a scientific record of an academic subject with new scientific research achievements or innovative ideas and knowledge in experimental theory or observation, or a scientific summary of known principles that have made new progress in practice. Academic papers should provide new scientific and technological information, and their content should be discovery, invention, creation and progress, rather than repeating, imitating and copying the work of predecessors. " Admittedly, there are differences in the connotation and quality of academic papers, but academic papers do not have to be named as "papers" to reflect their true academic connotation. The division of works is also mixed with the editor's human factors to some extent, which inevitably makes some works misnamed.
In our opinion, according to the relevant national standards, it seems unnecessary to subdivide academic papers of journals into papers and theses. If it is creative subdivision, there should be corresponding objective basis and scientific division standard.