What are the different types of scientific articles?

What are the different types of scientific articles?

Research articles form the “core” of scientific literature – these are the articles written to present findings in specific areas, and are often targeted toward a specific audience of other scientists working in the same area.  Each research article includes enough background information (usually gained from other research articles and review articles) to provide a good context for the findings the authors are presenting.  They also include a good deal of technical detail, ideally allowing others in the field to replicate the experiments or use the same methods.  Research articles form the “primary literature”.
 
“Secondary literature” includes review articles.  These are written to give a broader and more comprehensive perspective of an area than that given by a research article, and often compare and contrast findings of various research articles.   They can be written at different levels, some highly “technical”, oriented toward scientists working in a specific field, or to a broader scientific audience.