The phrase "publish a paper" is correct and can be used in written English.
For example, "The professor expected his students to publish a paper before the end of the year."
I did publish a paper in 1947.
They will soon publish a paper presenting their findings.
"We hope to publish a paper on this.
"You can't publish a paper on physics without the full experimental data and results.
When I publish a paper, I do not even let my colleagues know about it.
One recent analysis found that thousands of scientists publish a paper every five days.
(SHIFT plans to publish a paper on affirmative consent later this year).
Powles is shortly to publish a paper looking at DeepMind's relationship with the NHS.
By 2004, we'd found enough evidence to publish a paper in Nature where we declared, "Humans were born to run".
"We are not doing research to publish a paper but research we can get on the back of a tractor".
Later this month, the government is due to publish a paper setting out whether, and how, air travel can grow.
