Scientometric study on research performance in China

A bibliometric analysis of publications by the Chemistry Department, Seoul National University, Korea, 1992-1998

This study examined research performance of chemists at Seoul National University (SNU), the most prestigious university in Korea, using the numbers of articles appearing in journals and the numbers of citations received by those articles covered by Science Citation Index (SCI) CD-ROM, 1992-1998. A total of 651 papers published by the 29 faculty members of the Chemistry Department at SNU and indexed by SCI during the seven-year period were considered. US and Korean journals published in English were utilised predominantly, followed by UK journals. Major journals used by Korean chemists are Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society (Korea), Tetrahedron Letters (UK), Journal of Physical Chemistry A (USA), Journal of Chemical Physics (USA) and Journal of the American Chemical Society (USA). In addition, half the Korean papers were published in journals having an impact factor of one or more. Among the 651 publications, 388 were cited 2,376 times. Considering the number of citations received by Korean papers, in terms of journal country, papers published in US, UK and Dutch journals have a higher visibility than others. No correlation between the number of papers by a particular chemist and the average number of citations per paper for that chemist was indicated by the study.

Independent research of China in Science Citation Index Expanded during 1980-2011

The study explores the characteristics of China's independent research articles published from 1980 to 2011, based on the database of Science Citation Index Expanded. The publication outputs of seven major industrialized countries including Canada, France, Japan, Germany, Italy, the UK, and the USA were compared with China. Annual production, field performance, research emphases and trends, top articles, as well as main institutional and individual contributors by its top cited articles were analyzed. Some newly developed indicators related to words in title, author keywords, KeyWords Plus, first author, corresponding author, and Y-index were employed to provide in-depth information on topic and author contributions. Results showed that China has been closing the gap with the USA with the greatest growth, and has stood the second since 2006. Most top cited articles were published in 2000s, made up approximately seven tenths of total articles. Pronounced activities were found in chemistry and physics related categories. The core categories included multidisciplinary chemistry, physical chemistry, multidisciplinary materials science, and applied physics. Moreover, China's performance of nanotechnology and science, especially carbon nanotubes, nanoparticles, nanowires, and nanostructures showed dramatic growth. Six top articles with at least 1000 citations were examined, and were observed to concern medicine, nanotube, and adsorption. In addition, main contributing institutions and authors were also revealed and evaluated. Chinese Academy of Sciences played a dominant role, and Tsinghua University, Peking University and five universities in Hong Kong showed good scientific performance.