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The Explanatory Power of Citations: a New Approach to Unpacking Impact in Science - Scientometrics

The Explanatory Power of Citations: a New Approach to Unpacking Impact in Science - Scientometrics

This article proposes a text clustering approach to derive contextual aspects of individual citations and the relationship between cited and citing work in an automated and scalable fashion. The method reveals a focal publication's absorption and use within the scientific community. It can also facilitate impact assessments at all levels. 

How Human Capital, Universities of Excellence, Third Party Funding, Mobility and Gender Explain Productivity in German Political Science - Scientometrics

How Human Capital, Universities of Excellence, Third Party Funding, Mobility and Gender Explain Productivity in German Political Science - Scientometrics

Apart from generally showing why political scientists publish more or less, this article specifically identifies accumulative advantage as the principal reason why women increasingly fall behind men over the course of their careers.

'Free to Think 2021' Report of the Scholars at Risk Academic Freedom Monitoring Project

'Free to Think 2021' Report of the Scholars at Risk Academic Freedom Monitoring Project

Free to Think 2021 is the seventh installment of an annual report by SAR's Academic Freedom Monitoring Project. The report analyzes 332 attacks on higher education communities in 65 countries and territories.

Climate Policy, Regulation and Governance

Climate Policy, Regulation and Governance

The articles presented here range from broad views on climate change governance in agroforestry systems and insights from climate-funded food system projects, to the nationally specific, exploring regulatory contexts in the UK, China, and Mexico. 

The Southern Ocean is Still Swallowing Large Amounts of Humans' Carbon Dioxide Emissions

The Southern Ocean is Still Swallowing Large Amounts of Humans' Carbon Dioxide Emissions

A 2018 study suggested the ocean surrounding Antarctica might be taking up less CO₂ than thought, but new data suggest it is still a carbon sink.

The Experimental Research Funder's Handbook (RoRI Working Paper No.6)

The Experimental Research Funder's Handbook (RoRI Working Paper No.6)

This Handbook aims to provide a practical resource for funders looking to move further or faster down the experimental path.

A Billion-dollar Donation: Estimating the Cost of Researchers' Time Spent on Peer Review

A Billion-dollar Donation: Estimating the Cost of Researchers' Time Spent on Peer Review

By design, our results are very likely to be under-estimates as they reflect only a portion of the total number of journals worldwide. The numbers highlight the enormous amount of work and time that researchers provide to the publication system, and the importance of considering alternative ways of …

The State of Social Science Research on COVID-19

The State of Social Science Research on COVID-19

This is the first scientometric study of the performance of social science research on COVID-19. It provides insight into the landscape, the research fields, and international collaboration in this domain. The results are useful for finding potential collaborators and for identifying the frontier and gaps in social science research on COVID-19 to shape future studies.

Reproducibility of Research During COVID‐19: Examining the Case of Population Density and the Basic Reproductive Rate from the Perspective of Spatial Analysis

Reproducibility of Research During COVID‐19: Examining the Case of Population Density and the Basic Reproductive Rate from the Perspective of Spatial Analysis

The emergence of the novel SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus and the global COVID-19 pandemic in 2019 led to explosive growth in scientific research. Given the high stakes of the situation, it is essential that scientific findings, on which good policy depends, are as robust as possible; as the empirical example shows, reproducibility is one of the keys to ensure this.

Advancing Transdisciplinary Adaptation Research Practice - Nature Climate Change

Advancing Transdisciplinary Adaptation Research Practice - Nature Climate Change

Transdisciplinary research is increasingly seen as critical for advancing climate change adaptation. Operationalizing transdisciplinary research in the global South, however, confronts ingrained cultural and systemic barriers to participatory research.

Climate Change to Stir Up Global Agriculture Within Next Decade

Climate Change to Stir Up Global Agriculture Within Next Decade

New computer simulations predict deep changes in growing conditions affecting the productivity of major crops already within the next 10 years if current global warming trends continue. 

Bird Population Declines and Species Turnover Are Changing the Acoustic Properties of Spring Soundscapes

Bird Population Declines and Species Turnover Are Changing the Acoustic Properties of Spring Soundscapes

Birdsong has long connected humans to nature. Historical reconstructions using bird monitoring and song recordings collected by citizen scientists reveal that the soundscape of birdsong in North America and Europe is both quieter and less varied, mirroring declines in bird diversity and abundance.

Incorporating Graduate-level Internships to Strengthen the STEM Workforce and Trainee Career Prospects

Incorporating Graduate-level Internships to Strengthen the STEM Workforce and Trainee Career Prospects

Universities and graduate institutions must adapt to meet the increasing demand for STEM laborers in non-academic sectors and provide relevant and robust training to their students.

Towards Globally Unique Identification of Physical Samples: Governance and Technical Implementation of the IGSN Global Sample Number

Towards Globally Unique Identification of Physical Samples: Governance and Technical Implementation of the IGSN Global Sample Number

Article: Towards Globally Unique Identification of Physical Samples: Governance and Technical Implementation of the IGSN Global Sample Number

No time to die: An in-depth analysis of James Bond's exposure to infectious agents

No time to die: An in-depth analysis of James Bond's exposure to infectious agents

Global travelers, whether tourists or secret agents, are exposed to infectious agents. We hypothesized that agents pre-occupied with espionage and counterterrorism may, at their peril, fail to correctly prioritize travel medicine.

Potentially Long-Lasting Effects of the Pandemic on Scientists

Potentially Long-Lasting Effects of the Pandemic on Scientists

The pandemic has caused disruption to many aspects of scientific research. In this Comment the authors describe the findings from surveys of scientists between April 2020 and January 2021, which suggests there was a decline in new projects started in that time.

Reply to the Comment by Heyard Et Al. Titled "Imaginary Carrot or Effective Fertiliser? A Rejoinder on Funding and Productivity" - Scientometrics

Reply to the Comment by Heyard Et Al. Titled "Imaginary Carrot or Effective Fertiliser? A Rejoinder on Funding and Productivity" - Scientometrics

Anti-SARS-CoV-2 Receptor Binding Domain Antibody Evolution After MRNA Vaccination - Nature

Anti-SARS-CoV-2 Receptor Binding Domain Antibody Evolution After MRNA Vaccination - Nature

Results suggest that boosting vaccinated individuals with currently available mRNA vaccines will increase plasma neutralizing activity but may not produce antibodies with equivalent breadth to those obtained by vaccinating convalescent individuals.

Publication Outperformance Among Global South Researchers: An Analysis of Individual-Level and Publication-Level Predictors of Positive Deviance

Publication Outperformance Among Global South Researchers: An Analysis of Individual-Level and Publication-Level Predictors of Positive Deviance

Research and development are central to economic growth, and a key challenge for countries of the global South is that their research performance lags behind that of the global North. Yet, among Southern researchers, a few significantly outperform their peers and can be styled research "positive deviants" (PDs). This paper asks: who are those PDs, what are their characteristics and how are they able to overcome some of the challenges facing researchers in the global South? 

Citation Patterns Between Impact-Factor and Questionable Journals

Citation Patterns Between Impact-Factor and Questionable Journals

One of the most fundamental issues in academia today is understanding the differences between legitimate and questionable publishing. This study's findings show that neither the impact factor of citing journals nor the size of cited journals is a good predictor of the number of citations to the questionable journals.

Imaginary Carrot or Effective Fertiliser? A Rejoinder on Funding and Productivity

Imaginary Carrot or Effective Fertiliser? A Rejoinder on Funding and Productivity

The question of whether and to what extent research funding enables researchers to be more productive is a crucial one. In their recent work, Mariethoz et al. (Scientometrics, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-020-03.855-1 ) claim that there is no significant relationship between project-based research funding and bibliometric productivity measures and conclude that this is the result of inappropriate allocation mechanisms. In this rejoinder, we argue that such claims are not supported by the data and analyses reported in the article.

Replication Studies for Undergraduate Theses to Improve Science and Education | FULL TEXT

Replication Studies for Undergraduate Theses to Improve Science and Education | FULL TEXT

FULL TEXT.  Requiring undergraduate students to perform what is termed original research for their thesis, an investigation that cannot constitute a replication of an existing study, is a failed opportunity for science and education, argues Daniel Quintana.