A Novel Metric for Assessing National Strength in Scientific Research: Understanding China's Research Output in Quantum Technology through Collaboration

doi:10.2478/jdis-2022-0019

Abstract

Abstract:

Purpose: The 5th Plenary Session of the 19th Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee clearly states that developing science and technology through self-reliance and self-strengthening provides the strategic underpinning for China's development. Based on this background, this paper explores a metric model for assessing national scientific research strength through collaboration on research papers.

Design/methodology/approach: We propose a novel metric model for assessing national scientific research strength, which sets two indicators, national scientific self-reliance (SR) and national academic contribution (CT), to reflect “self-reliance” and “self-strengthening” respectively. Taking the research papers in quantum technology as an example, this study analyzes the scientific research strength of various countries around the world, especially China in quantum technology.

Findings: The results show that the research of quantum technology in China has always been relatively independent with fewer international collaboration papers and located in a more marginal position in cooperation networks. China's academic contribution (CT) to global quantum technology research is increasing and has been greater than that of the United States in 2020. Combining the two indicators, CT and SR, China's research strength in the quantum field closely follows the United States, and the United States is the most powerful with high research autonomy.

Research limitations: This paper only reflects China's scientific research strength in quantum technology from collaboration on research papers and doesn't consider the segmentation of quantum technology and the industrial upstream and downstream aspects, which need further study.

Practical implications: The model is helpful to better understand the national scientific research strength in a certain field from “self-reliance” and “self-strengthening”.

Originality/value: We propose a novel metric model to measure the national scientific research strength from the perspective of “self-reliance” and “self-strengthening”, which provides a solid basis for the assessment of the strength level of scientific research in countries/regions and institutions.

Key words: National Scientific Research Strength, Academic Contribution, National Scientific Self-reliance Index, Quantum Technology Research

Yuqi Wang , Yue Chen , Zhiqi Wang , Kang Wang , and Kai Song .(2022). A Novel Metric for Assessing National Strength in Scientific Research: Understanding China's Research Output in Quantum Technology through Collaboration. Journal of Data and Information Science, 7(4), 39-60. DOI: 10.2478/jdis-2022-0019

0
/ / Recommend

Add to citation manager EndNote|Ris|BibTeX

URL: http://manu47.magtech.com.cn/Jwk3_jdis/EN/10.2478/jdis-2022-0019

http://manu47.magtech.com.cn/Jwk3_jdis/EN/Y2022/V7/I4/39

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Figures/Tables 15

Table 1.

Table 2.

Figure 1.

Figure 2.

Table 3.

Table 4.

Table 5.

Table 6.

Figure 3.

Appendix 1.

Table 7.

Table 8.

Table 9.

Figure 4.

Figure 5.

References 50

[1]	Abbas, A.M. (2010). Generalized Linear Weights for Sharing Credits Among Multiple Authors. arXiv:1012.5477 [cs]. http://arxiv.org/abs/1012.5477
[2]	Abbas, A.M. (2011). Weighted indices for evaluating the quality of research with multiple authorship. Scientometrics, 88(1), 107-131. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-011-0389-7 doi: 10.1007/s11192-011-0389-7
[3]	BINOSI, D., & CALARCO, T. (2017). Quantum Information Classification Scheme-QICS. http://qurope.eu/content/qics-book
[4]	Bornmann, Lutz, Leydesdorff, Loet, Wagner, Caroline, & S. (2015). Recent Developments in China-US Cooperation in Science. Minerva: A Review of Science, Learning and Policy, 53(3), 199-214.
[5]	Brandes, U. (2001). A faster algorithm for betweenness centrality. The Journal of Mathematical Sociology, 25(2), 163-177. https://doi.org/10.1080/0022250X.2001.9990249 doi: 10.1080/0022250X.2001.9990249
[6]	Charles & Oppenheim. (1998). Fractional counting of multiauthored publications. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 49(5), 482-482. https://doi.org/10.1002/(sici)1097-4571(19980415)49:5<482::aid-asi11>3.3.co;2-8 doi: 10.1002/(SICI)1097-4571(19980415)49:5<482::AID-ASI10>3.0.CO;2-K
[7]	Chen, K.H., Zhang, Y., & Fu, X.L. (2019). International research collaboration: An emerging domain of innovation studies? Research Policy, 48(1), 149-168. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.respol.2018.08.005 doi: 10.1016/j.respol.2018.08.005
[8]	Cho, C.-C., Hu, M.-W., & Liu, M.-C. (2010). Improvements in productivity based on co-authorship: A case study of published articles in China. Scientometrics, 85(2), 463-470. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-010-0263-z doi: 10.1007/s11192-010-0263-z
[9]	Cole, J.R., & Cole, S. (1974). Social Stratification in Science. American Journal of Physics, 42(10), 923-924. https://doi.org/10.1119/1.1987897 doi: 10.1119/1.1987897
[10]	Díaz-Faes, A.A., Costas, R., Galindo, M.P., & Bordons, M. (2015). Unravelling the performance of individual scholars: Use of Canonical Biplot analysis to explore the performance of scientists by academic rank and scientific field. Journal of Informetrics, 9(4), 722-733. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.joi.2015.04.006 doi: 10.1016/j.joi.2015.04.006
[11]	Edler, J. (2010). International Policy Coordination for Collaboration in S&T (SSRN Scholarly Paper ID 1542583). Social Science Research Network. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1542583
[12]	Egghe, L. (1991). Theory of collaboration and collaborative measures. Information Processing & Management, 27(2), 177-202. https://doi.org/10/b84gmq doi: 10.1016/0306-4573(91)90048-Q
[13]	Egghe, L., Rousseau, R., & Van Hooydonk, G. (2000). Methods for accrediting publications to authors or countries: Consequences for evaluation studies. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51(2), 145-157. https://doi.org/10.1002/(SICI)1097-4571(2000)51:2<145::AID-ASI6>3.0.CO;2-9 doi: 10.1002/(SICI)1097-4571(2000)51:2<145::AID-ASI6>3.0.CO;2-9
[14]	Fedorov, A.K., Akimov, A.V., Biamonte, J.D., Kavokin, A.V., Khalili, F.Y., Kiktenko, E.O., Kolachevsky, N.N., Kurochkin, Y.V., Lvovsky, A.I., Rubtsov, A.N., Shlyapnikov, G.V., Straupe, S.S., Ustinov, A.V., & Zheltikov, A.M. (2019). Quantum technologies in Russia. Quantum Science and Technology, 4(4), 040501. https://doi.org/10.1088/2058-9565/ab4472
[15]	González-Alcaide, G., Park, J., Huamaní, C., & Ramos, J.M. (2017). Dominance and leadership in research activities: Collaboration between countries of differing human development is reflected through authorship order and designation as corresponding authors in scientific publications. PLOS ONE, 12(8), e0182513. https://doi.org/10/gbqt6b
[16]	Haeffner-Cavaillon, N., & Graillot-Gak, C. (2009). The use of bibliometric indicators to help peer-review assessment. Archivum Immunologiae et Therapiae Experimentalis, 57(1), 33. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00005-009-0004-2 doi: 10.1007/s00005-009-0004-2 pmid: 19219530
[17]	Hagen, N.T. (2010). Harmonic publication and citation counting: Sharing authorship credit equitably—not equally, geometrically or arithmetically. Scientometrics, 84(3), 785-793. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-009-0129-4 pmid: 20700372
[18]	Harnad, S. (2008). Validating Research Performance Metrics Against Peer Rankings. Ethics in Science & Environmental Politics, 8(1), 111-120. https://doi.org/10.3354/esep00088
[19]	He, T.W. (2009). International scientific collaboration of China with the G7 countries. Scientometrics, 80(3), 571-582. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-007-2043-y doi: 10.1007/s11192-007-2043-y
[20]	Hodge, S.E., Greenberg, D.A., & Challice, C.E. (1981). Publication Credit. Science, 213(4511), 950-952.
[21]	Inglesi-Lotz, R., & Pouris, A. (2011). Scientometric impact assessment of a research policy instrument: The case of rating researchers on scientific outputs in South Africa. Scientometrics, 88(3), 747. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-011-0440-8. doi: 10.1007/s11192-011-0440-8
[22]	International Monetary Fund. (2018). World Economic Outlook, April 2018: Cyclical Upswing Structural Change. IMF. https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/WEO/Issues/2018/03/20/world-economic-outlook-april-2018
[23]	Jia, Z.J., Hong, B., Chen, D.M., Huang, Q.H., Yang, Z.G., Yin, C., Deng, X.Q., & Liu, J.M. (2014). China's Growing Contribution to Global Intracranial Aneurysm Research (1991-2012): A Bibliometric Study. PLOS ONE, 9(3), e91594. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0091594
[24]	Kato, M., & Ando, A. (2017). National ties of international scientific collaboration and researcher mobility found in Nature and Science. Scientometrics, 110(2), 673-694. https://doi.org/10/f9vc64 doi: 10.1007/s11192-016-2183-z
[25]	Kim, J., & Diesner, J. (2014). A network-based approach to coauthorship credit allocation. Scientometrics, 101(1), 587-602. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-014-1253-3 doi: 10.1007/s11192-014-1253-3
[26]	Lindsey, D. (1980). Production and Citation Measures in the Sociology of Science: The Problem of Multiple Authorship. Social Studies of Science, 10(2), 145-162. https://doi.org/10.1177/030631278001000202 doi: 10.1177/030631278001000202
[27]	Liu, J., & Mei, Y.E. (2015). Research on the Subject Development Forecast Based on ESl and lnCites—Taking China University of Geosciences as an Example. Sci-Tech Information Development & Economy. http://en.cnki.com.cn/Article_en/CJFDTotal-KJQB201506056.htm
[28]	Liu, X.Z., & Fang, H. (2012a). Fairly sharing the credit of multi-authored papers and its application in the modification of h-index and g-index. Scientometrics, 91(1), 37-49. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-011-0571-y doi: 10.1007/s11192-011-0571-y
[29]	Liu, X.Z., & Fang, H. (2012b). Modifying h-index by allocating credit of multi-authored papers whose author names rank based on contribution. Journal of Informetrics, 6(4), 557-565. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.joi.2012.05.002 doi: 10.1016/j.joi.2012.05.002
[30]	Lukovits, I., & Vinkler, P. (1995). Correct credit distribution: A model for sharing credit... Social Indicators Research. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=9601233217&site=ehost-live
[31]	Ma, T.C., Li, R.N., Ou, G.Y., & Yue, M.L. (2018). Topic based research competitiveness evaluation. Scientometrics, 117(2), 789-803. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-018-2891-7 doi: 10.1007/s11192-018-2891-7
[32]	Mallapaty, S. (2021). China's five-year plan focuses on scientific self-reliance. Nature, 591(7850), 353-354. https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-00638-3 doi: 10.1038/d41586-021-00638-3
[33]	Mokhnacheva, Yu, V., & Kharybina, T.N. (2011). Research performance of RAS institutions and Russian universities: A comparative bibliometric analysis. Herald of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 81(6), 569-574. https://doi.org/10.1134/S1019331611060104 doi: 10.1134/S1019331611060104
[34]	Morris, S.A., Yen, G., Wu, Z., & Asnake, B. (2003). Time line visualization of research fronts. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 54(5), 413-422. doi: 10.1002/asi.10227
[35]	Padma, T.V. (2020). India bets big on quantum technology [News]. Nature. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00288-x
[36]	Salehi, A.A. (2021). Iran has started developing quantum technology, Salehi says. Tehran Times. https://www.tehrantimes.com/news/457400/Iran-has-started-developing-quantum-technology-Salehi-says
[37]	Salton, G., & Mcgill, M.J. Introduction to Modern Information Retrieval[M]. New York: McGraw-Hill Book Copany, 1983.
[38]	Shibata, N., Kajikawa, Y., Takeda, Y., & Matsushima, K. (2008). Detecting emerging research fronts based on topological measures in citation networks of scientific publications. Technovation, 28(11), 758-775. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.technovation.2008.03.009 doi: 10.1016/j.technovation.2008.03.009
[39]	Small, H., Boyack, K.W., & Klavans, R. (2014). Identifying emerging topics in science and technology. Research Policy, 43(8), 1450-1467. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.respol.2014.02.005 doi: 10.1016/j.respol.2014.02.005
[40]	Small, H., & Upham, P. (2009). Citation structure of an emerging research area on the verge of application. Scientometrics, 79(2), 365-375. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-009-0424-0 doi: 10.1007/s11192-009-0424-0
[41]	Smith-Goodson, P. (2019). Quantum USA Vs. Quantum China: The World's Most Important Technology Race. https://www.forbes.com/sites/moorinsights/2019/10/10/quantum-usa-vs-quantum-china-the-worlds-most-important-technology-race/?sh=6f76589e72de
[42]	Tollefson, J. (2018). China declared world's largest producer of scientific articles. Nature, 553(7689), 390-390. https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-00927-4 doi: 10.1038/d41586-018-00927-4
[43]	Van Hooydonk, G. (1997). Fractional counting of multiauthored publications: Consequences for the impact of authors. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 48(10), 944-945. https://doi.org/10.1002/(SICI)1097-4571(199710)48:10<944::AID-ASI8>3.0.CO;2-1 doi: 10.1002/(SICI)1097-4571(199710)48:10<944::AID-ASI8>3.0.CO;2-1
[44]	Wang, L.L., & Wang, X.W. (2017). Who sets up the bridge? Tracking scientific collaborations between China and the European Union. Research Evaluation, 2. https://doi.org/10.1093/reseval/rvx009
[45]	Wang, X.W., Xu, S.M., Wang, Z., Peng, L., & Wang, C.L. (2013). International scientific collaboration of China: Collaborating countries, institutions and individuals. Scientometrics, 95(3), 885-894. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-012-0877-4 doi: 10.1007/s11192-012-0877-4
[46]	Wang, W.P. (2014). Study on the Patterns and Impacts of China's International Scientific and Technological Collaboration Based on Scientometrics. Doctoral dissertation, Beijing Institute of Technology.
[47]	Zhang, Z.Q., Chen, Y.W., Tao, C., Xu, J., & TIAN, Q.F. (2018). Bibliometric Analysis on International Competitive Situation of Quantum Information Research. WORLD SCI-TECH R&D, 40(1), 37-49.
[48]	Zheng, J., Zhao, Z.Y., Zhang, X., Chen, D.Z., & Huang, M.H. (2014). International collaboration development in nanotechnology: A perspective of patent network analysis. Scientometrics, 98(1), 683-702. https://doi.org/10/f5ns65 doi: 10.1007/s11192-013-1081-x
[49]	Zhou, P., & Glänzel, W. (2010). In-depth analysis on China's international cooperation in science. Scientometrics, 82(3), 597-612. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-010-0174-z doi: 10.1007/s11192-010-0174-z
[50]	Zou, Y.W., & Laubichler, M.D. (2017). Measuring the contributions of Chinese scholars to the research field of systems biology from 2005 to 2013. Scientometrics, 110(3), 1615-1631. https://doi.org/10/f9vfz2 doi: 10.1007/s11192-016-2213-x

Collaboration patterns	Dominant country	Largest contributing country	Subordinate country	Weight
Strongly dominant	i	i	j	5/15
Substrongly dominant	i	j		4/15
Dominant	i		j	3/15
Subweakly dominant		i	j	2/15
Weakly dominant			i j	1/15

No.	Collaboration country (Number of papers)	Collaboration strength^a	Collaboration papers
1	Sri Lanka (64); Cyprus (109)	0.51	43
2	Sri Lanka (64); Georgia (139)	0.46	43
3	Estonia (189); Sri Lanka (64)	0.39	43
4	Cyprus (109); Georgia (139)	0.38	47
5	Egypt (1,386); Saudi Arabia (1,567)	0.36	528

No.	Country	Betweenness Centrality	Degree Centrality	Closeness Centrality
1	France	0.0700	106	0.7650
2	South Africa	0.0607	90	0.7083
3	USA	0.0594	111	0.7846
4	Germany	0.0518	106	0.7650
5	Spain	0.0516	94	0.7183
6	China	0.0427	99	0.7391
7	England	0.0421	105	0.7612
8	India	0.0384	94	0.7217
9	Canada	0.0367	92	0.7116
10	Sweden	0.0335	89	0.7018

No.	Country	CT	Contribution proportion	No.	Country	CT	Contribution proportion
1	USA	1,593,667.96	30.57%	75	Cameroon	364.35	0.007%
2	China	639,792.41	12.28%	76	Iceland	358.65	0.007%
3	Germany	471,644.89	9.05%	77	Moldova	332.54	0.006%
4	England	317,155.23	6.08%	78	Indonesia	326.91	0.006%
5	Japan	230,317.08	4.42%	79	Ethiopia	294.08	0.006%
6	Italy	199,203.76	3.82%	80	Philippines	291.82	0.006%
7	France	198,179.40	3.80%	81	Czechoslovakia	281.92	0.005%
8	Canada	163,038.66	3.13%	82	Kazakhstan	238.84	0.005%
9	Austria	154,559.69	2.96%	83	Jordan	213.80	0.004%
10	Switzerland	135,561.92	2.60%	84	Kuwait	206.25	0.004%
11	Spain	113,040.28	2.17%	85	Sri Lanka	200.63	0.004%
12	Australia	111,733.35	2.14%	86	Oman	196.78	0.004%
13	India	91,204.80	1.75%	87	Lebanon	162.98	0.003%
14	Netherlands	80,271.91	1.54%	88	Malta	155.93	0.003%
15	South Korea	62,339.05	1.20%	89	Brunei	98.70	0.002%
16	Russia	61,630.01	1.18%	90	Azerbaijan	92.67	0.002%
17	Israel	60,244.46	1.16%	91	Palestine	83.25	0.002%
18	Poland	51,529.10	0.99%	92	Macedonia	81.75	0.002%
19	Sweden	46,708.93	0.90%	93	Vatican	74.46	0.001%
20	Brazil	41,762.49	0.80%	94	Bosnia & Herceg	72.07	0.001%
...	...	...	...	...	...	...	...
74	Bahrain	368.82	0.007%	147	Eritrea	0.23	0.000004%

	China	USA	Singapore	Japan	Australia	...	Algeria
China		↙10.36% ↑-9.66%	↙10.66% ↑-9.05%	↙11.76% ↑-5.10%	↙9.53% ↑-10.84%		↙6.67% ↑0
USA	↙20.02% ↑9.66%		↙12.97% ↑0.09%	↙12.92% ↑-1.58%	↙14.18% ↑0.91%		↙12.38% ↑1.90%
Singapore	↙19.71% ↑9.05%	↙12.88% ↑-0.09%		↙15.87% ↑5.333%	↙15.22% ↑4.03%		↙0.00% ↑0
Japan	↙16.86% ↑5.10%	↙14.51% ↑1.58%	↙10.54% ↑-5.33%		↙15.79% ↑5.53%		↙33.33% ↑33.33%
Australia	↙20.37% ↑10.84%	↙13.28% ↑-0.91%	↙11.19% ↑-4.03%	↙10.26% ↑-5.53%			↙0.00% ↑-33.33%
...						...	...
Algeria	↙6.67% ↑0	↙10.48% ↑-1.90%	↙0.00% ↑0	↙0.00% ↑-33.33%	↙33.33% ↑33.33%	...