Top 20 countries in all fields, 1998-2008
Febuary 2009
ScienceWatch.com recently unveiled its annual ranking of the Top 20 countries according to research output and citation performance—and China has broken into the top five.
In this seventh annual ranking from ScienceWatch.com, countries are ranked according to research output and citation performance using data from Essential Science Indicators. The analysis, reflecting all fields of science, is based on papers published and cited between January 1998 and August 31, 2008.
As in the previous Top 20 rankings, the United States shows dominance according to the measures of total citations and number of published papers, with Germany, England, and Japan also making their customary strong showings in these categories. Significantly, China makes its first appearance in the top five of nations according to paper output.
And in the citations-per-paper ranking, Switzerland maintains the top position it established in previous rankings. While the nation produced a comparatively modest quantity of papers over the decade, its scientists displayed a knack for participation in high-impact work, notably a highly cited paper on protein modeling, along with several international collaborations reviewing particle physics, and a report detailing the sequence of the mouse genome.
Further reading
Was this article useful?
Download a PDF of all
February 2009's
KnowledgeLink articles
Register now for KnowledgeLink, our customizable email newsletter that delivers expert insight on:
- Global innovation
- Information professional development
- Intellectual property
- Pharmaceutical knowledge
- Scientific research