Status of China in Science and Technology as Reflected in its Publications Output, 1997–2007
The study examines China’s performance in science and technology (S&T) during 1997–2007, based on several parameters including the country’s annual average growth rate, global publication share and rank, strong and weak subject areas (in terms of national priority, international collaborative share and global share), institutional profiles of select top institutions, the overall international collaboration profile and major collaborative partners, patterns of communication in national and international journals and characteristics of its top highly cited papers. The study also compares similarities of China’s research profile with nineteen other top productive countries.
Key labs and open labs in the Chinese scientific research system: qualitative and quantitative evaluation indicators
The introduction, construction and upgrading of a system of key labs and open labs are all results of a major S&T system reform in mainland China. A series of programmes extending over a period of 20 years has resulted in more than 160 key labs and nearly 400 open labs at present. Key labs as well as open labs are regularly evaluated qualitatively and quantitatively. The qualitative approach, however, is the more important part. A group of experts visits the lab so that the evaluation is based not only on written documents, but also on interviews and on a visual observation of the actual situation. In this article, special attention goes to the evaluation procedures for these labs used by the Chinese Government. Evaluation results from 1999 to 2003, based mainly on peer review, were collected. A comparison is made between qualitative indicators and quantitative indicators. Copyright , Beech Tree Publishing.
Age Structures of Scientific Collaboration in Chinese Computer Science
This paper is a scientometric study of the age structure of scientific collaboration in Chinese computer science. Analysis reveals some special age structures in scientific collaboration in Chinese computer science. Most collaborations are composed of scientists younger than thirty-six (Younger) or older than fifty (Elder). For two-dimensional collaboration formed by first and second authors, Younger-Elder and Younger-Younger are the predominant age structures. For three-dimensional collaboration formed by first, second and third authors, Younger-Younger-Elder and Younger-Younger-Younger are the most important age structures. Collaboration between two authors older than 38 amounts to only 6.4 percent of all two-person collaborations. Collaboration between two middle-aged scientists is seldom seen.Why do such types of age structure in Chinese computer science exist? We suggest a tentative explanation based on analyses of the age composition of all authors, the age distributions of the authors in different ranks, and the name-ordering of authors in articles written by professors and their students.