Heterogeneity of collaboration and its relationship with research impact in a biomedical field

This paper analyses existing trends in the collaborative structure of the Pharmacology and Pharmacy field in Spain and explores its relationship with research impact. The evolution in terms of size of the research community, the typology of collaborative links (national, international) and the scope of the collaboration (size of links, type of partners) are studied by means of different measures based on co-authorship. Growing heterogeneity of collaboration and impact of research are observed over the years. Average journal impact (MNJS) and citation score (MNCS) normalised to world average tend to grow with the number of authors, the number of institutions and collaboration type. Both national and international collaboration show MNJS values above the country’s average, but only internationally co-authored publications attain citation rates above the world’s average. This holds at country and institutional sector levels, although not all institutional sectors obtain the same benefit from collaboration. Multilateral collaboration with high-level R&D countries yields the highest values of research impact, although the impact of collaboration with low-level R&D countries has been optimised over the years. Although scientific collaboration is frequently based on individual initiative, policy actions are required to promote the more heterogeneous types of collaboration.Peer reviewe

Identifying Geographic Clusters: A Network Analytic Approach

In recent years there has been a growing interest in the role of networks and clusters in the global economy. Despite being a popular research topic in economics, sociology and urban studies, geographical clustering of human activity has often studied been by means of predetermined geographical units such as administrative divisions and metropolitan areas. This approach is intrinsically time invariant and it does not allow one to differentiate between different activities. Our goal in this paper is to present a new methodology for identifying clusters, that can be applied to different empirical settings. We use a graph approach based on k-shell decomposition to analyze world biomedical research clusters based on PubMed scientific publications. We identify research institutions and locate their activities in geographical clusters. Leading areas of scientific production and their top performing research institutions are consistently identified at different geographic scales

[Protocol] Visual feedback of the individual's medical imaging results for changing health behaviours in clinical and non-clinical populations

Primary objective To assess the extent to which presentation to the individual of images of their own body created during medical imaging procedures increases or decreases health behaviours such as: 1. dietary fat intake; 2. physical activity levels; 3. smoking; 4. alcohol use; 5. damaging exposure to sunlight or other sources of ultraviolet radiation. This will be considered in comparison to the impact of communicating the same findings in a way which does not involve showing the person the source images derived from the imaging procedure (such as solely through oral feedback, or a written report). Secondary objective A secondary objective is to determine the impact of this feedback on consumers': 1. understanding of the relevant condition and of the risk information they have been given; 2. perceived severity and risk of disease; 3. perceived control over the disease risk; 4. perceived effectiveness of the risk-reducing behaviour; 5. emotional response, including general anxiety and condition-specific worry

The effect of multidisciplinary collaborations on research diversification

This work verifies whether research diversification by a scientist is in some measure related to their collaboration with multidisciplinary teams. The analysis considers the publications achieved by 5300 Italian academics in the sciences over the period 2004-2008. The findings show that a scientist's outputs resulting from research diversification are more often than not the result of collaborations with multidisciplinary teams. The effect becomes more pronounced with larger and particularly with more diversified teams. This phenomenon is observed both at the overall level and for the disciplinary macro-areas

A Comparison of U. S. and European University-Industry Relations in the Life Sciences

We draw on diverse data sets to compare the institutional organization of upstream life science research across the United States and Europe. Understanding cross-national differences in the organization of innovative labor in the life sciences requires attention to the structure and evolution of biomedical networks involving public research organizations (universities, government laboratories, nonprofit research institutes, and research hospitals), science-based biotechnology firms, and multinational pharmaceutical corporations. We use network visualization methods and correspondence analyses to demonstrate that innovative research in biomedicine has its origins in regional clusters in the United States and in European nations. But the scientific and organizational composition of these regions varies in consequential ways. In the United States, public research organizations and small firms conduct R&D across multiple therapeutic areas and stages of the development process. Ties within and across these regions link small firms and diverse public institutions, contributing to the development of a robust national network. In contrast, the European story is one of regional specialization with a less diverse group of public research organizations working in a smaller number of therapeutic areas. European institutes develop local connections to small firms working on similar scientific problems, while cross-national linkages of European regional clusters typically involve large pharmaceutical corporations. We show that the roles of large and small firms differ in the United States and Europe, arguing that the greater heterogeneity of the U. S. system is based on much closer integration of basic science and clinical development

A quantitative perspective on ethics in large team science

The gradual crowding out of singleton and small team science by large team endeavors is challenging key features of research culture. It is therefore important for the future of scientific practice to reflect upon the individual scientist's ethical responsibilities within teams. To facilitate this reflection we show labor force trends in the US revealing a skewed growth in academic ranks and increased levels of competition for promotion within the system; we analyze teaming trends across disciplines and national borders demonstrating why it is becoming difficult to distribute credit and to avoid conflicts of interest; and we use more than a century of Nobel prize data to show how science is outgrowing its old institutions of singleton awards. Of particular concern within the large team environment is the weakening of the mentor-mentee relation, which undermines the cultivation of virtue ethics across scientific generations. These trends and emerging organizational complexities call for a universal set of behavioral norms that transcend team heterogeneity and hierarchy. To this end, our expository analysis provides a survey of ethical issues in team settings to inform science ethics education and science policy.Comment: 13 pages, 5 figures, 1 table. Keywords: team ethics; team management; team evaluation; science of scienc

Authorship analysis of specialized vs diversified research output

The present work investigates the relations between amplitude and type of collaboration (intramural, extramural domestic or international) and output of specialized versus diversified research. By specialized or diversified research, we mean within or beyond the author's dominant research topic. The field of observation is the scientific production over five years from about 23,500 academics. The analyses are conducted at the aggregate and disciplinary level. The results lead to the conclusion that in general, the output of diversified research is no more frequently the fruit of collaboration than is specialized research. At the level of the particular collaboration types, international collaborations weakly underlie the specialized kind of research output; on the contrary, extramural domestic and intramural collaborations are weakly associated with diversified research. While the weakness of association remains, exceptions are observed at the level of the individual disciplines