World citation and collaboration networks: uncovering the role of geography in science

Raj Kumar Pan, Kimmo Kaski, Santo Fortunato

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleScientificpeer-review

224 Citations (Scopus)
231 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Modern information and communication technologies, especially the Internet, have diminished the role of spatial distances and territorial boundaries on the access and transmissibility of information. This has enabled scientists for closer collaboration and internationalization. Nevertheless, geography remains an important factor affecting the dynamics of science. Here we present a systematic analysis of citation and collaboration networks between cities and countries, by assigning papers to the geographic locations of their authors’ affiliations. The citation flows as well as the collaboration strengths between cities decrease with the distance between them and follow gravity laws. In addition, the total research impact of a country grows linearly with the amount of national funding for research & development. However, the average impact reveals a peculiar threshold effect: the scientific output of a country may reach an impact larger than the world average only if the country invests more than about 100,000 USD per researcher annually.
Original languageEnglish
Article number902
Pages (from-to)1-7
JournalScientific Reports
Volume2
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2012
MoE publication typeA1 Journal article-refereed

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