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  • NATURE INDEX

Why is China’s high-quality research footprint becoming more introverted?

Data from the Nature Index suggest China-based authors are increasingly publishing without international colleagues.
By
  1. Brian Owens

    1. Brian Owens is a freelance writer in New Brunswick, Canada.

When China overtook the United States in the Nature Index for contributions to natural-sciences research articles last year, it marked a watershed moment for the database and for Chinese science. Since the index was launched in 2014, China’s ‘Share’ — a Nature Index metric that takes into account the percentage of authors from a particular location on each paper — has been rising. In 2022, for the first time, China led the world, with a Share of 19,373, an increase of more than 21% from the previous year, well ahead of the US Share of 17,610.

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doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-023-03762-4

References

  1. Xie, Q. & Freeman, R. B. NBER https://doi.org/10.3386/w31306 (2023).

    Article  Google Scholar 

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