Mapping of neuroscience research: a quantitative analysis of publications output of China, 1999-2008

doi:10.5214/225

Annals of Neurosciences, Vol 17, No 2 (2010)

Annals of Neurosciences, Volume 17, Issue 2 (April), 2010

Research Article

Mapping of neuroscience research: a quantitative analysis of publications output of China, 1999-2008

Adarsh Bala¹ and B.M.Gupta²

¹Central Library, Government Medical College and Hospital, Sector 32, Chandigarh; ² National Institute of Science, Technology & Development Studies, New Delhi 110 012

KEY WORDS
Citation
Publications
China
Neuroscience

Corresponding Author
Adarsh Bala
E-mail : adarshbindu@rediffmail.com
Tel. : 0172-2665253
Mob. : 9872092287

ABSTRACT

Background: Neuroscience is one of the most active research fields in many countries including China since 1970. The Chinese neuroscientists are playing an ever growing and important role in IBRO activities for the development of worldwide cooperation in Brain research. Purpose: The main objective of this study is to analyze the research performance of China in neurosciences in national and global context, as reflected in its publication output during 1999-2008. Methods: This study is based on the Chinese publication data in neurosciences retrieved from the Scopus Citation database for the 10 years (1999-2008). Several parameters including total research output, its growth, rank and global publication share, citation impact, share of international collaborative papers and major collaborative partner countries and patterns of research communication in most productive journals were studied. Results: China's world ranking improved to 8^th position in 2008. The cumulative publication output of China accounts for 39.69 % share of international collaborative papers during 1999-2008. Chinese authors in neuroscience field together contributed 794 papers, with an average of 49.63 papers per author. Conclusion: The top 49 highly cited papers in neurosciences from China had scored higher impact with 126.73 citations per paper. These 49 high-cited papers have appeared in 25 journals and are affiliated to 32 Chinese institutions.

doi : 10.5214/ans.0972-7531.1017204

Introduction

Neuroscience is one of the most active research fields in many countries including China, which is an economically and scientifically emerging country with rapid developments occurring since 1970. Among the biological sciences at large, neuroscience is one of the most advanced fields in China.

Neurosciences as a distinct discipline or research program have been a rather recent event in most Chinese universities, research institutes and other organizations. However, the last few years have witnessed increased funding and an improved research environment for neurosciences in China, both of which facilitated an influx of Chinese neuroscientists trained abroad.

A recent team members from International Brain Research Organization's (IBRO) visited to neuroscience centres in China and later termed the country as 'The Chinese Neuroscience Dragon'. The neuroscience community is growing fast in China. In several Institutes in Beijing, Xi'an, Hangzhou and Shanghai, neuroscientists are playing an active and leading roles in the development of neuroscience in the country and a number of centers of excellence have been recently established. The Chinese neuroscientists are playing an ever growing and important role in IBRO activities for the development of worldwide cooperation in brain research. For the growth of neuroscience in China, a unique China-Australian collaboration in neurosciences has been formed between Queensland Brain Institute (QBI) and the Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Much of the progress in neurosciences has been driven by small group of foreign trained scientists who have paired up with Institutes in China. Neurosciences growth story in Beijing and Shanghai is largely as a result of dedication and hard work of a few prominent individuals, but Institutes in Chinese provinces have still a long way to go to establish neurosciences programs and centers.

A few quantitative studies analyzing neuroscience literature in some countries have been carried out in the past. Braun et al.¹ analyzed the characteristics of publication activity and co-authorship in world neurosciences literature. Evaluation of country research output in neurosciences have been carried out on Europe²^-³ (Mela & Mancardi, 2002) (Robert,2006), Spain⁴^-⁵ (Lopez-Munoz, 1996) (Gomez, 1990), Italy⁶ (Berardelli, 2005), Sweden⁷ (Glanzel, 2003), China⁸^-⁹ (Xu, 2003)(Han, 2008), and Cuba¹⁰ (Dorta-Contreras, 2008) by different scholars from time to time. The main objective of this study is to analyze the research performance of China in neurosciences in national and global context, as reflected in its publication output during 1999-2008. In particular, the study focuses on the following objectives: (i) To study the Chinese research output, its growth, rank and global publication share and impact, (ii) To study the patterns of international collaboration, (iii) To study the publication productivity and impact of leading institutions of China (iv) To study the characteristics of prolific authors and high cited-papers, and (v) To study the patterns of research communication in most productive journals.

Methods

This study is based on the Chinese publication data in neurosciences retrieved from the Scopus Citation database for last 10 years (1999-2008). Three-year citations window has been used for counting the citations and for accessing the impact of Chinese research output, which included leading Chinese institutions and authors.

Results

Global Publication Share and Rank

The global publication shares of the top 26 countries varies from 0.84% to 36.13% during 1999-2008. The United States tops the list with global publication share of 36.13% and holds first rank during 1999-08, followed by United Kingdom (10.92%, 2^nd rank), Germany (8.77%, 3^rd rank), Japan (8.09%, 4^th rank), Canada (5.71%, 5^th rank), France (5.46%, 6^th rank) and Italy (5.24%, 7^th rank). Netherlands, Australia, Spain, Sweden and China ranks between 8^th-12^th position (with their global publication share ranging from 2% to 3%). The countries that rank between 13^th and 20^th positions include Switzerland, Columbia, Brazil, Israel, Belgium, South Korea, Finland and Turkey with their global publication share ranging from 1% to 2%. The next six countries (India, Austria, Denmark, Poland, Russia and Taiwan) rank from 21^st to 26^th positions with their global share less than 1% (Table 1).

Among developed countries, that has shown decline in publication share from the year 1999 to the year 2008 are United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, France, Sweden, Finland and Russia. In contrast, developed countries that have shown rise in their publication share during the same period are Canada, Netherlands, Australia, Spain, Switzerland, Belgium, Finland, Turkey, Austria, Denmark and Poland. In contrast, most developing countries (except Columbia) has shown rise in their publication share from 1999 to 2008: China by 3.93%, South Korea by 1.42%, Brazil by 1.29%, India by 0.63%, Taiwan by 0.60% and Israel by 0.28% (Table 1).

China ranks at 12^th position among the top 26 countries in Neurology, with its global publication share of 2.03% during 1999-08. Brazil, South Korea and India ranks at 15^th, 18^th and 26^th position, with global publication share of 1.74%, 1.24% and 0.99% during 1999-08. China's global share has increased from 0.86% to 4.79% and also its world ranking from 21^st to 8^th from 1999 to 2008. In comparison, Brazil, South Korea and India's global publication share increased from 1.09% to 2.38%, 0.57% to 1.99% and from 0.72% to 1.35% from 1999 to 2008 and their global ranking increased from 15^th to 12^th, 18^th to 15^th and from 23rd to 19^th (Table 1).

China's publication output in Neurosciences

China's total cumulative publication output during 1999-0 consists of 9184 papers, with average number of papers per year as 918. Compared to China, the publication output of Brazil, South Korea and India during the same period consists of 7850 papers, 5625 papers and 4503 papers, with average number of papers per year as 785, 562 and 450 respectively. The cumulative number of publications of China increased from 2182 papers in 1999-03 to 7002 papers in 2004-08, witnessing a growth of 220.90% (Table 2). Compared to China, the cumulative publication output of Brazil, South Korea and India has increased from 2871 papers to 4979 papers, 1788 papers to 3837 papers and from 1737 papers to 2766 papers respectively from 1999-03 to 2004-08, witnessing a growth rate of 73.42%, 114.6% and 59.24% as against 20.59% growth of the world cumulative publication output during the same period (Table 2).

Table 1: Global publication output, publication share and rank of top 26 most productive countries in Neurosciences

S.No.	Country	No. of Papers			% Share of Papers			Rank
		1999–08	1999	2008	1999–08	1999	2008	1999–08	1999	2008
1	USA	163055	14360	18539	36.13	36.61	35.09	1	1	1
2	U.K.	49283	4284	5665	10.92	10.92	10.72	2	2	2
3	Germany	39594	3517	4664	8.77	8.97	8.83	3	4	3
4	Japan	36532	3643	3544	8.09	9.29	6.71	4	3	4
5	Canada	25786	2154	3237	5.71	5.49	6.13	5	6	5
6	France	24642	2395	2697	5.46	6.11	5.10	6	5	7
7	Italy	23634	2091	2845	5.24	5.33	5.38	7	7	6
8	Netherlands	13716	940	1830	3.04	2.40	3.46	8	10	9
9	Australia	13098	1020	1786	2.90	2.60	3.38	9	8	10
10	Spain	12044	918	1579	2.67	2.34	2.99	10	11	11
11	Sweden	9282	942	987	2.06	2.40	1.87	11	9	16
12	China	9184	337	2534	2.03	0.86	4.79	12	21	8
13	Switzerland	8699	692	1156	1.93	1.76	2.19	13	12	13
14	Columbia	7852	527	1063	1.74	1.34	2.01	14	14	14
15	Brazil	7850	429	1257	1.74	1.09	2.38	15	17	12
16	Israel	7484	559	900	1.66	1.42	1.70	16	13	17
17	Belgium	5636	435	739	1.25	1.11	1.40	17	16	18
18	South Korea	5580	224	1051	1.24	0.57	1.99	18	24	15
19	Finland	4580	451	452	1.01	1.15	0.85	19	15	24
20	Turkey	4540	181	694	1.00	0.46	1.31	20	26	20
21	India	4503	284	715	0.99	0.72	1.35	21	23	19
22	Austria	4387	349	485	0.97	0.89	0.92	22	19	23
23	Denmark	4302	346	535	0.95	0.88	1.01	23	20	22
24	Poland	4136	302	419	0.92	0.77	0.79	24	22	25
25	Russia	3825	424	405	0.85	1.08	0.77	25	18	26
26	Taiwan	3787	219	615	0.84	0.56	1.16	26	25	21
	World	451331	39221	52836

Table 2: Publication output and citations received by China, Brazil, South Korea and India Papers in Neurosciences, 1999-08

	China	Brazil	South Korea	India
	TP TC ACPP	TP TC ACPP	TP TC ACPP	TP TC ACPP
1999	337 1849 5.49	429 2008 4.68	224 1934 8.63	284 700 2.46
2000	386 2343 6.07	527 3212 6.09	312 2329 7.46	319 1416 4.44
2001	361 2128 5.89	533 2949 5.53	336 2503 7.45	312 1308 4.19
2002	460 3165 6.88	653 3746 5.74	391 2928 7.49	359 1308 3.46
2003	638 4640 7.27	729 4799 6.58	525 4313 8.22	463 1694 3.66
2004	789 6267 7.94	733 4644 6.34	554 4999 9.02	411 1888 4.59
2005	942 7957 8.45	872 5589 6.41	646 5994 9.28	464 2349 5.06
2006	1284 9282 7.23	1020 6013 5.90	772 5802 7.52	546 2626 4.81
2007	1453	1097	814	630
2008	2534	1257	1051	715
99–03	2182	2871	1788	1737
04–08	7002	4979	3837	2766
99–08	9184	7850	5625	4503
TP = Total Paper; TC = Total Citations; ACPP = Average Citation per Paper

In terms of impact and quality, the average citations per paper registered by China's publication output during 1999-06 were 7.24. In comparison, South Korea publications have registered a comparative higher impact of 8.29 than China, followed by Brazil (5.99) and India (4.21) with comparative less impact for their publications during the same period. The average citations per paper for China's cumulative publications decreased from 7.70 in 1999-02 to 7.24 in 2003-06. In comparison, the average citations per paper for cumulative publications of Brazil, South Korea and India decreased from 6.27 to 5.99, 8.61 to 8.29 and from 4.54 to 4.21 from 1999-02 to 2003-06 (Table 2).

International collaborative share in China's publication output

Based on the publication data, the total cumulative International collaborative papers of China consist of 3645 papers, which accounts for 39.69% share in the cumulative output of China in Neurosciences during 1999-08. In comparison, South Korea's International collaborative papers share in their cumulative publication output during 1999-08 was 28.18% share (with 1585 collaborative papers), followed by Brazil with 24.09% (with 1891 collaborative papers) and India with 17.34% share (with 781 collaborative papers) (Table 3).

China witnessed a marginal decrease in the share of international collaborative papers from 40.74% in 1999-03 to 39.36% in 2004-08. In comparison, the international collaborative publications share of Brazil and India has increased from 22.78% to 24.84% and from 13.59% to 19.70%, as against decrease from 28.35% to 28.09% in case of South Korea from 1999-03 to 2004-08 (Table 3).

Considering the contribution of collaborative partners in China's publication output, 19 countries were found to publish more than 20 collaborative papers with China during 1999-2008 and they are considered as major collaborative partners. United States is the largest collaborating partner during 1999-08, by contributing 45.38% share in China's total international collaborative papers in Neurosciences during 1999-08, followed by Japan (13.09% share), Taiwan, Canada, Germany, Sweden, and Australia, (between 3.21% to 6.36% share), France, UK, Netherlands and Singapore, (between 2% to 3%), South Korea, Denmark, Italy, Columbia and Switzerland (between 1 to 2% share). On analyzing the shift in International collaborative publications share of these countries from 1999-03 to 2004-08, it was found that the share of United States have increased by 4.82%, followed by Canada (2.6%), Germany (1.57%) South Korea (1.24%), Singapore (1.04%) and Australia (0.82%), while the share of all other collaborating countries have decreased by 3.67% in Japan, followed by Sweden (3.07%), Taiwan (1.85%), Denmark (1.09%), and U.K (0.27%)(Table 4).

Table 3 : Number and share of International papers of China, Brazil, South Korea and India.

Year	China	Year	Brazil
	TP	TICP	%TICP		TP	TICP	%TICP
1999-03	2182	889	40.74	1999-03	2871	654	22.78
2004-08	7002	2756	39.36	2004-08	4979	1237	24.84
1999-08	9184	3645	39.69	1999-08	7850	1891	24.09

Year	South Korea	Year	India
	TP	TICP	%TICP		TP	TICP	%TICP
1999–03	1788	507	28.36	1999–03	1737	236	13.59
2004–08	3837	1078	28.09	2004–08	2766	545	19.70
1999–08	5625	1585	28.19	1999–08	4503	781	17.34
TP = Total Paper; TICP = Total International Collaborative Papers

Table 4 : Major collaborative country's share in total International collaborative papers (TICP) of China, 1999-2008

Country	Total International Collaborative Papers (TICP)				% Share of TICP
	1999-03	2004-08	1999-08	1999-03	2004-08	1999-08
USA Japan Taiwan Canada Germany Sweden Australia France UK Netherlands Singapore South Korea Denmark Italy Columbia Switzerland Belgium Israel Spain Total	371 141 69 32 38 58 23 26 26 17 12 7 22 13 9 9 8 6 3 976	1283 336 163 171 161 95 94 81 73 62 66 56 38 43 47 33 24 18 18 3259	1654 477 232 203 199 153 117 107 99 79 78 63 60 56 56 42 32 24 21 4235	41.73 15.86 7.76 3.60 4.27 6.52 2.59 2.92 2.92 1.91 1.35 0.79 2.47 1.46 1.01 1.01 0.90 0.67 0.34	46.55 12.19 5.91 6.20 5.84 3.45 3.41 2.94 2.65 2.25 2.39 2.03 1.38 1.56 1.71 1.20 0.87 0.65 0.65	45.38 13.09 6.36 5.57 5.46 4.20 3.21 2.94 2.72 2.17 2.14 1.73 1.65 1.54 1.54 1.15 0.88 0.69 0.58

Research profile of most productive Chinese Institutions

The top 15 Chinese most productive Institutions in Neurosciences have published more than 170 papers during 1999-2008. The list of these Institutions along with their research output, percentage share, growth rate, number of collaborative papers, citations and h index value registered is presented in Table 5 & 6. These 15 institutions together contributed 57.61% share (with 5291 papers) in the cumulative publication output of China in Neurosciences, with an average of 352.73 papers per Institution. Only 4 institutions registered the higher publications output than the group average. These are Chinese University of Hong Kong (with 831 papers and 9.05% share), Peking University (with 669 papers and 7.28% share), The University of Hong Kong (with 628 papers and 6.84% share), and Fudan University (with 466 papers and 5.07% share).

Considering the growth rate of these 15 Institutes' publications from 1999-2003 to 2004-2008, the overall growth rate was found to be 179.01%. Nine institutions have achieved the higher growth rate than the group average. These are Shanghai Jiaotong University, Shanghai with a growth rate 1442.11%, followed by Sun Yat Sen University, Guangzhou (with 1220% growth rate), China Medical University, Shenyang (with 870% growth rate), Capital Medical University, Beijing (with 760.61% growth rate), Zhejiang University, Hangzhou (with 659.10% growth rate), Sichuan University, Chengdu (with 600% growth rate), Huazhong Univ. of Science & Technology, Wuhan (with 490.91% growth rate), Peking University (with 284.78% growth rate) and Fudan Univ., Shanghai(with 194.92% growth rate).

The average citation per paper received by the total papers of these 15 most productive Institutions is 4.08. Among these 15 Institutions, Shanghai Inst. for Biological Sciences, Shanghai scored the highest impact with 5.40 citations per paper, followed by The University of Hong Kong, China (with 4.67 citations per paper), Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou (with 4.61 citations per paper), Peking University and Fudan University (with 4.50 citations per paper each), Huazhong University of Science & Technology, Wuhan (with 4.38 citations per paper), Univ. of Science & Technology, Hefei (with 4.37 citations per paper) and Chinese University of Hong Kong (with 4.14 citations per paper).

Considering the number and share in the form of international collaborative papers, these Institutions together contributed 1979 International collaborative papers, with an average share of 37.40% in total papers by these Institutions. Only six Institutions have scored more than the average share of International collaboration of all 15 Institutions. They are Zhejiang University, Hangzhou with 53.44% share of International collaborative papers), followed by The University of Hong Kong, China (with 52.71% share), Sichuan University, Chengdu (with 48.86% share), Sun Yat Sen University, Guangzhou (with 46.95% share), China Medical University, Shenyang (with 46.26% share), and Peking University (with 40.66% share) .

Table 5: Percentage share and growth rate of top institutions of China in Neuroscience during 1999-2008

Institution name	TP			%share	Growth Rate
Institution name	99-03	04-08	99-08	1999-2008	99-03 to 04-08
Chinese Univ. of Hong Kong, Hong Kong China Peking Univ., Beijing The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China Fudan Univ., Shanghai Capital Medical Univ. China, Beijing Shanghai Jiaotong Univ., Shanghai The Fourth Military Medical Univ., Xi'an Zhongshan Ophthalmic Center, Guangzhou Shanghai Inst. for Bilogical Sc. Chinese Acdemy of Sc., Shanghai Huazhong Univ. of Sc. & Tech., Wuhan China Medical Univ. Shenyang, Shenyang Sun Yat–Sen Univ., Guangzhou Univ. of Sc. & Technology, Hefei Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou Sichuan Univ., Chengdu	289 138 242 118 33 19 142 172 68 33 20 15 63 22 22	542 531 386 348 284 293 160 122 179 195 194 198 142 167 154	831 669 628 466 317 312 302 294 247 228 214 213 205 189 176	9.05 7.28 6.84 5.07 3.45 3.40 3.29 3.20 2.69 2.48 2.33 2.32 2.23 2.06 1.92	87.54 284.78 59.50 194.92 760.61 1442.11 12.68 -29.07 163.24 490.91 870.00 1220.00 125.40 659.10 600.00

The average h-index value of these 15 most productive institutions was 23. The six institutions have registered higher h-index value than group average. These are Chinese University of Hong Kong and The University of Hong Kong (each with h-index value of 38), followed by Peking University, Beijing (32), Fudan Univ., Shanghai (30), The Fourth Military Medical Univ., Xi'an (25) and Shanghai Inst. for Biological Sciences, Shanghai (24).

Most prolific authors in Neurosciences research in China

Considering the prominent authors in Neurosciences research in China, 16 Chinese authors are identified as productive ones, who have published 39 and above papers during 1999-2008. Of these 16 authors, 3 are affiliated to Peking University, Beijing, 2 each with Fourth Military Medical Univ., Xi'an and Fudan University, Shanghai, and 1 each to other institutions. (Table 7).

These 16 authors together contributed 794 papers, accounting for 8.65% share in the cumulative publication output of China, with an average of 49.63 papers per author. However, the contribution of these authors witnessed decrease in their publication share from 13.66% in 1999-2003 to 7.08% in 2004-08. Seven Chinese authors have published higher number of papers than the group average (49.63 papers per author). These are L.Y. He with 74 papers during 1999-08), followed by Q.Y. Li (with 64 papers), T.L. Xu (with 58 papers), L.C. Yu (with 56 papers), J.S. Han (with 55 papers), G. Ju (with 53 papers) and G.C. Wu (with 52 papers) (Table 7).

Table 6: Research output, impact, International collaborative papers share and h- index of top institutions of China in Neurosciences during 1999-2008.

S.No.	Name of Institution TP	TC	ACPP	TICP	% Share of TICP		h-index
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15.	Chinese Univ. of Hong Kong, Hong Kong China Peking Univ., Beijing The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China Fudan Univ., Shanghai Capital Medical Univ. China, Beijing Shanghai Jiaotong Univ., Shanghai The Fourth Military Medical Univ., Xi'an Zhongshan Ophthalmic Center, Guangzhou Shanghai Inst. for Bilogical Sc. Chinese Acdemy of Sc., Shanghai Huazhong Univ. of Sc. & Tech., Wuhan China Medical Univ. Shenyang, Shenyang Sun Yat–Sen Univ., Guangzhou Univ. of Sc. & Technology, Hefei Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou Sichuan Univ., Chengdu	831 669 628 466 317 312 302 294 247 228 214 213 205 189 176	3442 3012 2932 2098 1197 1267 1088 199 1333 1000 797 982 895 734 637	4.14 4.50 4.67 4.50 3.78 4.06 3.60 0.68 5.40 4.38 3.52 4.61 4.37 3.88 3.62	309 272 331 158 99 88 106 29 61 81 99 100 59 101 86	37.18 40.66 52.71 33.91 31.23 28.21 35.10 9.86 24.70 35.53 46.26 46.95 28.78 53.44 48.86	38 32 38 30 22 21 25 9 24 21 16 15 22 16 16
TP = Total Papers; TC = Total Citations; ACCP = Average Citations Per Paper

Table 7: Research output, impact and h-index of top productive authors of China in Neurosciences, 1999-2008

S.No.	Name	Affiliation	TP			TC			ACPP	h– index
S.No.	Name	Affiliation	99–03	04–08	99–08	99–03	04–08	99–08	ACPP	h– index
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16.	Lin YanHe Y.Q Li Tianle L. Xu Long Chuan Yu Jisheng Sheng Hans Gong Ju Gen Cheng Wu Jian Zhong Ge David T W Yew Xiong Li Yang Rui Qiong Wang Tianzi Jiang Jiang Ning Zhou Yu Feng Zhang Shihui Hans Tao Yuan Li	Shanghai Institute for Biological Sciences, Shanghai Fourth Military Medical University, Xi'an Institute of Neuroscience, Shanghai Peking University, Beijing Peking University, Beijing The Fourth Military Medical University, Xi'an, Shaanxi Shanghai Medical College, Shanghai Zhongshan Ophthalmic Center, Sun Yat–sen University, Guangzhou Department of Anatomy, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin Fudan University, Shanghai Institute of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology, Lanzhou Institute of Automation, Beijing School of Life Sciences, Hefei Fu–Dan University, Shanghai Peking University, Beijing Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an	10 40 16 29 25 29 32 26 10 24 6 5 11 21 7 7	64 24 42 27 30 24 20 22 37 21 37 36 29 19 32 32	74 64 58 56 55 53 52 48 47 45 43 41 40 40 39 39	50 151 58 145 148 101 119 2 31 85 40 25 60 70 39 51	412 65 299 94 163 46 65 44 102 75 196 473 137 92 152 179	462 216 357 239 311 147 184 46 133 160 236 498 197 162 191 230	6.24 3.38 6.15 4.27 5.65 2.77 3.54 0.96 2.83 3.56 5.49 12.15 4.93 4.05 4.90 5.90	16 13 15 15 16 11 13 6 10 11 13 16 13 13 11 12

The average h-index value of these authors is 12.75. Ten authors registered higher h-index value than group average. The highest h-index value (16) is achieved by Jisheng Sheng Han, Lin Yan He and Tianzi Jian, followed by Long Chuan Yu and Tiangle L. Xu (each with h-index value of 15), Y.Q. Li, Gen Cheng Wu, Gen Wu, Qiang Wang Rui, Jiang Ning Zhou and, Yu Feng Zhang (each with h-index value of 13) (Table 7).

Research communication profile of high productive journals

The top productive 21 Chinese and foreign Journals together contributed 54.20% share in the cumulative publication output of China in Neurosciences during 1999-2008. Of these 21 journals, only 4 journals are of Chinese origin contributing 8.83% share and 17 are International journals contributing 45.37% share in the total publication productivity of China in Neurosciences. The cumulative share of these journals showed decrease in its share from 56.69% in 1999-2003 to 53.43% in 2004-2008. (Table 8).

Research patterns of high cited papers

The characteristics of selected highly cited papers of China in Neurosciences were also evaluated in this section and the list of such high-cited papers is presented in Table 9. Based on publication output of China in this area, 49 papers are identified as highly cited ones, who have received citations (since their publications till 30 October 2009) from 90 to 216 during 1999-2009. Of these 49 papers, 41 appeared as articles, 6 as reviews, and 2 as short surveys. Of the 49 high-cited papers, 73.47% involve international collaboration (26 bilateral and 10 multilateral) and 6.12% national collaboration.

These 49 papers together received 6210 citations with an average of 126.73 citations per paper. Of these 49 papers, 7 papers are in citation range of 161-250, 26 papers in citations range of 101-160 and 16 papers in citations range of 90-100. The authors of these high cited papers are affiliated to 32 Chinese institutions including 5 papers each from Dalian Medical University, Dalian and Institute of Neuroscience, Shanghai, 4 papers each form Fudan University, Shanghai and Fourth Military Medical university, Xi'an, 2 each from Peking University, Beijing, Univ. of Science & Technology and Wuhan, Hunan University, Changsha and 1 paper each from 29 other Chinese institutions. These 49 high cited papers have appeared in 25 journals, including 8 in Neuron, 7 in Neural Networks, 5 in Journal of Neuroscience, 3 in Journal of Neurochemistry & Biological Psychiatry, 2 each in Trends in Neurosciences, Annals of Neurology and Nature Neuroscience and 1 paper each in 17 other journals.

Table 8: List of highly productive journals publishing papers of China in Neuroscience, 1999-2008.

S.No.	Journal Name		Total Papers
		1999-2008	1999-03	2004-08
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. Total	Neuroscience Letters Brain Research Yan Ke Xue Bao Eye Science Yan Ke Xue Bao Bian Ji Bu Neurocomputing European Journal of Pharmacology Neural Regeneration Research Neuroreport Neuroscience Peptides Neuroscience Bulletin Journal of Neuroscience Research Journal of Neurochemistry Chinese Journal of Contemporary Neurology and Neurosurgery Journal of Neuroscience Neurochemical Research Brain Research Bulletin European Journal of Neuroscience Neurological Research Chinese Journal of Neuroscience Neuroscience Research Regulatory Peptides 4978	751 582 383 377 367 314 295 251 225 208 148 136 124 117 114 107 106 99 96 89 89 1237	206 179 246 28 86 0 104 68 48 0 31 24 0 23 20 36 28 11 49 25 25 3741	545 403 137 349 281 314 191 183 177 208 117 112 124 94 166 71 78 88 47 64 64

Table 9: List of top 49 highly cited papers, 1999-2008

Author	Title	Source title	Cited by	Affiliation	Collaboration
Gao H.-M., Jiang J.etal	Microglial activation-mediated delayed and progressive degeneration of rat nigral dopaminergic neurons: Relevance to Parkinson's disease	Journal of Neurochemistry,2002,81(6)	216	Dalian Medical University, Department of Physiology, Dalian, China	BC
Chen Z., Sandercock P.,etal	Indications for early aspirin use in acute ischemic stroke: A combined analysis of 40 000 randomized patients from the Chinese Acute Stroke Trial and the Int ernational Stroke Trial	Stroke, 2000,31(6)	214	Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, Beijing, China	BC
Liao X., Chen G., Sanchez E.N.	Delay-dependent exponential stability analysis of delayed neural networks: An LMI approach	Neural Networks, 2002,15(7)	210	Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Chongqing University, Chongqing	MC
Feng R., Rampon C.,etal	Deficient neurogenesis in forebrain-specific presenilin-1 knockout mice is associated with reduced clearance of hippocampal memory traces	Neuron, 2001,32(5)	189	Shanghai Institute of Brain Functional Genomics, East China Normal University, Shanghai, China	MC
George M.S., Nahas Z.,etal	A controlled trial of daily left prefrontal cortex TMS for treating depression	Biological Psychiatry, 2000,48(10)	181	Department of Psychiatry, Shangdong Medical University, Jinan, China;	BC
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Zhang J.-M., Wang H.-K., etal	ATP Released by Astrocytes Mediates Glutamatergic Activity - Dependent Heterosynaptic Suppression	Neuron, 2003,40(5)	157	Institute of Neuroscience, Shanghai Institutes for Biol. Sci., Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai,	BC
Zhang H., Craciun L.C.,etal	PIP2 activates KCNQ channels, and its hydrolysis underlies receptor-mediated inhibition of M currents	Neuron, 2003,37(6)	153	Basic Medical Research Institute, Hebei Medical University, Shijiazhuang, China	BC
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Li Y., Cichocki A., Amari S.-I.	Analysis of sparse representation and blind source separation	Neural Computation, 2004,16(6)	105	Southchina University of Technology, Guangzhou, China;	BC
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Zhang J.-Y., Luo X.-G., etal	Endogenous BDNF is required for myelination and regeneration of injured sciatic nerve in rodents	European Journal of Neuroscience, 2000,12(12)	91	Department of Anatomy, Hunan Medical University, Changsha, Hunan, China;	BC
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Conclusion

China published 9184 papers in Neurosciences during 1999-08, compared to 7850 papers by Brazil, 5725 papers by South Korea and 4503 papers by India during the same period. China ranks at 12^th position among the top 26 countries in Neurology, with its global publication share of 2.03% during 1999-08. Compared to China, Brazil, South Korea and India ranks at 15^th, 18th and 21^st position, with global publication share of 1.74%, 1.24% and 0.99% during 1999-08. China witnessed rise in global publication share from 0.86% in 1999 to 4.79% in 2008. Correspondingly, China's world ranking improved from 21^st position in 1999 to 8^th position in 2008.

In terms of impact and quality, the average citations per paper registered by China's publication output during 1999-06 were 7.24. Compared to China, only South Korea publications have registered higher impact of 8.29 instead of Brazil (5.99) and India (4.21) for their publications during the same period.

The cumulative publication output of China accounts for 39.69 % share of international collaborative papers during 1999-2008. China has shown the decrease in its share of internationally collaborative papers from 40.74% in 1999-2003 to 39.36% in 2004-2008. Among the collaborative countries, USA is the major collaborator with China during 1999-08, followed by Japan, Taiwan, Canada, Germany, Sweden, Australia, France, etc.

The cumulative publication output of 15 most productive institutions in China's total research output in Neuroscience during 1999-2008 was 5291 papers (57.61% of the China's total output in this field) with the growth rate of 179.01% for the papers published from 1999-2003 to 2004-2008. These 15 Institutions have registered an average impact of 4.08 citations per paper and an average h-index value of 23. They have contributed 37.40% share of international collaborative papers in their total publication output during 1999-08.

The 16 most productive Chinese authors in Neuroscience field together contributed 794 papers, with an average of 49.63 papers per author, received an average of 4.75 citations per paper and average h-index of 12.75 per author.

The total publication output of top 21 productive journals together contributed 54.20% share to the total publication output of China in Neurosciences during 1999-2008.

Of the 49 high-cited papers, 73.47% involve international collaboration (26 bilateral and 10 multilateral) and 6.12% national collaboration. The top 49 highly cited papers in Neurosciences from China had scored higher impact with 126.73 citations per paper. These 49 high-cited papers have appeared in 25 journals and are affiliated to 32 Chinese Institutions.

Competing interests – None, Source of Funding - None
Received Date : 24 Nov. 2009; Revised Date : 5 May 2010
Accepted Date : 8 June 2010

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