Marianne Hörlesberger

An advanced diffusion model to identify emergent research issues: the case of optoelectronic devices

Scientific progress in technology oriented research fields is made by incremental or fundamental inventions concerning natural science effects, materials, methods, tools and applications. Therefore our approach focuses on research activities of such technological elements on the basis of keywords in published articles. In this paper we show how emerging topics in the field of optoelectronic devices based on scientific literature data from the PASCAL-database can be identified. We use Results from PROMTECH project, whose principal objective was to produce a methodology allowing the identification of promising emerging technologies. In this project, the study of the intersection of Applied Sciences as well as Life (Biological & Medical) Sciences domains and Physics with bibliometric methods produced 45 candidate technological fields and the validation by expert panels led to a final selection of 10 most promising ones. These 45 technologies were used as reference fields. In order to detect the emerging research, we combine two methodological approaches. The first one introduces a new modelling of field terminology evolution based on bibliometric indicators: the diffusion model and the second one is a diachronic cluster analysis. With the diffusion model we identified single keywords that represent a high dynamic of the mentioned technology elements. The cluster analysis was used to recombine articles, where the identified keywords were used to technological topics in the field of optoelectronic devices. This methodology allows us to answer the following questions: Which technological aspects within our considered field can be detected? Which of them are already established and which of them are new? How are the topics linked to each other?

Identification and characterisation of technological topics in the field of Molecular Biology

Following up the European project PromTech the aim of which was to detect emerging technologies by studying the scientific literature, we chose one field, Molecular Biology, to identify and characterize emerging topics within that domain. We combined two analytical approaches: the first one introduces a model of the terminological evolution of the field based on bibliometric indicators and the second one operates a diachronic clustering analysis. Our objective is to bring answers to questions such as: Which technological aspects can be detected? Which of them are already established and which of them are new? How are the topics linked to each other?

A concept for inferring `frontier research' in grant proposals

This paper discusses a concept for inferring attributes of ‘frontier research’ in peer-reviewed research proposals under the popular scheme of the European Research Council (ERC). The concept serves two purposes: firstly to conceptualize, define and operationalize in scientometric terms attributes of frontier research; and secondly to build and compare outcomes of a statistical model with the review decision in order to obtain further insight and reflect upon the influence of frontier research in the peer-review process. To this end, indicators across scientific disciplines and in accord with the strategic definition of frontier research by the ERC are elaborated, exploiting textual proposal information and other scientometric data of grant applicants. Subsequently, a suitable model is formulated to measure ex-post the influence of attributes of frontier research on the decision probability of a proposal to be accepted. We present first empirical data as proof of concept for inferring frontier research in grant proposals. Ultimately the concept is aiming at advancing the methodology to deliver signals for monitoring the effectiveness of peer-review processes.

Challenges in the Management of New Technologies

New developments in bio- and nanotechnologies and also in information and communication technologies have shaped the research environment in the last decade. Increasingly, highly educated experts in R&D departments are collaborating with scientists and researchers at universities and research institutes to develop new technologies. Transnational companies that have acquired various firms in different countries need to manage diverse R&D strategies and cultures. The new knowledge-based economy permeates across companies, universities, research institutes and countries, creating a cross-disciplinary, global environment. Clearly, managing technology in this new climate presents significant challenges.

Web networks of the science system: Weighted hubs and authorities

SummaryVisualization with the algorithm of BibTechMon provides the out-degree as well as the in-degree. The analysis shows that both frequency and co-occurrences of objects (nodes in the network) support the idea of Kleinbergs algorithm. The analysis of the algorithm shows clearly that strongly linked scores lead the iteration to a convergence and give the highest weights. Therefore BibTechMon visualizes the results well.

Identification of Emergent Research Issues: the Case of Optoelectronic Devices

The optoelectronic devices field is one of the last decades most promising technological fields. Light emitting diodes gain more applications in cars and housing lighting, OLED displays are introduced in electronic devices and consumer electronics. Optimization of lighting power and tuning of light spectrum are well known important research topics.

The 14th International Conference of the International Society for Scientometrics and Informetrics

The International Conference of the International Society for Scientometrics and Informetrics (ISSI) is certainly amongst the world’s largest and most prestigious of its kind in our field. The last event, the 14th ISSI conference took place at the University of Vienna 15–19 July 2013 and was jointly organised by the University of Vienna and the AIT Austrian Institute of Technology. It will certainly be remembered as one of the biggest and most successful ISSI conferences since its foundation. The large number of 389 participants from all over the world exceeded all expectations from the organisers by far. The countries with the highest number of participants were Austria (host), Germany, China, Spain and the United States. The large number of submissions (338) by more than 900 authors affiliated to organisations located in 42 countries reflects the large interest sparked internationally. The top three contributing countries were China (149), Spain (129) and the USA (101). All contributions were reviewed by the International and Local Committees. Thereof 145 (107 full papers and 38 research in progress papers) could be accepted for oral presentations. After the conference, authors of oral presentations were invited to submit an essentially extended version for possible publication in a special issue of Scientometrics. All papers have been reviewed anew, and on the basis of this process 38 papers have finally been selected.

How to address the role of a Journal as a Knowledge Transfer Vector between disciplines? A Case Study Relying on Citation Analysis

Abstract In this study our aim was to characterize the role of a scientific journal as a vector for the transfer of knowledge between different research communities. To detect the size and extent of a journals readership, we used citation analysis of two scientific corpora constructed around the production of one journal. The first was made up of ex ante references or references cited in the bibliographies of all the articles published in the journal over a given year of publication while the second consisted of the articles’ ex post references - subsequent works which cite them. Both corpora underwent a stage of clustering which produced a theme-based representation of the contents made possible by automatic indexing. Computer-aided thematic categorization validated by an expert gave a representation of both corpora through a vector of categories each element which indicated the level of representativity of the category in the corpus. A role indicator was then defined based on a calculation of cosine similarity between the two vectors of categories associated with the journal. This indicator qualified the behaviour of the journal in terms of a transfer vector for knowledge. The case study involved two journals in the field of Information and Communication Sciences and Technologies.

From applicateness to potential applicability: An informetric approach based on researchers’ scientific productions

This work discusses a methodology for measuring the applied orientation, which we call “applicateness”, of the results published by a researcher in the scientific and technological literature, and applies this methodology to evaluate the potential applicability of a research project submitted for funding to a grant agency. Our methodology develops a content analysis approach operated with the help of text mining tools coming from the natural language processing (NLP) and clustering techniques. Its deployment aims at easing the workload of the final stage of expertise, which nevertheless remains necessary. We illustrate our approach by processing a real case coming from the grant applications of the main European funding agency that has established a selection process based on the identification of scientific excellence in frontier research as the sole evaluation criterion for funding decisions.