Mapping life sciences research in India: a profile based on BIOSIS 1992-1994

S. Arunachalam

Report submitted to NISSAT, DSIR (1998)

Life sciences research carried out in India, as seen from the journal literature indexed in three years of BIOSIS Biological Abstracts (1992-1994), is quantified and mapped. The Indian institutions active in life sciences research, the journals and sub-fields in which they publish their work, and the impact factors of the journals as seen from Journal Citation Reports 1992 and 1994 are identified. In the three years studied researchers from over 1,400 institutions located in over 450 cities/ towns have authored 20,046 papers in 1,582 journals published from 52 countries. Over 54% of these papers have appeared in 18 Indian journals. While India has contributed papers to al 10 sub-fields, her contribution has exceeded 1,000 papers in three years in only four sub-fields, and 500 papers in seven other sub-fields. Only 49 institutions have published more than 100 papers each. The contribution made by different institutions to 26 sub-fields and to 36 often used journals is highlighted. More than 64% of Indian papers indexed in BIOSIS come from academic institutions. Among scientific agencies, Indian Council of Agricultural Research and Council of Scientific and Industrial Research have published more than 1,500 papers each. In all Indian researchers have published 188 papers (less than 1.0%) in journals with a 1994 impact factor greater than 4.0. More than 46.3% of Indian papers have appeared in non-5CY journals, and a further 37.5% of papers have been published in journals with impact factors less than 1.0. The analysis reveals the existence of two clusters: a large number of institutions devoted to agriculture and classical biology, publishing mostly in low-impact journals, often in Indian journals, and a smaller group of institutions publishing some papers in new biology and some areas of medicine in quality international journals of medium impact. The larger cluster includes the agricultural universities and many general universities, while the smaller cluster includes the Indian Institute of Science, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology, National Institute of Immunology, and Indian Institute of Chemical Biology. While it would be desirable for Indian researchers to publish bulk of the agricultural research and a substantial part of medical research in Indian journals, they have no such constraint in new biology and can publish their work in high-impact international journals. Yet only a small proportion of Indian papers in biochemistry and molecular biology, general and internal medicine, microbiology, biophysics, immunology, and gastroenterology have appeared in such journals.

http://openmed.nic.in/242/01/arun1.pdf

Agricultural Research in India – A Profile Based on CAB Abstracts 1990-1994 (1998)

S. Arunachalam

A Report Submitted to NISSAT (1998)

India’s contribution to research in agriculture and related fields is assessed from an analysis of publications indexed in CAB Abstracts. CAB Abstracts indexed 51,761 papers, including about 48,300 journal articles, from more than 3,330 addresses in over 800 locations, spread over 30 states/ union territories of India, in the five years 1990-1994. CAB Abstracts has classified these papers into 22 major research areas and about 250 subfields. Plants of economic importance is the leading area of research in India, followed by Animal science. The largest number of papers published are in the three subfields, viz. Pests, pathogens and biogenic diseases of plants (8,898 papers), Plant breeding and genetics (5,675 papers) and Plant production (5,231 papers). A little over 63% of these papers were published by academic institutions. Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana, and the Haryana Agricultural University, Hissar, have contributed more than 2370 papers each, not including papers published from other centres of these universities. Agricultural universities have published 16,555 papers and general universities 9,933. The Indian Council of Agricultural Research has accounted for 7,856 papers. Indian researchers have used more than 1950 journals from over 65 countries. About 77% of all journal articles were published in 483 Indian journals. In no other field did Indian researchers publish such a large percent of papers in Indian journals. Unlike in physics and materials science, Indian agricultural scientists have used letters journals only infrequently. Delhi, Ludhiana, Hissar and Bangalore are the leading centres of agricultural research, while Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra. Tamil Nadu, Haryana and Karnataka are the states accounting for the largest number of papers. This report was prepared by the M.S. Swaminathan Research Institute and was submitted to NISSAT, Department of Scientific & Industrial Research, Government of India in July 1998.

http://dlist.sir.arizona.edu/833/01/Article%5F03.pdf