Canada strong in astronomy & astrophysics research, according to new bibliometric report

Canada is a world leader in astronomy and astrophysics research, ranking fifth among the top 15 leaders in the field, according to a bibliometric survey on behalf of the National Research Council. The survey — conducted by Montreal-based Science Metrix — found that Canada has boosted its standing from ninth to fifth since 1998 and is particularly strong when gauged by the impact of the research on the scientific community.

Science-Metrix based its survey on several bibliometric indicators including number of scientific papers and citations to papers, number of papers per capita, average of relative citations, average of relative impact factors (ARIF) and international and national collaboration rates.

Canada does particularly well when ranked by ARIF (#1) and average of relative citations (#2). It has also shown considerable improvement in terms of the size of its research production per capita and specialization index.

The survey was conducted for the NRC to help address performance questions as part of a larger independent study on astronomy and astrophysics.

While Canada's overall performance is strong, the survey found one drawback: lack of specialization. The report says Canada could further improve its ranking by increasing specialization in the field, with one major caveat.

"It is often challenging to increase specialization while maintaining a high scientific impact and/or quality, which are Canada's main success factors in the field," states the report. "There is fierce global competition with respect to all of these indicators, such that Canada should not play a single card in trying to maintain or improve its standing."

The survey was conducted to answer four questions posed by the NRC to determine the quality and impact of Canadian astronomy and astrophysics research. It found that the research was well integrated within the international scientific community, with 78.2% of its papers co-authored with at least one international partner, all of whom are in the field's top 10.

Collaboration is strong with Germany, France and Australia but 14 out of the top 20 organizations Canada collaborates with are based in the US. The organizations Canada collaborates most often with are NASA, CALTECH, the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and John Hopkins Univ. The number one collaborating partner, however, is France's Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique.

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