Publication Analysis of Nanotechnology in Global Perspective: a Scientometric Approach

The purpose of this paper is to identify the global scientific publications of Nanotechnology research, and a significant emerging thrust area that has huge potential to improve information understanding, organization, decision making and administration. This study retrieved scholarly communications published during 2001-2015 from various versions such as Science Citation Index (SCI), Social Science Citation Index (SSCI), and Arts & Humanities Citation Index (ACHI) which are available on Web of Science. The scientometric analysis was performed from characteristics of global output, institutional, core journals, continental, countries/territories and topical aspects. Basic statistical methods, activity index, relative growth rate and doubling time and CAGR were applied to the selected data. The characteristics of global publications identified that Nanotechnology research has improved stage, along with huge participation and collaboration. The huge papers were found in 2015. The Activity Index was high (140.41) in 2015 whereas the least (31.81) in 2003. Majority of records was from China (24.34 %) and ranked first and followed by United States with 22.83%. India has got sixth position with a total output of 54, 190 (5.41%) contributing a share of total output. The relative growth rate of Nanotechnology (global level) has been progressed from 0.6 in 2001 to 2.05 in 2015 and its average relative growth rate was 1.518 and the doubling time showed the decline trend. The highest exponential growth rate was 1.27 with 33, 472 research output in 2004 and it is noticed that except the period 2002 to 2005. This study focused that there was a fluctuation trend after 2006. This is the first study to evaluate global literature output trends in Nanotechnology, which might provide a potential guide for the future research. These indicators lead Nanotechnology to formulate policy, setting priorities, and undertake strategic planning, monitoring, and evaluation.

Keywords: Nanotechnology, Scientometrics, WoS, Nano Science, Scientific publications, Scholarly communication.