Posted on: 25 March 2010
Immunology research carried out by Trinity College Dublin has placed Ireland in the top three nations worldwide according to data provided by Thomson Reuters from its Essential Science Indicators database for the ten year period, January 1999-October 2009. The country is ranked in third place ahead of Japan and behind the US and Switzerland which is in first place. Commenting on the data, a recent article in Times Higher Education wrote: “In immunology, 91 nations are listed, meaning 182 were surveyed. Twenty-eight nations collected at least 10,000 citations. Of particular interest is the outstanding performance of Ireland, which ranks third by citation impact despite its relatively small output. Researchers at Trinity College Dublin published eight of nine highly cited Irish papers in the field: of these, seven were written by Luke O’Neill, a professor at Trinity’s School of Biochemistry and Immunology. Professor O’Neill, who focuses on innate immunity and inflammation, recently received the Science Foundation Ireland Researcher of the Year Award and the Royal Dublin Society-Irish Times 2009 Boyle Medal in recognition of his influential research.”
The database, surveys journal articles (original research reports and review articles) indexed by Thomson Reuters.
The ranking in immunology is by citations per paper (which is a measure of the impact of research for the field) among nations that collected 10,000 or more citations during the period to reveal weighted impact. For articles with multiple authors from different nations, each nation receives full, not fractional, credit. Essential Science Indicators lists nations ranked in the top 50 per cent for a field over a given period, based on total citations.
