Consolidation in a crisis: Patterns of international collaboration in early COVID-19 research
Consolidation in a crisis: Patterns of international collaboration in early COVID-19 research
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DOI：
10.1371/journal.pone.0236307
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发表时间：
2020-07-21
期刊：
影响因子：
3.7
通讯作者：
Wagner, Caroline S.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Fry, Caroline V.;Cai, Xiaojing;Wagner, Caroline S.
本文试图了解一个灾难性而紧迫的事件，如新冠肺炎疫情爆发的头几个月，是加速还是逆转国际合作的趋势，尤其是中国和美国之间的合作。对新冠肺炎疫情爆发前几个月发表的研究文章的回顾表明，与新冠肺炎冠状病毒爆发之前的研究相比，新冠肺炎研究的团队规模更小，涉及的国家也更少。美国和中国过去和现在都处于冠状病毒相关研究的全球网络中心，而发展中国家则相对缺席了新冠肺炎时期的早期研究活动。中国和美国不仅处于全球冠状病毒研究网络的中心，而且在新冠肺炎期间加强了双边研究合作，发表的论文总数占全球论文总数的4.9%以上，而大流行前这一比例为3.6%。此外，在“新冠肺炎”期间，联合王国、中国和美国继续作为冠状病毒相关研究的最大捐赠者和主要资助者。这些发现表明，全球新冠肺炎疫情改变了冠状病毒研究的地理位置，以及科学团队的结构，缩小了团队成员范围，有利于精英结构。这些发现对科学家在组建团队以最大限度地权衡速度和技能时面临的决定提出了进一步的问题。文中还讨论了政策含义。
This paper seeks to understand whether a catastrophic and urgent event, such as the first months of the COVID-19 pandemic, accelerates or reverses trends in international collaboration, especially in and between China and the United States. A review of research articles produced in the first months of the COVID-19 pandemic shows that COVID-19 research had smaller teams and involved fewer nations than pre-COVID-19 coronavirus research. The United States and China were, and continue to be in the pandemic era, at the center of the global network in coronavirus related research, while developing countries are relatively absent from early research activities in the COVID-19 period. Not only are China and the United States at the center of the global network of coronavirus research, but they strengthen their bilateral research relationship during COVID-19, producing more than 4.9% of all global articles together, in contrast to 3.6% before the pandemic. In addition, in the COVID-19 period, joined by the United Kingdom, China and the United States continued their roles as the largest contributors to, and home to the main funders of, coronavirus related research. These findings suggest that the global COVID-19 pandemic shifted the geographic loci of coronavirus research, as well as the structure of scientific teams, narrowing team membership and favoring elite structures. These findings raise further questions over the decisions that scientists face in the formation of teams to maximize a speed, skill trade-off. Policy implications are discussed.