Cardiovascular Research as a forum for publications from China: present, past, and future

There has been a rapid growth of publications from China over the last 20 years, with China becoming the second largest producer of scientific papers across all disciplines in the year 2007.1 Focused investment in building scientific capacity in China has significantly contributed to the growth in publication output. In 1998, the launch of the ‘985’ project increased China's commitment to improve the global standing and publication activities of a select group of 24 universities.2 Research performance has also gained from the commitment of the Chinese government to increase the Gross Domestic Expenditure on Research and Development (GERD). A common indicator used is the ratio of GERD to Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and in China, this ratio has grown steadily from 1.07% in 2002 to reach 1.84% in 2011.3 More specifically, the funding provided through the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC; http://www.nsfc.gov.cn/publish/portal1/tab293/) and the National Basic Research Program of China (NBRPC) have had a significant impact in fuelling basic research, for example with almost 40 million Euros [312 million Chinese Renminbi (RMB)] being assigned by the NSFC to experimental cardiovascular studies in 2013 alone.4 These policy and funding commitments in China have affected the submissions to Cardiovascular Research over the past 40 years. The number of publications from Chinese authors in Cardiovascular Research has grown progressively from one article being published in the 1970s, three in the 1980s, and seven being published from 1990 to 1994, before finally seeing more than one publication per year starting from 1998 onwards. Cardiovascular Research has experienced a steady increase in the submissions resulting from research based in China, which has raised the interest of the Editorial Board to analyse the data and better understand the context of this growing amount of research output from China. This editorial provides a brief analysis of the submission and publications from China (the data group is from mainland China and Hong Kong; Taiwan is not included as the research context is different and the smaller numbers limit more detailed analysis) during the 10-year period of 2004–13. Furthermore, it looks at the contribution of the journal to the overall output from China in the field and the future perspectives. Figure 1 shows that the share of submissions by corresponding authors from China has increased almost five-fold from 2004 to 2013. When it comes to the number of publications per year, this continues to increase over the years from only 3 being published in 2003 to 26 being published in 2013. Along with the increase in submissions from China, the share of publications from China compared with all documents published in Cardiovascular Research is also on the rise. Thus, the increase in submissions also led to an increase in published papers. Submissions and publications from China between 2004 and 2013. The data refer only to those manuscripts where the corresponding author has a unique or main affiliation address in China (i.e. mainland China and Hong Kong). The document types included are: articles, reviews, editorials, and letters. (A) Data for submissions obtained from the Cardiovascular Research database, as share of all submissions. (B) Data for publications is the absolute number of manuscripts published as obtained from the Web of Science. The number and share of publications by corresponding authors from China was further compared across leading cardiovascular basic and clinical research journals (Figure 2); the definition of basic and clinical journals is based on a previously published network analysis.5 First to note is that the contributions from China in the leading clinical journals are much more limited, and stable, than in the basic science journals. The only exception is the International Journal of Cardiology. The profile of this journal has changed substantially over the last 10 years and saw an increase in its total share of publications in the field, its position in the impact factor ranking (not without controversy),6 and its share of publications from China. The journal publishes predominantly clinical research, but includes basic science research. In 2013, this journal published 1440 articles of which 300 originated from China. Adding this journal to the data from the other leading clinical journals gives a different profile. Contributions from China across leading journals. (A) Analysis of the share (in %) of published manuscripts where the corresponding author has a unique or main affiliation address in China, in leading comprehensive clinical journals (Circulation, JACC, Eur Heart J, and without and with Int J Cardiol included) and basic cardiovascular journals (journals as named in B). (B) The total number of manuscripts published in the journals indicated. In the basic research journals, the journals publishing the greatest number of publications by corresponding authors from China are Cardiovascular Research and Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis, and Vascular Biology (ATVB). One possible explanation could be the focus on cardiac biology and pathology of the Journal of Molecular and Cellular Cardiology (JMCC), if research from China is more vascular oriented and thus more represented in ATVB and Cardiovascular Research (see also below). Circulation Research, despite publishing a comparable number of total manuscripts per annum as ATVB, Cardiovascular Research and JMCC, publishes only a limited number of manuscripts from China. For the remaining analyses, the data analysis was restricted to the 6-year period from 2008 to 2013 as this time period better reflects more recent research published by authors from China. The previous analysis presented manuscripts with the affiliation of the corresponding author in China without distinguishing between ‘China-only’ and collaborative studies. Although no set policy states which authors are named as first and corresponding authors, it is often the case that the corresponding author is from the institution that was leading the research.7Table 1 summarizes the analysis of the 122 articles and reviews (Cardiovascular Research database) where the corresponding author was from China. The majority of the publications (76; 62%) are domestic research articles, i.e. all authors were from China. For the remaining publications (46; 38%), China is leading international collaborative research, since co-authorship is a reliable indicator of scientific collaboration.8 Document types published from China by leading authorship (2008–13) The numbers in italics signify that they are totals or sub-totals. Document types published from China by leading authorship (2008–13) The numbers in italics signify that they are totals or sub-totals. Overall for the 122 publications, the number of authors per publication ranges from 1 to 17 authors; with a median number of 7 authors per publication. As can be seen in Table 1, 95% of the publications are articles. Letters and editorials were rare and have not been included as only two were published during this time period. Previous research comparing the amount of international collaborative research has shown that China, like many major Asian countries, tends to exhibit a low percentage of international collaboration (only 22% of the publications).9 In contrast, in Cardiovascular Research, a total of 98 (56%) papers (46 plus 52) resulted from international cooperation. It is possible that such international collaborations have strengthened the scope and potential impact of studies.9 As per Figure 3, the countries which have contributed to the 46 collaborative publications led by authors in China include the USA, UK, Canada, Germany, Japan, France, Denmark, and New Zealand; with the vast majority of collaboration being with the USA (31/46 = 67%). This is in line with other studies of scientific collaboration that show that the major international collaborators of China tend to include the USA, Japan, Germany, UK, Canada, and France/Australia. International collaborations led by China. Analysis of country of origin of co-authors on published manuscripts where the corresponding author has a unique or main affiliation address in China (46 manuscripts from the Cardiovascular Research database—44 publications only had one international collaborating country and 2 publications had two collaborating countries, USA/Canada and France/Denmark). When exploring the affiliations of the corresponding authors of the 122 publications from China, 103 (84%) of the corresponding authors are affiliated to a university and 52 (43%) are affiliated to a hospital. There is a large distribution of institutions and corresponding authors publishing in Cardiovascular Research, with only few standing out as a single institution, possibly related to the low numbers analysed. Furthermore, it must be noted that assigning the affiliation is a challenging task due to the complex affiliations between universities, hospitals, and research institutes. The most common affiliations of the corresponding authors (Figure 4A) include a number of top ranking institutions as per the Academic Ranking of World Universities (Shanghai ranking) in 2013,10 with Peking University and Shanghai Jiao Tong University being ranked in the top five universities in China and Sun Yat Sen University being ranked in the top 6–8 universities in China. The Huazhong University of Science and Technology is also ranked in the top 9–16 universities in China and Peking Union Medical College ranked in the top 17–28 universities. The Chinese University of Hong Kong was ranked number 1 in 2013, with the University of Hong Kong ranking 2/3rd in Hong Kong, China. Author affiliations by city. (A) The stacked bar graphs represent the number of publications, organized by region, and individual institutions of corresponding authors. Beijing: (a) Peking University, (b) Peking Union Medical College, (c) Other; Shanghai: (d) Second Military Medical University, (e) Shanghai Jiao Tong University, (f) Other; Guangzhou: (g) Sun Yat Sen University, (h) Southern Medical University, (i) Other; Hong Kong: (j) The University of Hong Kong, (k) The Chinese University of Hong Kong; Nanjing: (l) Nanjing Medical University, (m) Other; Wuhan: (n) Huazhong University of Science & Technology, (o) Wuhan University. (B) Analysis of all authors' affiliations for each publication, not only corresponding authors as in A. By extending the review from looking at only the corresponding author's affiliation to exploring all authors' affiliations, it is possible to see in Figure 4B that a number of institutions also actively collaborate with each other in China. For example, Peking University is an affiliation included in 35 of the 122 publications (29%), although in only 17 of these publications (14%) the corresponding author resides at Peking University. It is of interest to note the presence of universities sponsored by the ‘985’ project: Peking University, Central South University in Changsha, Huazhong University of Science & Technology and Wuhan University in Wuhan, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, and Sun Yat Sen University in Guangzhou. Taken together, almost half of the most active universities have obtained support to increase their research performance through the 985 project. In addition, the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) and the National Basic Research Program of China (NBRPC) have been acknowledged as supporting the research presented in 77 and 35%, respectively, of the 122 articles and reviews published in Cardiovascular Research over the 6-year period of 2008–13. One method of identifying research topics of interest is to analyse the keywords utilized by authors. The 122 publications lead by China from 2008 to 2013 included 389 unique keywords, pointing to high diversity of the research being undertaken in China. The most commonly used author keywords used from 2008 to 2013 include vascular smooth muscle cell, myocardial infarction, heart failure, and atherosclerosis. Further analyses of these small numbers of publications are limited. However, the number of publications on vascular smooth muscle cells11–16 and atherosclerosis15–19 has increased in the last 2 years (2012–13) and suggests that a greater focus of research in China is placed on the vascular domain. A recent analysis undertaken by Oxford University Press (OUP—unpublished) showed that the top 10 keywords used in 2011 and 2012 across the journals mostly publishing basic science (Figure 2) included all the keywords mentioned above. Terms such as microRNA, progenitor cells, reperfusion, and VEGF were used much less often as keywords, but they had a much higher average number of citations per use and may represent emerging areas. Looking at recent articles in Cardiovascular Research (2012–13), the keyword microRNA was found in 17 articles of which half of the articles were from China: seven were unique authors from China and two were collaborations with China.12,13,15,20–25 With VEGF as keyword the journal published 12 articles, of which 2 originated from China.26,27 Fewer articles were among the 26 publications including progenitor cells as keywords, with 2 articles authored from China.26,28 With the keyword reperfusion 55 articles were published, of which 5 originated in China.23,29–32 Overall, the data suggest that there is a great focus in China on microRNA research. The number of citations is an indicator that is often used to present the impact or visibility of a publication; however, there are no set cut offs as to what is considered to be a highly cited article. From the 122 articles and reviews in this analysis, two articles published in 2008 and 2009 have received over 100 citations since their publication.33,34 Overall, one-quarter of the publications (31/122) has received over 21 citations and 65 publications (53%) have received over 12 citations since their publication. Table 2 presents the 10 most frequently cited articles from 2012 and 2013, illustrating the visibility of research on microRNAs. Most frequently cited articles from China published in 2012 and 2013 Most frequently cited articles from China published in 2012 and 2013 Overall, the relative citation rate of the publications by corresponding authors based on China is still lower than for other countries. This may be due in part to challenges in identifying authors by name, as well as to a negative influence from domesticity. The index of domesticity examines how often authors cite/are being cited by authors from their own/same country. Such domesticity is high for authors from the USA who often have a higher share of articles published, thereby having a larger overall impact.40 Authors from other countries, including China, also tend to cite the US authors more often. Authors from China, in contrast, do not cite each other's work beyond their share, although certain areas are highly active within China as, for example, the study of Chinese traditional medicine. The Editorial Board has noted with some concern that the acceptance rate of manuscripts from China has been somewhat lower compared with, for example, studies from Western Europe. A review of the recent submissions indicates that a number of manuscripts were out of scope for the journal, e.g. epidemiology and clinical surveys, or studies focused on pharmacology. An element that would help to enhance priority is a better embedding and connection to ongoing research through a clear rationale and hypothesis that clarifies how the findings advance the field beyond being ‘unknown’. Presentation and communication have become more uniform in recent years, but can sometimes still be a hurdle. With growing collaborations and exchanges, as well as enhanced scientific editing, this will further improve. More time is needed to tell what impact the growth in publications from China will have in the development of cardiovascular science research. Cardiovascular Research certainly looks forward to publishing more leading and innovative research from China. Conflict of interest: none declared.