The University of Barcelona is the second research center in Spain with more scientific production

Recently, the Spanish R&D+I Observatory (ICONO) of the Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology (FECYT), belonging to the Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness, published the report Indicadores bibliométricos de la actividad científica española 2005-2014. Edición 2016. (Bibliometric indicators of the Spanish Scientific Activity 2005-2014. 2016 Edition). One of the main conclusions is that the University of Barcelona is still one of the research centers in Spain with more scientific production, in particular the second one following the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC). During the period 2005-2014, researchers from the University of Barcelona published 45.796 articles, a figure that makes the UB to be the top one Spanish university regarding scientific production.

Regarding the field-weighted citation impact (FWCI), which measures the quality impact of publications of an institution compared to the world average, the UB gets a 1,58, positioning itself before CSIC. In excellent publications, that is, publications in the 10% of most cited articles, the University of Barcelona registers a total of 7,020. Last, in leading excellent publications, gathering publications with an author of the area, the UB has a total of 3,112. These data were taken from Scopus database.

High State performance

The report has other important conclusions. While Spain represents a 0.7% of the global population, a 1.0% of global expenditure in R&D and has a 1.7% of researchers, in 2014 it produced a 3,2% of all scientific publications worldwide, a 4,3% of all excellent production worldwide and a 6,7% of the production published in the most important journals (first quartile).

Spain enters the Top Ten list of countries with a higher figure of publications. In particular, it holds the ninth position, with 77,013 articles published from 2005 to 2014. The United States lead the list with 539,723.

Regarding territory distribution, Catalonia is the leading region in Spain regarding normalized impact on scientific production, going from 1,38% in 2005 to 1,72 in 2014. Together with Madrid, they take part in more than two thirds of the Spanish scientific production.

This report, Indicadores Bibliométricos de la Actividad Científica Española 2005-2014. Edición 2016, gathers the main bibliometric indicators of Spanish scientific production, its international position and theme distribution as well as autonomous communities.

Further information is available here

Image: This report gathers the main bibliometric indicators of Spanish scientific production.