|
Title: Electronic network bolsters
Southern science
Author: Katie Mantell
Date Posted: 31 Jan 2002
Electronic network bolsters Southern science
Katie Mantell
Developing country
scientists can boost the international profile of their
work by publishing papers as part of a regional network
of electronic publications that are freely available
on-line, according to an analysis by two Latin American
researchers.
Wladimir Alonso and Esteban
Fernández-Juricic from the University of Oxford looked
at the impact of the Scientific Electronic Library
Online (SciELO), a publicly funded web-based network
that provides free access to 93 journals from Brazil,
Chile and Cuba.
Presenting their results in a
letter published in this week’s issue of Nature,
the two scientists describe how they found that the
impact factor of a set of these journals — a measure of
the number of references to their papers in other
journals worldwide — has more than doubled since joining
SciELO.
“This indicates that such networks not
only foster the availability of scientific information
on a regional scale, but also generate international
impact,” they conclude. In turn, this “may entice
researchers into publishing in the journals concerned”,
they say.
The findings indicate a path forward
for Southern scientific journals, which are often
sidelined in the international research literature and
struggle to compete with developed country journals with
higher impact ratings.
“Several factors interact
to produce the higher impact after joining SciELO,” says
Alonso. “Researchers can reach such journals more
easily, studies published there are read and cited more
frequently, and in the end, since they are reaching a
greater audience, researchers find it more attractive to
publish in these journals.”
SciELO, launched in
1997 by the Latin America and Caribbean Centre on Health
Sciences Information (BIREME) and the São Paulo Science
Foundation (FAPESP) is a “pioneering initiative”, says
Alonso, that benefits both researchers and the science
journals that are linked to the site.
"The
editors of some local journals believe that increasing
their representation worldwide is a difficult task
because their journals are not supported by powerful
publishers," says Fernández-Juricic. "However, our
results underscore that the Internet and the
organisation of similar regional networks provide a new
means of dissemination that can improve the situation of
small journals substantially."
BIREME director
Abel Packer says, “We are very happy with the findings,
because they confirm SciELO’s objectives of increasing
the visibility, accessibility and credibility of science
publications from Brazil and Latin America”.
©
SciDev.Net 2002
Link
to letter by Alonso and Fernández-Juricic
See also:
SciELO
BIREME
FAPESP
SciDev.Net
homepage | 
