Like a nation, we’re not publishing as numerous scientific papers as a number of our neighbors do. Yet, individual Filipino scientists, here and abroad, are earning significant contributions to world science. Just how much are our scientists adding? How can their contributions match up against the very best of the planet? What impact has Filipino scientists made on world science?

There are many measures from the impact from the scientific work of the researcher. An research into the various metrics utilized in the look at a investigator and the jobs are the subject of the recent Nature magazine special (print edition: Next Month, 2010 available on the web at world wide web.nature.com/news/specials/metrics/index.html . (With apologies, I’ll only use a mans reference for writing ease.) The first is the amount of papers he’s printed, particularly in peer-reviewed journals. An frequently-used gauge of the caliber of one’s jobs are the amount of his publications in “high-impact,” i.e. frequently reported, journals. Another is through how frequently his publications are reported by others. You will find arguments against using the measures presently getting used, because there are natural difficulties within the proper assessment from the impact of one’s scientific publications. (The readers is inspired to see the articles within the Nature special, along with the article by Peter Lawrence (2007), appropriately entitled “The mismeasurement of science.”)

For just one factor, the amount of papers a researcher has printed is really a way of measuring his output — not always the caliber of his work. Everyone knows of countless individuals previously who’d printed only a small amount of papers, but whose jobs are still appreciated even today.

To illustrate Francis Crick from the double-helix fame, who did seminal work not just in molecular biology but additionally in protein crystallography, but who printed only 87 papers (indexed by PubMed world wide web.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed /) — several occasions less compared to creation of numerous scientists I understand. Further, the amount of papers by which one has printed like a co-author doesn’t always reflect his true contribution to science.

Indeed, a significant difficulty comes from the issue of authorship. There’s not a problem when there’s just one author. Inside a paper with multiple authors, proper attribution of credit is frequently not straightforward. What did each author lead towards the project and just how will it be quantified? You could consider a stride that’s in some way associated with an order where the authors are listed. But there’s no uniform convention within the report on authors. Sometimes, your opportunity of authors is completed alphabetically — this is also true several years ago. Nowadays, the very first-listed author should really have contributed more towards the project and also the last-listed author (the senior author) is intended as the inventor from the idea behind the work. That isn’t always the situation. Increasingly more, we have seen papers where several from the authors are noted as getting contributed equally towards the work. Further, more projects are collaborations of countless independent groups, so the report on authors is frequently caused by settlement and doesn’t always reflect the contribution of the baby authors.

And there’s an natural difficulty in knowing the caliber of a paper which was printed inside a “high-impact” journal. A journal’s “impact factor” is dependant on the amount of occasions the articles for the reason that journal are reported by others, in order that it represents the typical impact of all of the articles which made an appearance for the reason that journal and isn’t a stride from the impact associated with a individual article. The “impact factor” is really misused the European Association of Science Editors has suggested that “journal impact factors be utilized only — and very carefully — for calculating and evaluating the influence of entire journals, although not for that assessment of single papers, and definitely not for that assessment of researchers or research programs either directly or like a surrogate” (European Association of Science Editors 2007).

A far more appropriate way of measuring a paper’s impact is most likely the amount of occasions that that paper is reported by others along with a good way of measuring a scientist’s impact will be the final amount of occasions his publications have been reported. One measure that’s gaining acceptance may be the “h-index ”, which is understood to be the amount h of the scientist’s publications with a minimum of h citations (Hirsch 2005). Interestingly, the “h-index ” seems to obviate the necessity to correct for that problem connected with multiple authorships and self-citations (Hirsch 2007). But any measure which is used to estimate the outcome of the researcher that is dependant on citations depends upon his field or discipline. For instance, because there are less mathematicians than biologists, the amount of citations of the mathematical paper could be likely to be less compared to a biological paper. Any comparison ought to be restricted to individuals within the same or carefully related disciplines.

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I’ve selected to make use of the “h-index ” in assessing the outcome of some Filipino scientists on world science — with the appropriate caveats.

I present the h-index of probably the most printed Philippine- and foreign-based Filipino chemists, biochemists, and molecular biologists. Their email list is always incomplete, since I don’t understand all the Filipino scientists in individuals fields, and that i apologize for just about any omission. For reasons of space, I’ve selected a random cutoff. The figures were acquired on June 2, 2010 (a scientist’s h-index changes as time passes) and my resource is Google Scholar (scholar.google.com/), that is free and open to anybody with internet access. The figures might be different if your different citation database can be used (I’ve no use of other databases apart from Google Scholar). An essential facet of a Google Scholar search is the potential of including citations from patents and that i chose that option because individuals citations reflect the functional contribution of the article to novelty and practical use. The compilation ought to be made more complete as well as for all fields, and updated periodically, if we want to observe how our scientists still impact world science. In the finish from the list, I’ve added the h-index of two well-known scientists in individuals fields.

Here’s their email list: the h-index (proven in parentheses) of Rigoberto Advincula (33), Lourdes Cruz (40), Sevilla Detera-Wadleigh (39), Pedro Jose (40), Bienvenido Juliano (44), Carlito Lebrilla (31), Baldomero Olivera (63), Michael Purugganan (33), and Florante Quiocho (57) and individuals of Francis Crick (49) and Linus Pauling (81).

Again, I have to highlight that it is really an incomplete list and just for individuals within the fields of chemistry, biochemistry, and molecular biology.

The readers can draw their own conclusions. My conclusion? Our kapwa -Filipinos are earning a substantial effect on world science. The way forward for Philippine science is vibrant!

European Association of Science Editors. EASE statement on inappropriate utilization of impact factors. European Science Editing 2007 33: 99-100.

HirschJE. A catalog to evaluate an individual’s research output. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 2005 102: 16569-16572.

HirschJE. Will the h index have predictive power? Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 2007 104: 19193-19198.

Lawrence PA. The mismeasurement of science. Curr Biol 2007 17: R583-R585.

ADDENDUM: The assessment of the scientist’s contribution to science must include his focus on growing the science literacy from the populace, around the improvement of science education, on mentoring of youthful scientists, around the elevated utility of science in national progress, etc. Various articles within this column have addressed and is constantly address individuals issues.

Eduardo A. Padlan is really a corresponding person in the NAST. He is able to be arrived at at eduardo.padlan@gmail.com.