India shows second highest growth in science research: Nature Index 2016 Rising Stars Report
According to the Nature Index 2016 Rising Stars report, while India made its mark, Chinese institutions are leading the world in rapidly increasing high-quality research outputs
India is at the second position among
countries with the highest increase in their contribution to high-quality
scientific research, according to a new report which shows that the growth of
research in the country is only behind China’s.
The institutions from India among the top 100
highest performers across the globe include Council for Scientific and
Industrial Research (CSIR), Indian Institute of Science Education and Research
(IISER), Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Indian Institute of
Science (IISc) and Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs).
India is at the second position among
countries with the highest increase in their contribution to high-quality
scientific research, according to a new report which shows that the growth of
research in the country is only behind China’s.
The institutions from India among the top 100
highest performers across the globe include Council for Scientific and
Industrial Research (CSIR), Indian Institute of Science Education and Research
(IISER), Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Indian Institute of
Science (IISc) and Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs).
While India made its mark, Chinese
institutions are leading the world in rapidly increasing high-quality research
outputs, according to the Nature Index 2016 Rising Stars report.
As many as 40 of the top 100 performers are
from China with 24 of those showing growth above 50 per cent since 2012.
The US — which remains the largest
contributor to high-quality scientific papers overall — has 11 entrants into
the top 100, despite many starting from a high base.
Nine institutions feature from the UK, eight
from Germany and five from India. The Rising Stars report used the Nature Index
which tracks the author affiliations of published research articles by more
than 8,000 global institutions in a group of 68 journals.
Chemistry made up for more than half (51 per
cent) of India’s scientific contributions to the index in 2015. About 36 per
cent was from physical sciences, nine per cent from life sciences and four per
cent from earth and environmental sciences.
“India’s emergence as one of the world’s
largest economies is being reflected by its increasing contribution to the
world’s high-quality research publications as the Nature Index Rising Stars has
shown,” Derk Haank, Chief Executive Officer of Springer Nature, said releasing
the report yesterday.
“It is not that scientists educated in India
don’t want to come back, they are desperate to come back. Many of them will
come back if there is basic infrastructure for them to be able to work,” Haank
said.
“Reports like this — proving that India is in
fact progressing — will make them think and make it easy for them to come back
and take office,” he said.
“The Rising Stars report shows that India is
moving in the right direction and hopefully, it will stimulate not only the
government and individual scientists, but also young people in schools to take
science more seriously,” he said.
An earlier report, published by National
Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER), shows that less than three per
cent of school-going children want to pursue a career in science in India.
Students drifting to other job-oriented
courses after graduation in science is prevalent in India owing to the
widespread impression among them that unlike professional courses, a career in
basic science is not lucrative.
The academic ambience in many universities
does not encourage the research pursuits of faculties. Research management is
another very serious problem faced by many Indian universities.
According to Haank, India needs to grow an
attractive environment for research, so that students and academics who leave
the country for higher studies and research opportunities have an incentive to
return.
China spends enormous amounts on basic
research, Haank said. India currently spends around one per cent of its GDP on
research and development. In contrast, China spent about $209 billion on
research and development in 2015, or 2.1 per cent of its GDP, according to the
report.
However, rather than comparing progress with
other countries, it is important to be moving in the right direction, Haank
said.
Regards
Pralhad Jadhav
Senior Manager @ Library
Khaitan & Co
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