Applying network analysis to study the scientific collaboration between China and Spain during the period 2000-2009

Abstract

This paper studies the research work conducted in cooperation between China and Spain covered by three databases on the Web of Knowledge platform (AHCI, SCI and SSCI) in the period 2000-2009. A distinctive increase in these two countries’ collaboration was identified for this period. The results show the evolution over time, the languages used in the publication of the papers, the participation of both countries in the production of the projects, and the most commonly used journals together with their thematic areas. Physics was the area with the highest number of papers, Astronomy standing out from this field possibly due to the very high equipment costs. The publication of the majority of scientific papers was the result of efforts made by one or several teams from two or more countries but it was surprising to find that in scientific areas like Social Sciences, scientific collaboration was less frequent and that it did not even exist in Humanities.