Demography,education, and research trends in the interdisciplinary field of disease ecology

Micro‐ and macroparasites are a leading cause of mortality for humans, animals, and plants, and there is great need to understand their origins, transmission dynamics, and impacts. Disease ecology formed as an interdisciplinary field in the 1970s to fill this need and has recently rapidly grown in size and influence. Because interdisciplinary fields integrate diverse scientific expertise and training experiences, understanding their composition and research priorities is often difficult. Here, for the first time, we quantify the composition and educational experiences of a subset of disease ecology practitioners and identify topical trends in published research. We combined a large survey of self‐declared disease ecologists with a literature synthesis involving machine‐learning topic detection of over 18,500 disease ecology research articles. The number of graduate degrees earned by disease ecology practitioners has grown dramatically since the early 2000s. Similar to other science fields, we show that practitioners in disease ecology have diversified in the last decade in terms of gender identity and institution, with weaker diversification in race and ethnicity. Topic detection analysis revealed how the frequency of publications on certain topics has declined (e.g., HIV, serology), increased (e.g., the dilution effect, infectious disease in bats), remained relatively common (e.g., malaria ecology, influenza, vaccine research and development), or have consistently remained relatively infrequent (e.g., theoretical models, field experiments). Other topics, such as climate change, superspreading, emerging infectious diseases, and network analyses, have recently come to prominence. This study helps identify the major themes of disease ecology and demonstrates how publication frequency corresponds to emergent health and environmental threats. More broadly, our approach provides a framework to examine the composition and publication trends of other major research fields that cross traditional disciplinary boundaries.     

Characterizing interdisciplinarity of researchers and research topics using web search engines

Researchers' networks have been subject to active modeling and analysis. Earlier literature mostly focused on citation or co-authorship networks reconstructed from annotated scientific publication databases, which have several limitations. Recently, general-purpose web search engines have also been utilized to collect information about social networks. Here we reconstructed, using web search engines, a network representing the relatedness of researchers to their peers as well as to various research topics. Relatedness between researchers and research topics was characterized by visibility boost-increase of a researcher's visibility by focusing on a particular topic. It was observed that researchers who had high visibility boosts by the same research topic tended to be close to each other in their network. We calculated correlations between visibility boosts by research topics and researchers' interdisciplinarity at the individual level (diversity of topics related to the researcher) and at the social level (his/her centrality in the researchers' network). We found that visibility boosts by certain research topics were positively correlated with researchers' individual-level interdisciplinarity despite their negative correlations with the general popularity of researchers. It was also found that visibility boosts by network-related topics had positive correlations with researchers' social-level interdisciplinarity. Research topics' correlations with researchers' individual- and social-level interdisciplinarities were found to be nearly independent from each other. These findings suggest that the notion of "interdisciplinarity" of a researcher should be understood as a multi-dimensional concept that should be evaluated using multiple assessment means.     

A bibliometric analysis of research trends in bat echolocation studies between 1970 and 2021

Bats are among the few mammals that have acquired a sophisticated echolocation ability, attracting considerable attention for their uniqueness. Over the past 50 years, numerous research projects have been designed to study bat echolocation. The overall trend is complex and the dynamics of those publications are difficult to capture. In this study, we conducted quantitative bibliometric analyses of academic articles to identify global research trends in bat echolocation. Data were retrieved from the Web of Science, with 2914 articles sampled in our dataset from 1970 to 2021. We analyzed the global research trends in terms of annual publications, active journals, authors, institutions, and countries. We identified growth trends in the past 50 years, to which the United States was found to be the largest contributor. The University of Bristol, the University of Munich, and the Smithsonian Institute were the representative institutions of publication records. Meanwhile, Acta Chiropterologica, Journal of Experimental Biology, and Journal of the Acoustical Society of America were the top three active platforms for bat echolocation research. Co-occurrence analysis of keywords identified five clusters that correspond to five major research topics in bat echolocation: “habitat use and conservation,” “evolution,” “physiology and nervous system,” “communication and social call,” and “hunting and predation.” The overlay visualization indicated that studies on the evolution of bat echolocation had become the latest research trend, which we summarized and reviewed. Lastly, based on the results obtained, we discussed the importance of future directions for integrative multi-omics studies to uncover the mechanisms and evolution of bat echolocation.     

蜣螂后胸叉骨形态演化趋势及其在系统发育分析中的意义(鞘翅目:金龟科)

后胸叉骨是昆虫胸部的内骨骼,是重要的肌肉联结点,在昆虫运动中起着不可替代的作用。该结构在鞘翅目高级阶元系统发育关系重建中扮演了重要角色,但由于其在低级阶元间的差异较小以及在形态分析中使用困难等因素限制,致使后胸叉骨的研究并未受到广泛重视。国内学者对于甲虫后胸叉骨的研究非常少,甚至长期以来没有中文名称,相关内容只零星散布于教科书和学位论文中,针对蜣螂后胸叉骨形态学研究尚未见报道。本文对金龟科蜣螂亚科9族65种的后胸叉骨进行了详细的比较形态学研究,归纳了族级形态特征,进而探究蜣螂后胸叉骨形态演化趋势及其在系统发育分析中的意义。此外,还对利用现代形态学和几何形态学等方法研究后胸叉骨功能形态的前景进行了阐述。     

A bibliometric analysis of research papers published on photosynthesis: 1992–2009

We present here a bibliometric analysis of publications on photosynthesis research from 1992 to 2009 in the Science Citation Index Expanded (SCI-Expanded) Web of Science. This has allowed us to examine the growing trends and the key topics on this subject. We have assessed the document type, language of the publications, publication output, subject category, journal distribution, countries and territories of these publications, institutions involved, hot topics and highly cited papers. The top 30 countries/territories were ranked according to their total number of articles (TA), single country articles (SCA), internationally collaborative articles (ICA), first author articles (FAA) and corresponding author articles (CAA). Research directions on the subject of photosynthesis were also investigated and evaluated by statistically analyzing the distribution of author keywords in the database. Our analysis indicates that “water”, “stress”, “carbon dioxide”, “nitrogen” and “climate change” are hot topics of research on photosynthesis during this period.     

Understanding the Evolution of Industrial Symbiosis Research

This study analyzes the evolution of the research field of industrial symbiosis (IS). We elucidate its embedding in industrial ecology (IE), trace the development of research themes, and reveal the evolution of the research network through analysis of the core literature and journals that appeared from 1997 to 2012 by citation analysis, cocitation analysis, and network analysis. In the first period (1997–2005), IS research held a minority share in the IE literature. The research revolved around the concept of IS, the assessment of eco‐industrial park projects, and the establishment of waste treatment and recycling networks. In the second period (2006–2012), diverse research approaches and theories enriched the field, which has led to a maturation in theory building. Our findings clearly illustrate that IS evolved from practice‐oriented research toward coherent theory building through a systematic underpinning and linking of diverse topics. As scientific attention shifted from exploring a phenomenon to elucidating underlying mechanisms, IS knowledge found worldwide practical implementation. The coauthorship network shows that the academic communities of IS are distributed worldwide and that international collaboration is widespread. Through bibliometric and network analysis of IS, we have created a systemic, quantitative image of the evolution of the IS research field and community, which gives IS researchers an underpinned overview of the IS research and may help them to identify new directions and synergy in worldwide research.     

大尺度陆地生态系统状态变化及其资源环境效应的立体化协同联网观测

环境变化和人类活动的双重驱动正在快速地改变地球生态系统状态,呈现出了众多级联的资源环境问题,生态系统的状态变化和时空演变驱动因素以及相应的资源环境效应是大尺度陆地生态系统科学研究的永恒主题。观测和评估生态系统状态变化,发现和理解生态系统响应机制,认知和描述生态系统演变规律,预测和预警生态系统演变趋势,都依赖于大陆及全球尺度的分布式协同观测研究网络。本研究以服务大陆尺度生态系统科学研究、支撑区域生态环境治理为目标,围绕生态系统状态变化及资源环境效应科学问题,综合分析了现有生态环境观测研究网络现状,明确提出了生态系统观测研究站及其网络的发展方向,进而提出了发展“多要素-多界面-多介质-多过程-多尺度-多方法”的联网协同观测体系,构建“高新技术集成化-区域分布网络化-网络管理智能化-观测实验长期化-模型模拟多功能化-数据集成和资源共享远程化”的新一代大陆尺度生态系统观测实验研究网络的设想,并进一步阐述了该研究网络的功能定位、设计理念、设计方案、建设目标和技术体系,以期为我国陆地生态系统观测研究网络的发展提供借鉴与参考。     

Topics and trends in Mountain Livestock Farming research: a text mining approach

Pasture-based and small-scale livestock farming systems are the main source of livelihood in the mountain primary sector, ensuring socioeconomic sustainability and biodiversity in rural communities throughout Europe and beyond. Mountain livestock farming (MLF) has attracted substantial research efforts from a wide variety of scientific communities worldwide. In this study, the use of text mining and topic modelling analysis drew a detailed picture of the main research topics dealing with MLF and their trends over the last four decades. The final data corpus used for the analysis counted 2 679 documents, of which 92% were peer-reviewed scientific publications. The number of scientific outputs in MLF doubled every 10 years since 1980. Text mining found that milk, goat and sheep were the terms with the highest weighed frequency in the data corpus. Ten meaningful topics were identified by topic analysis: T1-Livestock management and vegetation dynamics; T2-Animal health and epidemiology; T3-Methodological studies on cattle; T4-Production system and sustainability; T5-Methodological studies; T6-Wildlife and conservation studies; T7-Reproduction and performance; T8-Dairy/meat production and quality; T9-Land use and its change and T10-Genetic/genomic studies. A hierarchical clustering analysis was performed to explore the interrelationships among topics, and three main clusters were identified: the first focused on sustainability, conservation and socioeconomic aspects (T4; T6 and T9), the second was related to food production and quality (T7 and T8) and the last one considered methodological studies on mountain flora and fauna (T1; T2; T3; T5 and T10). The 10 topics identified represent a useful and a starting source of information for further and more detailed analysis (e.g. systematic review) of specific research or geographical areas. A truly holistic and interdisciplinary research approach is needed to identify drivers of change and to understand current and future challenges faced by livestock farming in mountain areas.     

Setting priorities for research and development in the NHS: a case study on the interface between primary and secondary care.

Since 1991 the NHS has attempted to identify and prioritise its needs for research and development in a systematic manner. This has not been done before and there is little evidence on which to draw. Multidisciplinary expert groups have identified priorities in different topics using explicit criteria and after widespread consultation within the NHS and research community to identify pressing problems and opportunities for research. This paper focuses on a review completed in 1993 to identify research and development priorities for the NHS in relation to the interface between primary and secondary care. The review covered several recent developments which require evaluation. The authors describe the process used to identify research and development priorities in this complex subject and examine the strengths and weaknesses of the approach. This case study should help to stimulate a wider debate on methods of identifying priorities, particularly those using participatory approaches, in research and non-research contexts.     

A text mining analysis of the climate change literature in industrial ecology

The literature on climate change research has evolved tremendously since the 1990s. The goal of this study is to use text mining to review the climate change literature and study the evolution of the main trends over time. Specific keywords from articles published in the special issue “ Industrial Ecology for Climate Change Adaptation and Resilience” in the Journal of Industrial Ecology are first selected. Details of over 35,000 publications containing these keywords are downloaded from the Web of Science from 1990 to 2018. The number of publications and co‐occurrence of keywords are analyzed. Moreover, latent Dirichlet allocation (LDA)—a probabilistic approach that can retrieve topics from large and unstructured text documents—is applied on the abstracts to uncover the main topics (consisting of new terms) that naturally emerge from them. The evolution in time of the importance of some emerging topics is then analyzed on the basis of their relative frequency. Overall, a rapid growth in climate change publications is observed. Terms such as “climate change adaptation” appear on the rise, whereas other terms are declining such as “pollution.” Moreover, several terms tend to co‐occur frequently, such as “climate change adaptation” and “resilience.” The database collected and the LiTCoF (Literature Topic Co‐occurrence and Frequency) Python‐based tool developed for this study are also made openly accessible. This article met the requirements for a gold – gold JIE data openness badge described http://jie.click/badges .     

基于Citespace软件的生态风险知识图谱分析

伴随着重大环境事件频发,环境污染、生态破坏现象的日益严峻,生态风险研究受到各国学者和政府的广泛关注。对整个生态风险研究领域进行全面系统的分析,旨在探究研究热点及趋势,归纳研究主题演进,了解当前国际研究现状。以Web of Science数据库为数据源,利用Citespace软件,绘制生态风险研究知识图谱,进行文献可视化分析。研究发现:(1)国际生态风险研究的发文数量经历了缓慢增长-平稳增长-迅速增长3个阶段;(2)生态风险研究分为奠基期,成长期,拓展期3个阶段,各阶段研究热点不同,当前研究热点是"空间分布、生态系统服务、城市土壤、源解析、海洋沉积物";(3)生态风险研究由单一风险源、风险受体、小尺度的评价演化为多种风险源、多种风险受体的大尺度综合评价;(4)欧美国家、学者奠定了该领域的研究基础,中国起步较晚但发展迅速。     

Social traits,social networks and evolutionary biology

The social environment is both an important agent of selection for most organisms, and an emergent property of their interactions. As an aggregation of interactions among members of a population, the social environment is a product of many sets of relationships and so can be represented as a network or matrix. Social network analysis in animals has focused on why these networks possess the structure they do, and whether individuals’ network traits, representing some aspect of their social phenotype, relate to their fitness. Meanwhile, quantitative geneticists have demonstrated that traits expressed in a social context can depend on the phenotypes and genotypes of interacting partners, leading to influences of the social environment on the traits and fitness of individuals and the evolutionary trajectories of populations. Therefore, both fields are investigating similar topics, yet have arrived at these points relatively independently. We review how these approaches are diverged, and yet how they retain clear parallelism and so strong potential for complementarity. This demonstrates that, despite separate bodies of theory, advances in one might inform the other. Techniques in network analysis for quantifying social phenotypes, and for identifying community structure, should be useful for those studying the relationship between individual behaviour and group‐level phenotypes. Entering social association matrices into quantitative genetic models may also reduce bias in heritability estimates, and allow the estimation of the influence of social connectedness on trait expression. Current methods for measuring natural selection in a social context explicitly account for the fact that a trait is not necessarily the property of a single individual, something the network approaches have not yet considered when relating network metrics to individual fitness. Harnessing evolutionary models that consider traits affected by genes in other individuals (i.e. indirect genetic effects) provides the potential to understand how entire networks of social interactions in populations influence phenotypes and predict how these traits may evolve. By theoretical integration of social network analysis and quantitative genetics, we hope to identify areas of compatibility and incompatibility and to direct research efforts towards the most promising areas. Continuing this synthesis could provide important insights into the evolution of traits expressed in a social context and the evolutionary consequences of complex and nuanced social phenotypes.     

国内外产业共生网络研究比较述评

产业共生网络是指基于物质及能量交换以及知识及基础设施共享而形成的在不同产业主体之间的合作共赢网络,是产业转型升级的重要保障。作为产业共生的运作方式,产业共生网络的研究国外从20世纪90年代开始从概念到实例就展开了一系列探讨,国内自2002年也开始在网络结构等方面开展相关研究。尤其在2008年以后,产业共生网络的研究方向不断拓宽,研究成果丰富多样。为明晰国内外产业共生网络研究的发展态势,促进产业共生网络理论体系的发展并使其得到有效应用。本文从共生网络内涵、结构、功能及评价、演化、管理调控等方面比较分析了国内外产业共生网络的研究进展,并对产业共生网络的发展前景做了展望。未来产业共生网络研究在不同尺度的比较及推演、数据信息平台的搭建以及产业共生网络演化模拟及管理调控的耦合等方面需重点关注。     

The scientific research on rhodolith beds: A review through bibliometric network analysis

Rhodolith beds are benthic biogenic calcareous habitats formed by the aggregation of unattached, non-geniculate coralline algae. They have a worldwide distribution and, due to their 3D structural complexity and functioning, they provide several ecosystem services (i.e., provisioning and regulating). Recently, their importance and vulnerability have been internationally recognized by international policy and scientific research, and more attention has been drawn to their investigation and conservation. In this study, we conducted a systematic review integrated with a bibliometric analysis of the academic literature related to rhodolith beds. The analysis was based on published literature data over the period 1965–2022, and allowed the generation of maps based on network data displaying the relationships among countries, researchers, keywords, and scientific journals. A total of 853 publications were identified, revealing that scientific research on rhodolith beds is still relatively limited if compared to other coastal vegetated habitats (e.g., seagrass beds, kelp forests), although it has increased over time. Results showed that the scientific documents were published by 77 countries, 2255 researchers, and 279 journals. USA led the research production in this field with 159 documents and 4802 citations, and Amado-Filho was the most productive author with 36 documents and 1126 citations. The co-occurrence network map of keywords showed that the main research fields linked to rhodolith beds are geology, paleontology, algal taxonomy, community ecology, conservation, and physiology. The results also highlighted that most focus on the subject is recently shifting from geological and paleontological aspects to molecular taxonomic, conservation, and ecophysiological ones, while studies on the current topics of ecosystem services and carbon sequestration are still very limited.     

Variation and evolution of plant virus populations

Over the last 15 years, interest in plant virus evolution has re-emerged, as shown by the increasing number of papers published on this subject. In recent times, research in plant virus evolution has been viewed from a molecular, rather than populational, standpoint, and there is a need for work aimed at understanding the processes involved in plant virus evolution. However, accumulated data from analyses of experimental and natural populations of plant viruses are beginning to delineate some trends that often run contrary to accepted opinion: (1) high mutation rates are not necessarily adaptive, as a large fraction of the mutations are deleterious or lethal; (2) in spite of high potential for genetic variation, populations of plant viruses are not highly variable, and genetic stability is the rule rather than the exception; (3) the degree of constriction of genetic variation in virus-encoded proteins is similar to that in their eukaryotic hosts and vectors; and (4) in spite of huge census sizes of plant virus populations, selection is not the sole factor that shapes their evolution, and genetic drift may be important. Here, we review recent advances in understanding plant virus evolution, and describe the experimental and analytical methods most suited to this purpose.     

社会-生态系统:研究态势、主题演进与地域实践

社会-生态系统综合了人类社会治理与自然环境利用研究视角,为解决全球生态问题提供新途径,是人地系统研究的热点。梳理和归纳社会-生态系统研究的发展历程和近今态势,总结前沿议题和地域实践,对人地系统耦合研究和可持续发展具有重要意义。主要发现如下：社会-生态系统研究领域整体发文量较少,发展阶段受国际重要研究计划和组织的直接影响;欧洲、北美洲和澳大利亚的高校、研究所和政府机构是领域内的主要研究力量,核心作者间合作紧密;我国社会-生态系统研究受资助力度逐年增加,研究内容不断深入,但在国际相关学术话语体系构建和关键作用发挥上仍有较大提升空间。社会-生态系统具有复杂性、地域性和动态性等特点,研究内容涵盖自然生态系统、气候变化、土地利用、社会治理与管理政策等主题,是综合了环境科学、生态学、地理学等自然科学与经济学、政治学和社会学等社会科学的多学科交叉领域;以脆弱性和韧性研究为起点,社会-生态系统研究的发展受到诸多人地关系研究工作的启发和推动,Olsson的动态连接分析、Redman的社会模式与过程和生态格局与过程、Ostrom的公共资源治理是目前影响较广的三个社会-生态系统研究框架。扰沌为解释社会-生态系统快速与慢速交互作用、局部与全球适应性变化提供理论基础,干扰响应机制、系统自组织过程、学习与适应性治理成为社会-生态系统研究核心。海岸带、干旱区和城市等生态环境与社会环境敏感区是社会-生态系统研究最受关注的地域。未来的工作应注重结合我国广泛的地域实践,推动社会-生态系统的理论与方法体系的完善。相关发现为社会-生态系统领域凝炼研究方向和深化科学问题提供了参考。     

Cephalopods in neuroscience: regulations,research and the 3Rs

Cephalopods have been utilised in neuroscience research for more than 100 years particularly because of their phenotypic plasticity, complex and centralised nervous system, tractability for studies of learning and cellular mechanisms of memory (e.g. long-term potentiation) and anatomical features facilitating physiological studies (e.g. squid giant axon and synapse). On 1 January 2013, research using any of the about 700 extant species of “live cephalopods” became regulated within the European Union by Directive 2010/63/EU on the “Protection of Animals used for Scientific Purposes”, giving cephalopods the same EU legal protection as previously afforded only to vertebrates. The Directive has a number of implications, particularly for neuroscience research. These include: (1) projects will need justification, authorisation from local competent authorities, and be subject to review including a harm-benefit assessment and adherence to the 3Rs principles (Replacement, Refinement and Reduction). (2) To support project evaluation and compliance with the new EU law, guidelines specific to cephalopods will need to be developed, covering capture, transport, handling, housing, care, maintenance, health monitoring, humane anaesthesia, analgesia and euthanasia. (3) Objective criteria need to be developed to identify signs of pain, suffering, distress and lasting harm particularly in the context of their induction by an experimental procedure. Despite diversity of views existing on some of these topics, this paper reviews the above topics and describes the approaches being taken by the cephalopod research community (represented by the authorship) to produce “guidelines” and the potential contribution of neuroscience research to cephalopod welfare.     

中国野生动物红外相机监测与研究: 现状及未来

智能传感器、人工智能、信息技术等现代科学技术的创新应用极大地提升了人类在全球生物多样性保护和恢复方面的潜力。结合国内外相关研究案例, 本文的主要内容包括: (1)对过去30年间(1991-2021年)中国野生动物红外相机监测研究相关文献资料进行总结分析; (2)结合国内2011年以来的典型案例, 对技术方法、物种发现与编目、形态与行为研究、生态学研究和保护管理等主题领域的进展进行总结分析; (3)结合国外近期的典型案例, 对红外相机监测与研究的重点领域进行评估分析; (4)对中国野生动物红外相机监测研究的未来发展提出相关建议。通过回顾, 本文旨在明晰国内外红外相机技术在野生动物监测研究中的创新应用和发展趋势, 为中国在该领域的未来发展提供参考依据, 以便更好地服务于中国生物多样性监测与研究网络建设和以国家公园为主体的自然保护地体系建设, 为推进国家生态文明建设、保障生态安全和生物安全提供决策支持和科学依据。     

Review of research on closed loop supply chain management in the process industry

Closed loop supply chain (CLSC) management is a major enabler for sustainability in value creating networks. This contribution aims to describe and analyze the main characteristics of CLSC planning in the process industry and the related publications, in order to determine the evolution and gaps of this current research over time and improve our understanding of this issue. We built up a database with the articles on CLSC in different sectors of the process industry and identified the most relevant journals within this field. Furthermore, we derive and identify the requirements for CLSC considerations in the process industry for verifying whether these requirements are met in the literature so far. In addition, we have explored the topic, the methodology and the techniques of analysis, as well as other relevant aspects of the research in this field. We mainly focus on general and specific quantitative approaches, observing what has been done and how, where and by whom it has been carried out. The result is an extensive review of the research work itself and their limitations having an influence on CLSC concepts for the process industry. We conclude with some suggestions to those who begin to research on this apparently disregarded topic.     

Exploring the evolution of sustainable fisheries development: Focusing on ecological,environmental and management issues

Living marine resources are crucial for guaranteeing food security, meeting nutritional needs, generating employment, and solving other human challenges worldwide. Nevertheless, resource overexploitation and environmental contamination pose serious challenges to the sustainable development of fisheries (SDF). Numerous studies have been conducted in various disciplines worldwide to address these challenges. In this study, we collected 4450 journal articles from the Web of Science Core Collection database to help explain the evolution process, current state of affairs, research hotspots, and trends of research on the SDF. Using bibliometric tools, VOSviewer, CiteSpace, and Scimago Graphica, a scientometric analysis was conducted to define the knowledge structure by visualizing the co-occurrence network, co-authorship network, co-citation network, and emergence analysis. The findings indicate that the number of publications in this field are expanding rapidly, and key events related to the SDF have influenced publication numbers. Additionally, performance analysis from the author, journal and national perspectives provides scientific information for researchers. The thematic content on the SDF has also changed to emphasize ecosystem structure and its services.