A comparison between domestic and international publications in Brazilian psychiatry

This article assesses the Brazilian psychiatric production and compares the numbers of articles published between 1981 and 1995 in Brazilian domestic journals and published in international journals. From the total number of articles analyzed, 87.2% were published in domestic journals. These probably will never reach the international scientific community. From the articles published in Brazil, 56.8% were review and opinion articles, while from the articles published in international journals, 69.8% were research articles. Publications in both Brazilian and international journals included few prospective research studies and research reports dealing with bipolar disorder and cocaine use. On the other hand, alcohol use disorder and major depressive disorder were the most commonly studied clinical fields published both in domestic and in international psychiatric journals. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

A comparative study of patenting activity in U.S. and Brazilian scientific institutions

Patents generated from scientific research indicate academic involvement in technology development. Academic patenting activity is recent, even in developed countries. This study compares patenting activity of Brazilian and American universities. Brazilian universities had 29.5-fold increase in applications and 4.01-fold in grants (1990–2001), about twice the increase presented by American universities in this period. However, a significant fraction of Brazilian academic applications are abandoned due to the lack of specialized staff to help in writing and to shepherd the application through the patenting process in universities. The participation of research institutes in technological innovation is increasing steadily, even without financial incentives. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

A new input indicator for the assessment of science &; technology research?

Traditional input indicators of research performance, such as research funding, number of active scientists, and international collaborations, have been widely used to assess countries’ publication output. However, while publication in today’s English-only research world requires sound research in readable English, English proficiency may be a problem for the productivity of non-native English-speaking (NNES) countries. Data provided by the Brazilian National Research Council (CNPq) containing the academic profile of 51,223 Brazilian researchers show a correlation between English proficiency and publication output. According to our results, traditional input indicators may fall short of providing an accurate representation of the research performance of NNES developing countries.     

Brazilian scientific production in science education

In the present study we analyzed the Brazilian scientific production in the area of science education. The study was structured on: data by research groups registered in Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico; analysis of the post-graduate strictu sensu programs; analysis of theses and dissertations linked to post-graduate programs; and papers in international databases. Our research was conducted strictly via world wide web, from December 2009 to September 2010. It was found that both number of research groups, researchers, post-graduate programs, thesis, dissertations and papers presented a marked increase, especially in the last decade (from 2000 onwards). The major research centers were found to be located in public universities from Brazilian southeast and south regions. However, it was observed a tendency of decentralization, due to a recent investment in new public universities in the other Brazilian regions. So, this study sought to present an overview of the scientific production about science education and we expect that this information can help to expand the vision about the development of this research area in Brazil.     

Central international visibility of Brazilian psychiatric publications from 1981 to 1995

In this study, we examine the scientific output of Brazilian psychiatry, based on the databaseof the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI), publications in the 10 most important psychiatricjournals, and publications in major Brazilian journals. The number of Brazilian publications (i.e.,those carrying at least one Brazilian address) in psychiatry in the ISI database increased by 168%during the 15-year period under study (1981-1995) . Despite this growth, the relative contributionof publications in psychiatry to the country's publications in medical sciences did not change overthe 15-year period. This fraction, around 2%, remained at less than one-third of the averagecontribution of psychiatry journals to publications in medicine worldwide. The impact inferredfrom number of citations (1981-1992) shows that Brazilian articles in psychiatry were cited lessthan the world average in this field. In the 10 psychiatry journals with the highest impact,Brazilian authors published only 48 articles in the 1981-1995 period, representing only 0.2% ofthe articles in those journals. Like their American and British counterparts, Brazilian psychiatristsalso published primarily in domestic journals: 87.1% of the publications by Brazilians appeared inthe two major Brazilian psychiatric journals, compared with only 12.9% in foreign journals.Among publications in psychiatry in the ISI database, the number of articles co-authored byBrazilians with scientists from other countries increased 12.3 fold from 1981-1985 to 1991-1995,representing at the end 50% of all publications by Brazilian psychiatrists in international journals.Despite all cuts in funding for Brazilian science during the last decades, all of the articles in oursample originated in public universities, and only 10 universities were responsible for 70% of thepublications by Brazilian psychiatrists in our survey period. We conclude that Brazilianpsychiatric research is a subject worthy of particular concern, especially if we take into accountthe country's modest scientific performance and the socio-economic consequences of mentaldisorders in the Brazilian population.     

Brazilian sciences and government funding at the State of São Paulo

The State of São Paulo plays an important role in national research activities. The Foundation for the Support of Research of São Paulo State (FAPESP) is commissioned to manage funds for these activities. The profile of Brazilian sciences is investigated and contrasted to FAPESP's investments. ISI date relative to years 1981 to 1995 are analysed through multivariate methods (Factor and Cluster Analysis) as to provide weighted ranks of research fields, relationships among them as geometric distances, and group classification. This information is compared to public reports on FAPESP's expenditures. Brazilian scientific production grows at 244 papers/year in the period, and its global share is almost doubled. Impact shows no trend. Best performers are from exact and biological sciences. Though impact varies greatly among research fields, their major distinctive feature is magnitude of production. The six top research fields identified (Physics, Biology &; Biochemistry, Clinical Medicine, Engineering, Chemistry, Plant &; Animal Sciences) were found to equally be the prime beneficiaries FAPESP's investments. The Brazilian scenario is one of increasing production under an international pattern. This trend is not accompanied by changes in impact. As a corollary, volume of publications rises as an important issue. Public investments from São Paulo State adequately conform this scenario giving reassurance that resouces are not being squandered.     

What publications metadata tell us about the evolution of a scientific community: the case of the Brazilian human–computer interaction conference series

Human–computer interaction (HCI) is a research field which engages different disciplines, interest groups and communities, and which has emerged in different countries at different times. To understand how the HCI research community has evolved in Brazil, this paper applies data and visual analytics to its main conference series, the Brazilian Symposium on Human Factors in Computing Systems, henceforth IHC. We have explored the metadata of all 340 full papers published in the 14 editions of IHC. Our goal was to investigate the evolution of the Brazilian HCI community so we can raise the level of “self-knowledge” and thus discuss strategies that can further help develop this research community. From our analysis, we could understand more deeply the authorship profile of our community and how it has changed over time, the co-authorship networks evolution, the prominent institutions and states, the reference profile and the research topics over time. We hope that this paper will contribute to inspire other scientific communities to analyze themselves, and encourage their own discussions.     

Concentration of science in Brazilian governmental universities

Brazilian university-based science has grown rapidly in the last 20 years. Most of the PhD-level teaching, research, and technical publications are based in the government-supported universities, although there are also privately supported universities, which educate a large fraction of Brazilian attorney, business people, and other professions. We investigate here the relationship between type of university, numbers of degree program offered, number of faculty members, and number of published papers. Twelve universities, all government supported, are found to produce a very large fraction of publications and to house the best qualified PhD programs. We find that there is a strong correlation between research carried out with foreign collaborators and rate at which the resulting publications are cited. This trend is characteristic of many developing and less developed nations. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Editorial: Selected papers from SBES '07

This Special Issue contains four extended papers selected from those presented in the 21st Brazilian Symposium in Software Engineering (SBES 2007) which took place in Joa?o Pessoa, state of Parai′ba, in the northeast of Brazil. This series of symposia, which is currently in its 23rd edition, is an initiative of the Software Engineering Special Committee (CEES) of the Brazilian Computing Society (SBC). The objective of SBES is to stimulate the exchange of experiences between research groups, disseminate the use of advanced software engineering techniques and tools and promote contact between participants and national and international invited speakers.     

A Brazilian government external individual monitoring service: experience since 1972

Instituto de Radioprote??o e Dosimetria, a Brazilian government research institute, provides individual monitoring services since 1972. Its dosemeters are: film-based thorax for whole body photons, thermoluminescence dosimetry (TLD) albedo for whole body neutrons and TLD ring for extremity photons. About 6000 radiation workers are currently being monitored with film dosemeters in 256 different facilities in Brazil, most of them working in health-related activities. Around 400 Brazilian radiation workers are monitored with TLD albedo neutron monitor and about 500 workers use TLD rings. This paper describes the monitoring systems used, presents the results obtained in internal quality programs and in intercomparison exercises and analyses the measured dose values from 1985 to 2009.     

Vaccine R&D in Brazil: The effectiveness of push and pull regulations

Government regulations can guide the technological progress, investment in research and development (R&D), and institutional organization of a specific sector. In this context, using patent data, this study aimed to analyze the effectiveness of three laws that pertain to R&D in Brazilian pharmaceutical market for vaccines. The results reveal an increasing international interest in the Brazilian market since the promulgation of the Industrial Property Law. Despite its limitations, this study reveals significant efforts and promising results in Brazil with respect to ensuring that technological and industrial policies and strategies incorporate innovation in vaccine R&D and change the economy's competitive circumstances.     

Profiles of Brazilian IS/IT professionals: Hierarchical and decision levels in an organization

The growing importance of the role of IS/IT professionals in setting and realizing organizational strategies has led to many lines of research pursued throughout the world. Numerous studies seek to diagnose professional profiles and the characteristics required of IS/IT professionals. This article presents the results of an investigation of 259 Brazilian IS/IT professionals. The study aims to familiarize researchers with the profile of these professionals by referring to levels of decision making that follow a standard hierarchical logic, namely, operational, tactical, and strategic. Based on data acquired in the investigation, and using the Spearman correlation coefficient by ranks test and the Pearson chi-square test, conclusions are provided about correlations found in the Brazilian sample.     

Practitioners’ perceptions of the Brazilian environmental impact assessment system: results from a survey

Practitioners play a key role in implementing environmental impact assessment (EIA) policies. Gauging their perception can help in designing legislation or regulation reforms and signals what needs more attention in research. The Brazilian EIA system is under review by lawmakers, but there is scant information about the views of professionals. A survey was conducted to inquiry on practitioners’ perception of the Brazilian EIA system regarding: (1) quality of the process, (2) quality of the environmental impact studies (EIS), and (3) proposals to change the system. Four hundred and fourteen professionals participated in an online survey responding to 44 questions. Results show positive perceptions about some aspects of current practice, but there is a clear predominance of negative appraisal both about the quality of the process and the quality of EIS. The poorest practices are the consideration of cumulative impacts and determination of impact significance. As for proposals to change the system, respondents defend the continuity of specific characteristics of the Brazilian system. Essentially, practitioners are calling for incremental changes that do not require any modification in the legislation.     

Circular supply chains in emerging economies – a comparative study of packaging recovery ecosystems in China and Brazil

This paper provides a circular supply chain perspective of packaging recovery ecosystems being implemented by Tetra Pak, a prime global player in the food packaging industry, in two major emerging economies: China and Brazil. The circular supply chain archetype considered in the research allowed a consistent comparative analysis of Tetra Pak's circular supply chains in both countries. Through a case study approach, the research provides theoretical propositions and learning points that are valuable for academics and practitioners interested in the Chinese and Brazilian markets as well as in the supply chains supporting recovery ecosystems in the packaging industry. In particular, the distinct environments in the Chinese and Brazilian markets render Tetra Pak opportunities to design circular supply chains in different ways showing adaptation and learning to local market characteristics. The industrial perspectives from these emerging economies add to the contributions offered in the paper. Overall, the conceptual considerations and practical recommendations presented in the paper provide useful insights for the development of further studies and implementation of industrial practices advocated by the circular economy.     

Thirty years of Brazilian research in Antarctica: ups, downs and perspectives

The Antarctic continent is the most untouched region of the world but is also among the most vulnerable to global environmental change. Alterations to the Antarctic environment can have cascading effects many of which are unpredictable. Our objective was to investigate the contribution of Brazilian scientists to Antarctic research and to characterize the actions taken by the country to improve its scientific output and its international impact in this area. Scientific publications related to Antarctica, released from 1981 to 2011 were searched using three important science data bases. The data were used to determine the absolute increase and the relative growth rate of publications in order to characterize the contribution of Brazil to the world’s scientific understanding of Antarctica. The number of publications revealed an undersized contribution of the Brazilian science to the world’s publications about Antarctica. However, over the last 30 years there has been a substantial increase in the number of publications associated with governmental financial policies. As in other countries, Brazil’s most significant scientific contributions regarding the Antarctic continent are in the biological sciences. Therefore, public policies should maintain the current official support, while the research groups should pay attention to strategic scientific and technological areas still uncovered in the Antarctic research.     

Dentistry scientometric analysis: a comparative study between Brazil and other most productive countries in the area

This research aims at performing a comparative study between the Brazilian scientific production in Dentistry, from 2000 to 2009 and countries that contribute with at least 2 % of the world’s scientific production indexed in the Scopus database. More specifically, we intend to assess the annual Brazilian scientific production by comparing it to the other countries’, analyze the Brazilian and other countries’ publications in journals with higher impact factors, as well as to highlight the scientific production from these countries and its international visibility, measured by its total and by its average of citations and normalized citation index per year, by comparing the countries, and to compare the index h of such countries. As work procedure, the SCImago Journal and Country Rank was used as source, identifying the group of producing countries in the Dentistry area from 1996 to 2009. From a total of 136 countries, 13 were highlighted as the most productive, each one of them accounting for at least 2 % the worldwide scientific production in the area. The following indicators were raised for each country: number of produced documents, total of citations, self-citations, average of citations per document and index h. We verified that Brazil is the only country in Latin America that is pictured among the most productive ones in the Dentistry area. We observed that Brazil presents a growing visibility and impact in the international scenery, what suggests that its production is constantly consolidating, with Brazilian scientific recognition in the main vehicles of dissemination in the area.     

Who’s who and what’s what in Brazilian Public Health Sciences

Introduction  The present study endeavours to provide information on what are the research interests of Brazilian Public Health and how authors can be ranked. Methods  Post-graduate faculty members ISI data are analysed according to regions. Number of paper and its citations, papers’ type-complexity-cooperation, Bradford’s Law, Shannon’s indexes, time dynamic functions, Lotka’s Law, and ranking functions are examined. Results  Current production was built up in the last 30 years at a rate of 9.6% articles/year and 12.6% citations/year. 66% of potential authors were present in ISI data records, 64% achieved at least one citation. Research fields do not much depart from the traditional PH purview. More than 66% of authors have just one paper and decrease is steep. Subtle differences call attention to the South region. Conclusion  Brazilian PH is mainly committed to classical research fields and ranking among authors is narrow.     

Example of open-source OPS (Open Patent Services) for patent education and information using the computational tool Patent2Net

This paper discusses the use of Patent2Net, an open source software for extracting and making available information on patents related to dengue fever, a neglected disease of high interest to Brazil. Only ten of 1427 dengue-related patents retrieved in the European worldwide database were filed by Brazilian institutions, showing low contribution of technological research in Brazil regarding this disease. The results enable the creation of new indicators, promoting social responsibility in research, since it is expected that scientific research will produce not only high-impact bibliographic production, but also technological products that can effectively further the search for solutions to problems.     

Correlations between bibliometrics and peer evaluation for all disciplines: the evaluation of Brazilian scientists

This paper correlates the peer evaluations performed in late 2009 by the disciplinary committees of CNPq (a Brazilian funding agency) with some standard bibliometric measures for 55 scientific areas. We compared the decisions to increase, maintain or decrease a scientist’s research scholarship funded by CNPq. We analyzed these decisions for 2,663 Brazilian scientists and computed their correlations (Spearman rho) with 21 different measures, among them: total production, production in the last 5 years, production indexed in Web of Science and Scopus, total citations received (according to WOS, Scopus, and Google Scholar), h-index and m-quotient (according to the three citation services). The highest correlations for each area range from 0.95 to 0.29, although there are areas with no significantly positive correlation with any of the metrics.