A Bibliometric Analysis of Highly Cited Articles in Materials Science

The aim of the present study is to identify and analyse the characteristics of the highly cited articles in materials science, including eight Web of Science categories: multidisciplinary materials science, coatings and films materials science, biomaterials materials science, ceramics materials science, composites materials science, paper and wood materials science, characterization and testing materials science, and textiles materials science within the publication year from 1900 to 2011 based on Science Citation Index-Expanded. Articles that have been cited at least 100 times since publication to 2011 were assessed regarding their distribution in indexed journals. The citation lives of the highly cited articles depending on citations in the publication year, recent years and years after publication were applied for the impact of articles. A new indicator, the Y-index, was applied to assess publication quantity and the characteristics of contribution to articles. Results showed that 14,044 highly cited articles were published between 1900 and 2010. Among them, 70% were published in 1990s and 2000s, and 48% originated from the US. Langmuir and Journal of the Electrochemical Society hosted the highly cited articles. Most top cited articles in the publication year would not be top cited in recent years. Y-index results showed that Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA had high articles publication potential as well as published the most first author and corresponding author articles. Geim and Novoselov who are the 2010 Nobel laureates, published the most potential article in materials science. Y-index showed that Inoue and Xia had the highest publication performance but different publication characteristics.