Visualizing Science
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I found this and thought I'd share it, but had no idea where to put it on Manx Forums so thought I'd put it up on my blog.
Below is an attempt to visualize how the endevours of science are communicated between the most important scientific journals. I found it at Well-Formed-Eigen-Factor.org!
Lots of science is really only of interest to specialists, and you can see that in the tight loops of citations between journals concentrated in one particular field.
But this detailed work can then explode outward to a much wider audience - often by it being cited in the important journals like Nature or Science. It is these journals which create scientific cross links as ideas and results reinforce or challenge theories across the range of human thought.
Check out here for more info - have a play - for example find the Annual Review of Nutrition - its a tiny journal at almost exactly 9 o'clock on the diagram, and see how its work has been picked up and used by scientists working in other areas.
Ok, its nerdish, but I though it was interesting - nearly every technological object around you will have started off in a link, or a loop, like that. Every time you see a doctor or take a tablet, or download some music off the web originally there was some scientist wondering if their idea worked and telling others about it and its results.
This tries to capture the complexity of that process - amazing innit!
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