Disciplinary dimensions and social relevance in the scientific communications on biofuels

Abstract

The disciplinary structure of research on complex problems related to human activities is supported by the fundaments of the social, life, and hard sciences. In this work, we looked at the development of scientific research in the field of biofuels, as a sustainable source of energy, searching for references regarding its scientific roots and social relevance. Scientific communications on biofuels published between 1998 and 2007 were analyzed using a combination of bibliometric methods and text mining techniques. This field of research was characterized as interdisciplinary, with marked social relevance. Our bibliometric analysis shows that, in this research subject, 132 different, interacting fields of knowledge overlap, with dominance of Chemistry, Engineering and Agricultural Sciences. Through the use of text mining techniques, this field was configured into three groups of Disciplinary Dimensions. The first and most influential group includes the Agricultural Sciences, Social Sciences, and Environmental Sciences. The second group, which gives the field its technological basis, includes Chemistry, Engineering, and Microbiology. The third group includes disciplines with emerging involvement in the field of biofuels: Biology and Biochemistry, Animal and Plant Sciences, Molecular Biology and Genetics, Economics, Material Sciences, Nanosciences and Nanotechnology, Geosciences, Physics, Humanities, Multidisciplinary Sciences, Mathematics, and Computer Sciences. This study suggests that the first group of Disciplinary Dimensions conforms to the elements that socially validate the progress of research in the field of biofuels. This study also proposes a metric that can be used to measure the interdisciplinarity and the social framing of any other research field.