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Measuring nanotechnology development through the study of the dividing pattern between developed and developing countries during 2000–2014

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Abstract

This paper investigates the global nanotechnology and nanoscience (NN) indicators in a developmental context, during three 5-year periods from 2000 to 2014. Through bibliometric analyses of the longitudinal data from well-known databases, the growth patterns of NN articles and patents were investigated. Furthermore, the causal relationships among these indicators and some characteristics of the 105 countries studied were examined using regression and correlation analyses leading to the identification of the top 20 “science and innovation giants,” in terms of all indicators, as well as the existence of significant, yet different, correlations among the indicators in developing and developed countries. In general, China’s growth rate (GR) in NN publications was found to surpass USA, from 2010 to 2014, leading to a change in the ranking of the top countries and moving China, with about 25 % of world’s NN articles, to top. A different trend was distinguished for patents in the area of nanotechnology, where USA, as the origin of over half of the world’s granted patents, has been the undisputed leader. The shares of developing countries (i.e., the percent ratios of the number of nanotech patents granted to the citizens of developing countries over the total number of nanotech patents granted worldwide) was found to be incompatible with the countries’ shares in the total NN articles, indicating a poor correlation between the two factors. However, developing countries were found to be superior in the GR of both NN articles and patents. Finally, the top countries identified can be regarded as suitable for comparative studies, and benchmarking by researchers and policy makers.

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Notes

  1. http://statnano.com/aboutus.

  2. http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GNP.PCAP.CD.

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Acknowledgments

The authors are very grateful for the valuable comments and suggestions provided by the anonymous reviewers. The authors also wish to thank the editor of the journal for his careful cooperation in the review process of the article, which significantly improved the quality of the paper. We are also very thankful for the precise proofreading and noteworthy recommendations of Dr. Morteza Rezapour, which helped us significantly and enhanced the comprehensibility of paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Industrial Engineering, Iran University of Science and Technology (IUST), Narmak, Tehran, Iran

    Mostafa Jafari & Hamid Reza Zarghami

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  1. Mostafa Jafari
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  2. Hamid Reza Zarghami
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Correspondence to Mostafa Jafari.

Appendix

Appendix

Search string used for retrieving NN-related publications and patents (Maghrebi et al. 2011) (nano* not nano2 not nano3 not nanog not nanosecond* not nanomol* not nanogram* not nanoplankton* or "atom* scale" or "atomic layer deposition*" or "giant magnetoresist*" or graphen* or dendrimer* or fulleren* or "c-60" or "langmuir blodgett*" or mesopor* or "molecul* assembl*" or "molecul* wire*" or "porous silicon*" or "quantum dot*" or "quantum well*" or "quantum comput*" or "quantum wire*" or qubit* or "self assembl*" or supramolecul* or supermolecul* or "ultrathin film*" or "ultra thin film*").

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Jafari, M., Zarghami, H.R. Measuring nanotechnology development through the study of the dividing pattern between developed and developing countries during 2000–2014. J Nanopart Res 18, 180 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11051-016-3431-0

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