Rete-Netzwerk-Red: Analyzing and visualizing scholarly networks using the network workbench tool

Abstract

The enormous increase in digital scholarly data and computing power combined with recent advances in text mining, linguistics, network science, and scientometrics make it possible to scientifically study the structure and evolution of science on a large scale. This paper discusses the challenges of this 'BIG science of science' - Also called 'computational scientometrics' research - in terms of data access, algorithm scalability, repeatability, as well as result communication and interpretation. It then introduces two infrastructures: (1) the Scholarly Database (SDB) (http://sdb.slis.indiana.edu), which provides free online access to 20 million scholarly records - papers, patents, and funding awards which can be cross-searched and downloaded as dumps, and (2) Scientometrics-relevant plug-ins of the open-source Network Workbench (NWB) Tool (http://nwb.slis.indiana.edu). The utility of these infrastructures is then exemplarily demonstrated in three studies: A comparison of the funding portfolios and co-investigator networks of different universities, an examination of paper-citation and co-author networks of major network science researchers, and an analysis of topic bursts in streams of text. The paper concludes with a discussion of related work that aims to provide practically useful and theoretically grounded cyberinfrastructure in support of computational scientometrics research, practice, and education.