Thomson Scientific Names 'Hottest' Researchers and Papers of 2006-2007

PHILADELPHIA and LONDON, March 12 /PRNewswire/ --

- Osaka's Shizuo Akira Ranks Among The Hottest for Fourth Year; Once Again, United States Accounts for More Than Half of the Top Researchers

Thomson Scientific, part of The Thomson Corporation (NYSE: TOC; TSX: TOC) and leading provider of information solutions to the worldwide research and business communities, today announced the results of its annual roundup of the "hottest" researchers and research papers. In the March/April issue of Science Watch (www.sciencewatch.com), Thomson Scientific identifies the top 10 authors who fielded the highest number of Hot Papers in 2006-2007. The annual Science Watch roundup also lists the scientific reports published during 2007 (aside from reviews) that were most cited by year's end.

Thomson Scientific Hot Papers are derived from the Web of Science(R) database. A published work is identified as a Hot Paper if it has achieved a rate of citations that is markedly higher than papers of comparable type and age. The researchers named have published the most Hot Papers in the latest two-year period indexed by Thomson Scientific for inclusion in Web of Science.

"Each year, our list of those authoring multiple Hot Papers highlights researchers who are leading modern scientific thought," said Christopher King, editor of Science Watch. "To identify these scientists, we tracked all unique occurrences of Hot Papers throughout the majority of 2007, noting the authors whose recent reports were being highly cited on a consistent basis."

This year, thanks to their participation in two large, multiauthor collaborations, a trio of high energy physicists ended Osaka University's Shizuo Akira's two-year streak at the top spot Mikhail Kopytine of Kent State University, Basanta K. Nandi of Indian Institute of Technology and Thomas Peitzmann of Utrecht University each garnered 12 Hot Papers, topping the list.

However, Shizuo Akira is showing no signs of slowing down. He follows closely behind the three physicists with 11 Hot Papers focused on immunology, in particular, pathogen recognition. This marks the fourth year in a row Akira has made the Hottest Researchers list.

Last year, the United States accounted for 60 percent of the "Hottest" researchers. This time, seven out of the top ten researchers come from American institutions. Rounding out the list are researchers from India, the Netherlands and Japan, each with one researcher.

"Hottest" Researchers, ranked by number of Hot Papers: (Alphabetically ordered) Number of Hot Name Institution Field Papers Mikhail Kopytine Kent State University, U.S. Physics 12 Basanta K. Nandi Indian Institute of Physics 12 Technology, India Thomas Peitzmann Utrecht University, Physics 12 Netherlands Shizuo Akira Osaka University, Japan Immunology 11 John A. Nousek Pennsylvania State Space Science 11 University, U.S. Jonathan Brinkman Apache Point Observatory, Space Science 10 U.S. Carlo M. Croce Ohio State University, U.S. Cancer Genetics 10 Todd R. Golub Howard Hughes Medical Cancer Genetics 10 Institute, Broad Institute, U.S. Jeffrey A. Lieberman Columbia University, U.S. Psychiatry 10 JoAnn Manson Harvard University, U.S. Epidemiology 10

During the past few surveys, the New England Journal of Medicine has made a strong showing fielding the most "hot" papers. This year was no exception. The New England Journal of Medicine fielded three of the top five papers and 15 overall.

The "Hottest" paper of 2007, "Three-year Wilkinson Microwave Anistropy Probe observations: Implications for cosmology" was able to provide solid evidence in favor of a simple cosmological model. Its citation count from 2006 through 2007 was 204.

For a complete list of rankings, please visit Thomson Scientific's recently launched Web site, ScienceWatch.com. ScienceWatch.com combines the latest Science Watch newsletter material and regularly updated data, analysis, interviews, and commentary that had been found previously in Thomson Scientific services In-Cites and Essential Science Indicators Special Topics.

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