Introducing ‘facilitymetrics’: a first review and analysis of commonly used measures of scientific leadership among synchrotron radiation facilities worldwide

Olof Hallonsten ()
Additional contact information
Olof Hallonsten: University of Gothenburg

Scientometrics, 2013, vol. 96, issue 2, No 7, 497-513

Abstract: Abstract Big Science accelerator complexes are no longer mere tools for nuclear and particle physics, but modern-day experimental resources for a wide range of natural sciences and often named instrumental to scientific and technological development for innovation and economic growth. Facilities compete on a global market to attract the best users and facilitate the best science, and advertise the achievement of their users as markers of quality and productivity. Thus a need has risen for (quantitative) quality assessment of science on the level of facilities. In this article, we examine some quantitative performance measurements frequently used by facilities to display quality: technical reliability, competition for access, and publication records. We report data from the world’s three largest synchrotron radiation facilities from the years 2004–2010, and discuss their meaning and significance by placing them in proper context. While we argue that quality is not possible to completely capture in these quantitative metrics, we acknowledge their apparent importance and, hence, we introduce and propose facilitymetrics as a new feature of the study of modern big science, and as a new empirical focus for scientometrical study, in the hope that future studies can contribute to a deeper, much-needed analysis of the topic.

Keywords: Big Science; Synchrotron radiation facilities; Quality assessment; Performance assessment; Productivity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (11)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11192-012-0945-9 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:scient:v:96:y:2013:i:2:d:10.1007_s11192-012-0945-9

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/11192

DOI: 10.1007/s11192-012-0945-9

Access Statistics for this article

Scientometrics is currently edited by Wolfgang Glänzel

More articles in Scientometrics from Springer, Akadémiai Kiadó
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().