Ohio State study: Global teamwork on scientific research growing

“More than ever, scientists are going beyond seeking colleagues from down the hall and instead looking to partner with the best and brightest across time zones, languages and cultures. Global science is nothing new, but the pace and expanse of international research is reaching incredible levels, according to a new study from OSU.

“Curiosity knows no border. Talent knows no boundaries,” said Dr. John Barnard, president of the Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital. “Science has always valued that. It’s core to our being.”

But as federal science funding dwindles and travel to and from the United States is becoming increasingly political and problematic, the international science community could rethink America’s role in that network, said Caroline Wagner, an OSU associate professor of public affairs who helped conduct the university’s recent research on the topic.

“What it hurts is future research,” she said. “The longer-term harm to science from that would be more corrosive.”

Her research analyzed multiple-author scientific papers with collaborators from more than one country between 1990 and 2015. The percentage of international studies grew from 10 percent to 25 percent.

The global focus also held true for Ohio, Wagner found, where an Akron scientist is more likely to have a co-author in Japan than one based in Dayton.

In 2013, Ohio produced more than 22,000 multinational papers. That year, Ohio researchers published just 400 studies that involved collaborations within the state.” Read full article from Columbus Dispatch