LIRC@SFIT

Tuesday, July 23, 2019

TCS says large contracts will help it absorb cost of keeping bench talent

TCS had issued joining letters to over 30,000 fresh graduates, of which 40% have been onboarded in the first quarter.

2019 Scholar Metrics Released

Scholar Metrics provide an easy way for authors to quickly gauge the visibility and influence of recent articles in scholarly publications. Today, we are releasing the 2019 version of Scholar Metrics. This release covers articles published in 2014–2018 and includes citations from all articles that were indexed in Google Scholar as of July 2019.

Scholar Metrics include journals from websites that follow our inclusion guidelines and selected conferences in Engineering & Computer Science. Publications with fewer than 100 articles in 2014-2018, or publications that received no citations over these years are not included.

You can browse publications in specific categories such as Ceramic Engineering,High Energy & Nuclear Physics, or Film as well as broad areas like Engineering & Computer Science or Humanities, Literature & Arts . You will see the top 20 publications ordered by their five-year h-index and h-median metrics. You also can browse the top 100 publications in several languages - for example, Portuguese and Spanish. For each publication, you can view the top papers by clicking on the h5-index.

Scholar Metrics include a large number of publications beyond those listed on the per-category and per-language pages. You can find these by typing words from the title in the search box, e.g., [security], [soil], [medicina].

For more details, see the Scholar Metrics help page.

Posted by: Anurag Acharya, Distinguished Engineer

Source: https://scholar.googleblog.com/2019/07/2019-scholar-metrics-released.html (Accessed on July 23, 2019)

Only 15.8% of Indian work in world’s top 10 journals

Only 15.8% of the total publications produced by Indian researchers feature in the top 10 journals globally, there is dire need to focus on the quality of research in the country

IANS

Published: 22 Jul 2019, 8:00 PM

Engagement: 17

Only 15.8 per cent of the total publications produced by Indian researchers feature in the top 10 journals globally, a government report has revealed. It has emphasised on the dire need to focus on the quality of research in the country.

Compared globally, India trails the UK, which has 37.3 per cent research work published in top 10 journals, the US (36.2 per cent), Germany (33.4 per cent) and China (27.6 per cent).

As per Scimago Journal Rankings, India ranks fifth in global research publication output. But countries such as the US, China, Germany and the UK continue to dominate the world rankings both in terms of quantitative and qualitative research.

"Presently, sizeable numbers of research and technology institutions/universities are spread across the nation, which includes central/state government funded and self-financed institutions. Despite these huge investments, the quality of research and innovation (R&I) is not of current global standards. Moreover, none of these institutions are amongst the top 100 R&I institutions in the world. Also, the quality of the workforce produced by these institutions is not amongst the best in the world," the HRD Ministry's Education Quality Upgradation and Inclusion Programme (EQUIP) report has said.

The quality of academic research produced by Indian scholars has become a subject of grave concern for the University Grants Commission (UGC), which had flagged the issue of increasing the number of students getting their research published in 'sub-standard journals'.

Following this, the UGC has released a list of journals and research work published only in those journals will be considered for academic credit.

The report has called for an increased shared of investment for the purpose of achieving global standards in research and innovation.

"India's R&I investments vis-a-vis global standards show that India's R&I investments have steadily dropped over the last decade - from 0.84 per cent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2008 to around 0.69 per cent in 2018.

"For the sake of comparison, the levels of R&I investment as a proportion of GDP in some other countries are the US (2.8 per cent), China (2.1 per cent), Israel (4.3 per cent) and South Korea (4.2 per cent)," it added.

The report noted that with a significant increase in investment in research and innovation, China now produces the maximum number of PhDs globally, having steadily increased the numbers yearly over the US.

According to the HRD Ministry's All India Survey on Higher Education (AISHE) data for 2017-18, 34,400 students were awarded PhD level degree during 2017.

China has produced four times the number of articles than India.

"India's share of scientific publications has increased from 3.1 per cent in 2009 to 4.4 per cent in 2013 and to 4.8 in 2016. However, a 2018 compilation of Science and Engineering indicators by the US National Science Foundation showed that both the US (17.8 per cent) and China (18.6 per cent) published approximately four times as many articles as India in 2016," the report added.

Due to the country's steady decline in investments, India severely lags in the number of patents and publications produced.

"According to the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) 2017 report, China made as many as 13,81,584 patent applications, with just 9.8 per cent being made by non-resident Chinese; the US made 6,06,956 patent applications while India made a mere 46,582 applications, of which approximately 68 per cent were by non-resident Indians, and only 26 per cent (12,387) of them were accepted as patents," it said.

The report, which aims to improve the standards of higher education in the country, has stressed the need for collaborative efforts between central and state governments as currently the research and innovation efforts are primarily funded by the Centre.

"The fundamental limitations of our educational system include marks-based assessment of students' potential, thereby promoting mugging-up of entire textbooks, too much parochialism, and inability to impart analytical skills. Very small percentages of students are capable of identifying a problem and visualizing an approach for finding the best solution. Moreover, the ability to think out-of-the-box is completely missing. As a result, confidence level or appetite for taking risk is very low, especially for pursuing new ideas," it added.

Source: https://www.nationalheraldindia.com/science-and-tech/only-158-of-indian-work-in-worlds-top-10-journals (Accessed on July 23, 2019)

Hijacked journals: what they are and how to avoid them

Hijacked journals are duplicate or fake websites of legitimate ones utilizing the title, ISSN and other information of the reputable journal. They are often created by a malicious third party for the purpose of fraudulently offering academicians the opportunity to rapidly publish their research online for a fee [1,2].

In this blog Dr. Varun G Menon, Associate Professor at SCMS Group of Educational Institutions, India, alerts researchers to the threat posed by hijacked journals to their career and to the scholarly community, and provides tips for spotting and avoiding them. In this article, the term ‘hijacked journal’ refers to the fake version of the original legitimate journal [3].

To read the full article, please visit:

https://publons.com/blog/hijacked-journals-what-they-are-and-how-to-avoid-them/ (Accessed on July 23, 2019)

Inside India’s fake research paper shops: pay, publish, profit

Despite UGC blacklist, hundreds of ‘predatory journals’ thrive, cast shadow on quality of faculty and research nationwide.

In the world of academia, getting published in an international research journal is almost the holy grail, it helps bump up the CV for hiring and helps in the competition for tenure or promotion. It takes rigorous research, an original contribution, exhaustive peer or expert reviews, and dogged persistence.

But then, there’s also an easy way — pay and publish.

An investigation by The Indian Express shows that India has emerged as one of the biggest markets for a business in which over 300 publishers manage what are called “predatory journals” that claim to be international and publish papers for a listed “charge” or “fee” that ranges from $30-$1,800 per piece.

From a plush office in the heart of Hyderabad, home to one of the world’s largest such publishers, to a one-room, one-man, one-laptop office at Richha in Bareilly, The Indian Express found that most of these publications exist online, claim to have a list of experts as editors, and employ minimal or no editorial checks before publication.

Hyderabad-based OMICS is, in fact, facing legal action by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in the US for fraudulent claims — a charge the company denies.

“These so-called predatory journals have brought a bad name for the country and also for many of its sincere researchers,” S C Lakhotia, professor emeritus at Banaras Hindu University, told The Indian Express.

Ten months ago, Lakhotia resigned from a committee set up by the University Grants Commission (UGC) to assess publications recommended by universities for inclusion in an approved list of around 32,000 journals maintained by the regulatory body. “The list had many bogus or dubious journals,” Lakhotia said.

On May 2, the UGC removed 4,305 journals from the list, saying they were of “questionable” nature or lacked mandatory information on their websites.

To read the full article, please visit:

https://indianexpress.com/article/india/inside-indias-fake-research-paper-shops-pay-publish-profit-5265402/ (Accessed on July 23, 2019)

Russian website offering ‘paid’ research authorship under probe

73 of the 344 papers offered for sale are from journals based in India

An “online marketplace” claiming to facilitate sale and purchase of authorships for research papers that have been accepted for publication in scientific journals has been brought to light by the Web of Science, part of London-based Clarivate Analytics, which provides analytical services to journals and innovation companies.

An investigation by the company showed that a Russian website (http://123mi.ru) claims to facilitate the fraudulent publication. Retraction Watch blog was the first to report the scam.

A Google translation of the claims on the Russian website says, “We sell publications of finished articles in Scopus and Web of Science journals (articles written and accepted in journals; sold in parts or in whole).”

It asks researchers to part with hundreds of dollars to become authors of papers that they never worked on, promising definite publication and indexing.

The website lists 344 articles for which first, second, third or more authorships are for sale.

Of the 344 papers where authorships are for sale, 73 are from journals based in India. Venezuela has the second highest number of papers at 54, followed by the U.S. (38), Russia (33) and Pakistan (28).

Although there are a few dozen papers listed from these countries, it is not clear how many journals are allegedly open to such a practice.

There is also no confirmation of the site’s claim that the journals are indexed in Scopus or Web of Science or whether they are predatory or standard journals.

Although the website claims that certain authorships had been sold, it is not clear if individuals parted with money.

It is also unclear if any papers have actually been published, or if the Russian website is just an online scam operation.

First-author fee

The cost of first authorship is highest and reduces for the successive authors. The cost of first authorship varies from $285 to $1,222.

Papers with five potential authors have been listed, although the norm is to have three or four.

“The articles have been accepted for publication in journals that are allegedly indexed. We do not know the identity of the authors or journals… We are investigating and trying to identify the journals. We will take appropriate action,” Amy Bourke-Waite, external communications director, Web of Science Group, Clarivate Analytics, said in an email to The Hindu.

The website does not mention the name of the journals or the title of the 344 papers. It says that the names of the journals and titles will be “available only to customers who have paid”. But it does provide information about journal disciplines, country of publication, the number of authors per paper, short description of the article and if the journal is indexed in Scopus and/or Web of Science.

“The primary transaction appears to be author-to-author (with the owners of the service presumably taking a cut) but beyond allowing post-acceptance changes in the author lists, it’s not clear to what extent journal editors or publishers are aware of, or involved in this enterprise,” Nandita Quaderi, editor-in-chief of Web of Science said in a July 17, 2019, letter to Natalie Ridgeway, executive officer of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), a non-profit that promotes integrity in research and publication.

“I wanted to bring this to your attention early as you may want to warn COPE members of this activity as soon as possible and perhaps take this opportunity to share best practice guidelines regarding post-acceptance changes to author lists,” she said.

Source: https://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/science/russian-website-offering-paid-research-authorship-under-probe/article28621576.ece (Accessed on July 23, 2019)