Report: U.S. R&D publications decline

[phantom power]

As I read this, it occurred to me that one factor in this trend may be the general business culture of "intellectual property uber alles" that dominates the US these days. I know that I've had more than one paper I wanted to publish, and essentially did not get permission from my employer on IP grounds. As a theory, it would explain the decline in publishing in spite of increasing R+D spending.

And, of course, there are the ever-present trends of declining science/engineering education in the US, combined with a latter-day 'know-nothing' variety of populism in recent years.

WASHINGTON, Nov. 27 (UPI) -- A science editor says the U.S. share of scientific papers published worldwide in peer-reviewed science and engineering journals is declining.

Michael Heylin, the editor-at-large of the journal Chemical & Engineering News, says the number of published U.S. scientific papers has been eroding since the 1990s, despite big increases in research and development funding and in the number of researchers.

(...)

Heylin documents above-average global growth in publications growth in China and selected Asian and Western European nations.

Although the United States remains the largest single national source of research papers by a large margin, Heylin says an NSF ranking of 157 nations puts the United States 12th in terms of scientific papers published per million population.

The top 6 producers of scientific papers are Sweden, Switzerland, Israel, Finland, Denmark and Netherlands.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/index.php?feed=Science&article=UPI-1-20061127-14520300-bc-us-sciencepapers.xml