Pakistan has been rated a ‘Rising Star’ in research multiple times over the last couple of years by ScienceWatch.com, a Thompson Reuters website which tracks trends and performance in research by analyzing its database of scientific papers and citations. The ‘Rising Star’ rankings are published every two months to acknowledge new entrants, by identifying the scientists, institutions, countries, and journals which have shown the largest percentage increase in total citations. In the May issue of the ratings, Pakistan was named a ‘rising star’ in two areas, ‘Materials Science’ and ‘Plant & Animal Science’. Amongst other countries of the region, Bangladesh was also listed as a rising star in ‘Computer Science’ and ‘Pharmacology & Toxicology’. Iran was named in four categories, and Qatar and UAE in one category each.
This is not the first time that Pakistan has been named in these ratings recently. In fact, Pakistan’s record has been very consistent since March 2008, the earliest ratings that are available on the website. Here’s a listing of Pakistan’s mention in the ‘rising star’ ratings:
- March 2008: Engineering, Mathematics
- May 2008: Materials Science
- July 2008: Engineering
- September 2008: Computer Science, Engineering, Materials Science, Mathematics, Plant and Animal Sciences (5 areas!)
- November 2008: Engineering
- January 2009: Computer Science
- March 2009: Computer Science
- May 2009: Materials Science, Plants and Animal Sciences
- July 2009: None
Quaid-e-Azam University in Islamabad, the country’s top university in terms of the number of publications per year, has also been recognized as a ‘rising star’ institution, in Jan 2009 and July 2008 issues, both times in the area of ‘Engineering’.
The ratings are based on the largest percentage increase and not the absolute numbers, and therefore, cannot be used to quantify research productivity in absolute terms. However, they definitely demonstrate the trend of a substantial increase in international publications from Pakistan compared to previous years. It is very healthy that a number of different areas are covered in these past two years, showing an across the board enhancement of research productivity.
While there has been a lot of debate on the effectiveness of HEC’s reforms in higher education, at least one thing is clear: the increased emphasis on research, largely due to HEC’s programs, has started to bear fruit. These are hard numbers here, based on data by the company that maintains the largest scientific citation index in the world, and cannot be easily refuted by the nay-sayers.
Acknowledgement: Thanks to Dr Usman Qazi for alerting me to these ratings.
I’d take these kinds of “rankings” with a pinch of salt even if they are from a reputable organization like Thomson Scientific. They have listed the UAE as a rising star in space science for Jan 09! I know for a fact that the UAE is /not/ engaged in any kind of systematic research activity in space science (unless they’ve done it again, i.e., zoned a piece of land and called it “Space City”). My fear is that these rankings are influenced by individual outlying flashes in the pan and are in no way indicative of a systemic change in a country’s research landscape.
Regards.
One important thing to consider here is that “rise” is a relative term (as also mentioned in the post above) measured as the percentage increase. So it is easier to rise for the countries that had little research activity to begin with. After all you cannot rise if you are already at the top. For some absolute rankings, see World Bank’s Knowledge Indices (http://info.worldbank.org/etools/kam2/KAM_page5.asp). These indices are composed of countries literacy rate, secondary and tertiary enrollments, innovation measures (patents, publications etc) and information and communication technology (internet users, computers, telephones, etc). While Pakistan has improved its ranking according to these indices as well, that it is still ranked at 115 (out of 134 countries) and behind many third world countries shows how far we have yet to progress.
We should take the rankings for what they are: showing an increase. If a country produced one paper in the area before, and now they have two, that will be a 100% increase. Being in these ratings does not imply a large volume of research output. However, consistently being in these ratings over the last two years does imply that something is beginning to change. This may not be an occasion to pat ourselves on the back, but definitely an occasion to acknowledge that the first steps are being taken and to reaffirm our commitment towards research…
As far as I can tell, Quaid-e-Azam University does not have any engineering department. So it being nominated as a ‘rising star’in ‘engineering’ is a bit weird.
QAU has an Electronics Department, which will be counted in ‘Engineering’ in their database.
The have a computer science dept. also.
Pakistan is a future leader in Research!
I am curious about the relationship of this research to the Pakistani industry. So far, this so-called research is just bringing good name to Pakistan without any material results. Any new theorems which might have been developed do not have any direct relevance to industry in Pakistan.
Engineering has been cited as one of the emerging areas of research. However, there is not much engineering industry so to say. Should not we first focus to build an engineering industry, then do the needful research to solve problems for this industry?
I agree that developing industry to consume and/or spur research is critical for creating a sustainable research environment in the country. One way the ongoing research can be leveraged to accomplish this task is by providing incentives to entrepreneurs, who can transition this research to the industry and turn it into products or services. This will require quite a bit of infrastructure and policy development, however there are some new initiatives, such as National ICT R&D fund, that are currently trying to accomplish this task.
Regarding the relevance of research to local industry, I do not think that academia should be explicitly bounded by constraints to perform locally relevant research. There are many examples of great scientific and technological accomplishments that were not motivated to solve problems of any industry and rather were the result of intellectual curiosity of the inventor(s). Adding constraints would only limit the intellectual freedom that is a necessary ingredient for scientific discovery and has been an important characteristic of academia. I believe that given the right incentives to both academia and industry along with the policies for transparency, oversight, and IP right protections, etc., the research will itself get aligned with the local needs.
I am in a kind of confusion…I have got admission in materials and metallurgical engineering at GIKI and in electrical eng. in FAST…seeing material sciences in rising star category made the decision even more difficult. Where should i go? Kindly reply to my query.
The only advice I can give you is that you should not decide your major based on these rankings. These rankings are fickle and will change from year to year. I think you should base your decision on, i) what you will like to do, ii) where do you see yourself in 10 years, 20 years …
I think participant countries for this survey should be required to have a minimum volume of publications in an area. Anyways, its interesting. No matter how small a ray of hope, its still there.
thanks for the reply…i have interest in doing metallurgy and material sciences but the only thing that stops me from making the choice is the fact that there are very few jobs in pakistan at the moment and the in the few jobs that are available mechanical engineers take the places instead of metallurgical eng.As far as Fast is concerned it only offers subdiciplines of elec eng. in two areas that are Telecom and computers(not power and electronics)…
@Yasir
NUST isn’t Ranking some where???
The only university in Pakistan in top 400 of world!