ERL and the impact of small groups of authors

Evidence from the 100-most cited papers ever published in ERL indicates the disproportionately large scientific impact of small groups of authors. The median number of authors on these 100 most-cited papers was 3.5, and 72 out of the 100 most cited papers had 5 or fewer authors. This indicates that...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Ken Caldeira
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: IOP Publishing 2016-01-01
Series:Environmental Research Letters
Online Access:https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/11/12/120204
Description
Summary:Evidence from the 100-most cited papers ever published in ERL indicates the disproportionately large scientific impact of small groups of authors. The median number of authors on these 100 most-cited papers was 3.5, and 72 out of the 100 most cited papers had 5 or fewer authors. This indicates that small groups of authors often produce the work with the greatest impact, even in an inter-disciplinary setting. This suggests that it may be wise to institute policy changes that discourage inflation of author lists and that encourage the funding of research conducted by single investigators and small groups of researchers.
ISSN:1748-9326