ӳý scientists among most cited authors
Photo by Maria Nemchuk, ӳý
In the January/February 2008 issue of Science Watch, three ӳý scientists are listed among the top 10 most cited authors of recent papers in molecular biology and genetics. Eric Lander, founding director of the ӳý, earned the highest ranking with 22 high-impact articles. David Altshuler, who leads the ӳý’s Program in Medical and Population Genetics, and Mark Daly, a senior associate member, also secured top 10 spots, each with 10 influential papers.
The Science Watch report, based on a survey by Thomson Scientific for the period from 2002 to 2006, considered high-impact articles to be ones that were in the top one percent most cited in their respective fields, compared to other articles published at similar times and in the same journals. From analyses of the 1,300 most highly referenced papers, the report highlighted the institutions, researchers and journals most highly represented.
Lander is well known for his work to lead a team of scientists at the Whitehead Institute/MIT Center for Genome Research in the public effort to decode the human genome. More recently at the ӳý, he has continued to pioneer ways to decipher how the human genome works, both normally and in disease. Lander and his colleagues have decoded (“sequenced”) several other mammalian genomes, notably those of the mouse, chimpanzee, and dog. Comparisons of those genome sequences to the human one — the driving force behind the field of comparative genomics — are proving to be a powerful approach to uncover the most meaningful features of our inner genetic landscape, namely the protein-coding genes, so-called non-coding genes, and key regulatory elements that control these genes’ activity.
Lander’s ӳý colleagues have also made fundamental contributions to recent genetics research, according to the Science Watch report. Altshuler, an associate professor at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, was a lead investigator for The SNP Consortium and the International HapMap Project. Those efforts led to the creation of publicly available maps of human genetic variation, laying the groundwork to systematically connect variations in the genome to disease risk. The cornerstone of that approach, known as a genome-wide association study (GWAS), is now a crucial research tool. Importantly, Daly and his colleagues developed many of the key statistical methods that now make those studies possible.
Within the scientific community, the consequences of these advances have been almost palpable — so much so that human genetic variation was named the breakthrough of the year for 2007 by Science magazine. In the past year alone, the results of at least a dozen GWAS were published, a handful of them by Daly, Altshuler and their colleagues. The major outcome: variations in scores of genes are now linked to human disease, many of which reflect unexpected, novel findings.
“In assessing citations, we're quantifying the judgments that scientists themselves make regarding research they view as the most significant and useful," said Christopher King, editor of Science Watch. “As their recent citation records attest, the three ӳý-affiliated scientists have participated in work that, unmistakably, is viewed as centrally important to ongoing genetics research.”
Science Watch, a publication of Thomson Scientific, uses unique citation data to provide rankings, interviews, and reports on today’s most significant science.
