An Assessment of Publishing Trends of Selected Multidisciplinary CSIR Labs in Open Access Journals during the period of 2009–2013

Abstract

The Council of Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR) is the premier industrial R&D organisation in India. Its 37 constituent units (laboratories, centres, institutes, etc.) address various scientific and technological needs of an emerging economy, such as providing industrial competitiveness, social welfare and inclusiveness, building up a strong S&T base for strategic sectors and advancement of fundamental knowledge. Research output published in open access (OA) journals by the scientist/researchers in five premier multidisciplinary CSIR laboratories in India has been analysed bibliometically. Publishing research findings in OA journals is a means of enhancing visibility and consequently increasing the impact of publications. The study provides an overview of OA publishing trends in five premier CSIR laboratories of India. The publication output of each laboratory from 2009 to 2013 was ascertained through Web of Science database and the name of source journals along with the number of publication recorded. All 1512 journal titles were searched in the directory of OA journals. In this article, we have analysed only research papers; specifically, document types such as research articles, review articles and conference proceedings published in SCI Journals. The 5973 research articles were contributed by the five multidisciplinary CSIR laboratories and appeared in 1512 journals. The CSIR-Central Drug Research Institute, Lucknow publishes 9.67% of its research output in OA journals, CSIR-National Chemical Laboratory (CSIR-NCL), Pune 4.84%, CSIR-National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (CSIR-NEERI), Nagpur 8.46%, CSIR-National Institute of Science Communications & Information Resources (CSIR-NISCAIR), New Delhi 62% and CSIR-National Physical Laboratory (CSIR-NPL), New Delhi 7.49%. The study reveals that a small portion of research publications of five multidisciplinary Indian CSIR labs is published in OA journals, the majority in journals of Indian origin. The NISCAIR has published more of their research papers in OA journals to other labs. The study also reveals that only peer reviewed OA journals (such as Current Science, PLoS One, Indian Journal of Pure and Applied Physics, etc.) are used by the CSIR's scientists and researchers for dissemination of their research findings.