Mexican Science Research Articles

Bibliometric analysis of medical journals included in the Mexican Science and Technology Journals Classification System

Bibliometric analysis of medical journals included in the Mexican Science and Technology Journals Classification System

A forgotten chapter of Mexican technology and science: Luis Gutiérrez Villegas and poliomyelitis in Mexico

A forgotten chapter of Mexican technology and science: Luis Gutiérrez Villegas and poliomyelitis in Mexico

Values and vendettas: Populist science governance in Mexico.

This article aims to diversify STS perspectives on populism by addressing a sequence of episodes of Mexican science policy in terms of clashes between populism and scientific communities. The article describes a reorientation of Mexican science policy that has destabilized the academic system during the present administration. Specifically, it looks at the legislative project initiated by Mexico's National Science and Technology Council (Conacyt) to overhaul the national regulatory framework on science, technology and innovation, and controversial political actions taken by Conacyt against the scientific community. Contextualizing these grievances, the article concludes that at stake is a form of 'trickle-down populism' that, through systematic authoritarianism, seeks to impose on the academic community a model of 'populist science governance'.

Roads traveled and roads ahead: the consolidation of Mexican ethnobotany in the new millennium. An essay

This work examines the development of ethnobotany, focusing on Mexico in this millennium. How has the discipline grown? What is the relative importance of Spanish? Are there inflection points? How did some select areas develop, and why? Numerical growth was analyzed mainly through Google Scholar queries. Other subjects were treated based on literature and experience of the authors. Spanish continues to be relevant, especially in Mexico. The discipline gained momentum from 2000 onwards because of the social context of the 1990s, the publication of several foundational works, methodological advances, and particularities of Mexican science. The trajectory of ethnobotany is congruent with a model derived from Kuhn’s proposal of cyclical advancement of science: an initial defining stage was followed by a first synthesis, then fast growth of descriptive studies, with a notable recent turn to theory and framework construction. The causes for advances are discussed for three areas (medicinal plants, agriculture, and wild-growing resources). General interest, financing, the consolidation of research groups and the internal organization of institutions have played a role. We highlight important open questions. Ethnobotany is maturing from a descriptive to an analytical stage. However, careful descriptive studies continue to be valuable because the sources of information are in decline, and theory needs an empirical basis. Also, ethnobotany encourages the transmission of knowledge and biocultural memory. It is a key element for integrated sustainability science.

Espacios de resistencia: antologías de ciencia ficción mexicana

La ciencia ficción en Latinoamérica y particularmente en México ha configurado su propia identidad mediante la narrativa corta. En México, la ciencia ficción ha encontrado en las antologías de cuento el espacio óptimo para su difusión, pues han sido el medio que consolida las plumas mexicanas más relevantes de esta narrativa mediante un corpus de autores constantes, de antologadores comprometidos con la difusión de la literatura cienciaficcional, con prólogos, introducciones y presentaciones que ilustran un fenómeno literario cada vez más vigente y atractivo. Por lo tanto, para aproximarse a una idea de tradición cienciaficcional en México, es necesario analizar las antologías como plataforma de difusión y como instancias consagrantes.

Bases de la institucionalización de la ciencia en América Latina en la Guerra Fría entre la política y la cooperación internacional

This article is a product of research on the historical development of the institutional capacities of the National Council of Science and Technology (CONACYT) to contribute to the formation of disciplinary fields in Mexico. Its objective is to specify the policies, programs and strategies that favored the development of educational disciplines. The historiography allowed to record the process of institutionalization of Mexican science and technology and its proximity to the systems of the region. In the process of reviewing the state of knowledge, the relationship between regional cooperation processes, scientific policies and the link between science and development through the state organization was shown. The documentary testimony exposed the influence of the United States on science and technology in Latin America through the control of political and economic agendas in multinational organizations, the formation of the scientific field to reduce poverty and establish state planning as an indispensable condition for bank financing or cooperation funds as it was in the Alliance for Progress. In this context, he realizes the strengthening of the Science and Technology Councils of Latin American countries.

El Papel del Conacyt en la Educación Superior Análisis del discurso-poder de la Ciencia en México

Conacyt has an important relationship with Mexican Science, this organization signals the initiatives that encourage the scientific sector therefore its necessary to study this organization. In this paper is proposed to analyze since discourse-power from the theoretical framework of Foucault making a contrast between the government ended in 2018 and which started in december 2018. The focus will be the value of Conacyt in the Science to relate the theory and method and main discourses in both of them governments. Already with this information will be analyzed discourses and power relations.

Análisis bibliométrico de las revistas médicas del Sistema de Clasificación de Revistas Mexicanas de Ciencia y Tecnología.

CONACYT's Mexican Science and Technology Journals Classification System (SCRMCYT) includes the area of medicine and health sciences (M&HS). A bibliometric analysis of M&HS journals listed in SCRMCYT in 2018 was performed. Twelve characteristics related to indexation in the Web of Science Core Collection (WoSCC), Scopus, and PubMed databases were analyzed. Indexed journals were analyzed on whether they had recent indexed publications (2017 and 2018). Indexed journals' 50 most-cited articles in WoSCC and Scopus were analyzed. Of the 35 M&HS journals included in the 2018 SCRMCYT list, 31 (89 %) were indexed in Scopus (22 with indexed publications in 2017; 18 in 2018), 17 (49 %) in PubMed (10 with indexed publications in 2017 and 2018), and 12 (34 %) in WoSCC (12 with indexed publications in 2017; 8 in 2018). The 50 most-cited articles had been published only in 4 journals indexed in WoSCC and 5 in Scopus; 60 % were review articles. Approximately half the 2018 SCRMCYT M&HS journals lack publications indexed in 2018; this suggests that national and international relevance of these journals can be improved.

Determinants of the emergence of modern scientific knowledge in mineralogy (Mexico, 1975–1849): a geohistoriometric approach

There is increasing interest in rethinking the history of science according to the geographical locations in which production of scientific knowledge occurs. This movement is identified as a spatial-turn and implies an interdisciplinary dialogue between sociology, geography, anthropology, and historiography of science. Scientometric studies developed as part of this movement we have characterized as “geohistoriometrics”. The present paper is an example of this approach. The aim is to study the emergence of the scientific text and the formation of the author’s profile in America, to provide arguments to support an alternative narrative of the history of science than the Eurocentric. We use the Historical Atlas of Mexican Science, complemented by a critical analysis of text contents, the development of bibliometric networks, geographical locations of the study objects and identification of knowledge flows. For this we use the Pajek-Networking and Quantum Geographical Information System softwares. We found, with a geohistoriometric approach, the improvement of early modern science practices and the integration of authorship with local capacity and independence to produce early knowledge claims as contributions to experimental knowledge. These results are part of a distinct narrative in the history of science in comparison to Eurocentric and Center-Periphery theories.

José Mariano Mociño y Lozada Naturalista Novohispano del Siglo de las Luces

The 18th century was key to the development of the science and the knowledge of the natural world in New Spain. Natural history and botany played prominent roles among the new scientific disciplines owing to the great interest and intense activity of the intellectuals of New Spain, the vast knowledge that Mesoamerican indigenous people had of their plants and landscapes, and the Royal Botanical Expedition to New Spain. Jose Mariano Mocino y Lozada is one of the most outstanding Mexican scientists and naturalists of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. His personality reflects the influence of those who vindicate indigenous knowledge, as well as the influence of the boom of science in Europe of that time. Indefatigable collector, Mocino identified a large number of plant species using the method of Linnaeus. He made headway in the natural history of temperate and tropical regions, and paid special attention to the relationship between indigenous cultures and their environments. Mocino was convinced that Mexican science should take into account the knowledge Mesoamericans had about nature and rigorously apply the scientific method to it. He always defended experimental research as basic to the rational use of natural resources.

The First Fantasy Characters of the Mexican Cinema: from Ghosts to Vampires

This article explores the kind of fantasy characters of Mexican film between 1933 and 1969. The appearance of these characters is related to two periods of Mexican film industry: the thirties, an epoch of cinematic experimentation and the search of new aesthetics; and then later the fifties and sixties, the decline of the Golden Age of the Mexican cinema and the search for new genres, stories, characters and filmic resources which contributed to the emergence of the horror and science fiction in Mexican film. This review focuses on the description of the fantasy figures and the analysis of how these figures from European literature and cinema were adapted to a Mexican context. Likewise, the main part of this study is dedicated to the classification and analysis of the figure of the vampire, the vampire films and their contribution to the development of the Mexican horror and science fiction films.

The role of public policies in the decentralization process of Mexican science and the formation of new researchers in institutions outside the Mexico City area

We analyze the scientific productivity of the public state universities that are located outside of the metropolitan area of Mexico City through the outputs of researchers who have the benefit of been “New Full Time Professors” (NFTP) of the “Faculty Improvement Program” (PRODEP). This program was designed by the Mexican government with special emphasis to support the creation of new full-time positions in these universities. A good proportion of professors hired as NFTP in the universities mentioned earlier became members of the national system of researchers (SNI, Sistema Nacional de Investigadores). As a consequence of these two public policies, SNI and PRODEP, our results show that research groups of these universities are reducing their science gap with respect to the stronger research institutions located in Mexico City in terms of the outputs that are being published in mainstream journals with high impact factors. We found that engineering is an area that has been mainly benefited with the PRODEP program in the period 2010-2015.

Mexican scientists feel the Trump effect.

Economic crisis, border wall threaten collaborations.

Building a wall around Mexican science? The <i>Science</i>Insider briefing

Building a wall around Mexican science? The <i>Science</i>Insider briefing

ВКЛАД ФРАНСИСКО ХАВЬЕРА КЛАВИХЕРО В ФОРМИРОВАНИЕ КРЕОЛЬСКОГО ПАТРИОТИЗМА НОВОЙ ИСПАНИИ

In this article we describe the major aspects of Creole patriotism in New Spain in the works of Mexican thinker Francisco Javier Clavijero. Among these aspects are national symbols, interest in region’s nature and geography, as well as the pre-Columbian past studies. For understanding the ideas of Clavijero the author requested the historical context. In this article were analyzed some factors affecting the process of formation of a nation identity in Mexican society. Among them the author highlighted rising of the Mexican science in the second half of XVIII century, creoles position in colonial hierarchy and European’s attitude towards the New World and its inhabitants. The information collected has enabled the author to pinpoint fi eld in which patriotic views of the Mexican thinker were formed. In this, article also showed aspects about Clavijero’s own national identity, about his perception of New Spain like homeland and his connections with Mexican society. The author noted that Clavijero’s major contribution was countering myths about the New World, in particularly about Mexico and also he could put old Amerindian cultures in one range with ancient European cultures.

Medical Genetics and the First Studies of the Genetics of Populations in Mexico.

Following World War II (WWII), there was a new emphasis within genetics on studying the genetic composition of populations. This probably had a dual source in the growing strength of evolutionary biology and the new international interest in understanding the effects of radiation on human populations, following the atomic bombings in Japan. These global concerns were shared by Mexican physicians. Indeed, Mexico was one of the leading centers of this trend in human genetics. Three leading players in this story were Mario Salazar Mallén, Adolfo Karl, and Rubén Lisker. Their trajectories and the international networks in human genetics that were established after WWII, paved the way for the establishment of medical and population genetics in Mexico. Salazar Mallén's studies on the distribution and characterization of ABO blood groups in indigenous populations were the starting point while Karl's studies on the distribution of abnormal hemoglobin in Mexican indigenous populations showed the relationships observed in other laboratories at the time. It was Lisker's studies, however, that were instrumental in the development of population genetics in the context of national public policies for extending health care services to the Mexican population. In particular, he conducted studies on Mexican indigenous groups contributing to the knowledge of the biological diversity of human populations according to international trends that focused on the variability of human populations in terms of genetic frequencies. From the start, however, Lisker was as committed to the reconstruction of shared languages and practices as he was to building networks of collaboration in order to guarantee the necessary groundwork for establishing the study of the genetics of human populations in Mexico. This study also allows us to place Mexican science within a global context in which connected narratives describe the interplay between global trends and national contexts.

Molecular Detector (Non)Technology in Mexico

This paper discusses the introduction of fraudulent “molecular detector” (non)technology into Mexico. The case is used to argue that contemporary science and technology studies’ approaches to scientific policy-making make basic assumptions about the societies they operate in that are inconsistent with the Mexican context. This paper also argues that contrary to what happens in the so-called Global North, the relative power of Mexican science in government and policy circles is as much limited by its relatively weak position as much as it is by self-censorship and unrealized impact in the country’s fragile democracy. The case is also used to highlight the necessity for more politically involved scientific institutions in Mexico, as these become critical safeguards against incoming destabilizing technologies from more powerful nations into the local “peripheral” context.

The impact of Triple Helix agents on entrepreneurial innovations' performance: An inside look at enterprises located in an emerging economy

During the past few decades, the configurations of new knowledge-intensive environments have required fertile settings for innovative and entrepreneurial activities. In these environments, Triple Helix has been operationalized in different ways, spaces, and contexts where those agents are transforming their roles in the development and strengthening of national innovation and entrepreneurial ecosystems. As a consequence, the phenomenon of entrepreneurial innovations emerged from enterprises with an entrepreneurial or high-growth orientation that collaborate with Triple Helix agents generating economic benefits and spillover effects. In emerging economies, the available literature about innovation and entrepreneurship is limited to explore the determinants of innovation performance as well as innovation constrains. Based on this argument and diverging from prior research, this research tries to provide a better understanding about the influence of Triple Helix agents on entrepreneurial innovations' performance of enterprises located in emerging economies. In particular, we analyze the effects produced by the links of enterprises with other enterprises, universities and government on their innovation performance (e.g., access to knowledge/technology, sources of funding, government subsidies), as well as, the moderation effects generated when those enterprises have a high-growth orientation (e.g., distinction of enterprises that develop entrepreneurial innovations or traditional innovations). To achieve this aim we look inside at the case of Mexico because is an emerging economy that during the last two decades has facing a transition to a knowledge-based economy. Using a cross-section dataset of 19,188 Mexican enterprises interviewed in the period of 2006 to 2012, we tested our proposed conceptual model with a Tobit regression. Our study provides interesting implications for the main actors involved in the Mexican Science, Technology and Innovation System, as well as, contributes about the debate of the impact of enterprises-university-government linkages on entrepreneurial innovations from diverse perspectives and research fields (e.g., open innovation, knowledge transfer, high-growth entrepreneurship, academic entrepreneurship, public entrepreneurship).

El desarrollo del Jardín Botánico a través de la prensa de la ciudad de México, 1832-1846

The historiography of Mexican science has appraised the Botanical Garden in Mexico’s post-independence years as a decadent institution, corresponding to the alleged cultural stagnation of Mexico City. This essay aims to reconstruct the activities of the Botanical Garden on the basis of articles published in three Mexican periodicals between 1832 and 1846. The analysis of these writings shows that the Botanical Garden brought together amateur and professional scientists interested in natural sciences and in their economic, therapeutic, educational and scientific uses.

La investigación geológica en la comisión científica de México

During Maximilian’s Empire, Mexican science experimented changes both in its general perspectives and its methodological outlook, due to scientific interaction among the local scientific community and foreign scientists. Maximilian encouraged local scientists to continue working in their ongoing projects, and invited others to participate in new scientific endeavors. Simultaneously, Napoleon III instructed the French Institute to organize a scientific expedition in order to study different aspects of the new Empire. Geological research stood out among the goals of the French expedition, and it was initiated taking into consideration several geological studies made by European travelers during the first half of the century. This paper will describe the main features of such investigations and will analyze the expedition’s goals and accomplishments during its brief sojourn in Mexico.