Science Mapping:A Systematic Review of the Literature

Purpose： We present a systematic review of the literature concerning major aspects of science mapping to serve two primary purposes： First, to demonstrate the use of a science mapping approach to perform the review so that researchers may apply the procedure to the review of a scientific domain of their own interest, and second, to identify major areas of research activities concerning science mapping, intellectual milestones in the development of key specialties, evolutionary stages of major specialties involved, and the dynamics of transitions from one specialty to another.Design/methodology/approach： We first introduce a theoretical framework of the evolution of a scientific specialty. Then we demonstrate a generic search strategy that can be used to construct a representative dataset of bibliographic records of a domain of research. Next, progressively synthesized co-citation networks are constructed and visualized to aid visual analytic studies of the domain＇s structural and dynamic patterns and trends. Finally, trajectories of citations made by particular types of authors and articles are presented to illustrate the predictive potential of the analytic approach.Findings： The evolution of the science mapping research involves the development of a number of interrelated specialties. Four major specialties are discussed in detail in terms of four evolutionary stages： conceptualization, tool construction, application, and codification. Underlying connections between major specialties are also explored. The predictive analysis demonstrates citations trajectories of potentially transformative contributions.Research limitations： The systematic review is primarily guided by citation patterns in the dataset retrieved from the literature. The scope of the data is limited by the source of the retrieval, i.e. the Web of Science, and the composite query used. An iterative query refinement is possible if one would like to improve the data quality, although the current approach serves our purpose adequately. More in-depth analyses of each specialty would be more revealing by incorporating additional methods such as citation context analysis and studies of other aspects of scholarly publications.Practical implications： The underlying analytic process of science mapping serves many practical needs, notably bibliometric mapping, knowledge domain visualization, and visualization of scientific literature. In order to master such a complex process of science mapping, researchers often need to develop a diverse set of skills and knowledge that may span multiple disciplines. The approach demonstrated in this article provides a generic method for conducting a systematic review.Originality/value： Incorporating the evolutionary stages of a specialty into the visual analytic study of a research domain is innovative. It provides a systematic methodology for researchers to achieve a good understanding of how scientific fields evolve, to recognize potentially insightful patterns from visually encoded signs, and to synthesize various information so as to capture the state of the art of the domain.

Relationship between partial and average atomic volumes of components in Au-Ni alloys

In the framework of systematic science of alloys,the average molar property（volume and potential energy） functions of disordered alloys were established.From these functions,the average molar property functions,partial molar property functions,derivative functions with respect to composition,general equation of relationship between partial and average molar properties of components,difference equation and constraining equation of different values between partial and average molar properties,as well as general Gibbs-Duhem formula were derived.It was proved that the partial molar properties calculated from various combinative functions of average molar properties of alloys are equal,but in general,the partial molar properties are not equal to the average molar properties of a given component.This means that the partial molar properties cannot represent the corresponding properties of the component.All the equations and functions established in this work were proved to be correct by calculating the results of partial and average atomic volumes of components as well as average atomic volumes of alloys in the Au-Ni system.

Holographic alloy positioning design system and holographic network phase diagrams of Au-Cu system

Taking Au?Cu system as an example, three discoveries and two methods were presented. First, a new way for boosting sustainable progress of systematic metal materials science (SMMS) and alloy gene engineering (AGE) is to establish holographic alloy positioning design (HAPD) system, of which the base consists of measurement and calculation center, SMMS center, AGE center, HAPD information center and HAPD cybernation center; Second, the resonance activating-sychro alternating mechanism of atom movement may be divided into the located and oriented diffuse modes; Third, the equilibrium and subequilibrium holographic network phase diagrams are blueprints and operable platform for researchers to discover, design, manufacture and deploy advanced alloys, which are obtained respectively by the equilibrium lever numerical method and cross point numerical method of isothermal Gibbs energy curves. As clicking each network point, the holographic information of three structure levels for the designed alloy may be readily obtained: the phase constitution and fraction, phase arranging structure and properties of organization; the composition, alloy gene arranging structure and properties of each phase and the electronic structures and properties of alloy genes. It will create a new era for network designing advanced alloys.

Alloy gene Gibbs energy partition function and equilibrium holographic network phase diagrams of Au_3Cu-type sublattice system

Taking Au3Cu-type sublattice system as an example, three discoveries have been presented. First, the fourth barrier to hinder the progress of metal materials science is that today’s researchers do not understand that the Gibbs energy function of an alloy phase should be derived from Gibbs energy partition function constructed of alloy gene sequence and their Gibbs energy sequence. Second, the six rules for establishing alloy gene Gibbs energy partition function have been discovered, and it has been specially proved that the probabilities of structure units occupied at the Gibbs energy levels in the degeneracy factor for calculating configuration entropy should be degenerated as ones of component atoms occupied at the lattice points. Third, the main characteristics unexpected by today’s researchers are as follows. There exists a single-phase boundary curve without two-phase region coexisting by the ordered and disordered phases. The composition and temperature of the top point on the phase-boundary curve are far away from those of the critical point of the Au3Cu compound; At 0 K, the composition of the lowest point on the composition-dependent Gibbs energy curve is notably deviated from that of the Au3Cu compounds. The theoretical limit composition range of long range ordered Au3Cu-type alloys is determined by the first jumping order degree.

Alloy gene Gibbs energy partition function and equilibrium holographic network phase diagrams of AuCu_3-type sublattice system

Taking AuCu3-type sublattice system as an example, three discoveries have been presented: First, the third barrier hindering the progress in metal materials science is that researchers have got used to recognizing experimental phenomena of alloy phase transitions during extremely slow variation in temperature by equilibrium thinking mode and then taking erroneous knowledge of experimental phenomena as selected information for establishing Gibbs energy function and so-called equilibrium phase diagram. Second, the equilibrium holographic network phase diagrams of AuCu3-type sublattice system may be used to describe systematic correlativity of the composition?temperature-dependent alloy gene arranging structures and complete thermodynamic properties, and to be a standard for studying experimental subequilibrium order-disorder transition. Third, the equilibrium transition of each alloy is a homogeneous single-phase rather than a heterogeneous two-phase, and there exists a single-phase boundary curve without two-phase region of the ordered and disordered phases; the composition and temperature of the top point on the phase-boundary curve are far away from the ones of the critical point of the AuCu3 compound.

Biodegradable metals for bone fracture repair in animal models: a systematic review

Biodegradable metals hold promises for bone fracture repair.Their clinical translation requires pre-clinical evaluations including animal studies,which demonstrate the safety and performance of such materials prior to clinical trials.This evidence-based study investigates and analyzes the performance of bone fractures repair as well as degr adation properties of biodegradable metals in animal models.Data were carefully collected after identification of population,interventions,com-parisons,outcomes and study design,as well as inclusion criteria combining biodegradable metals and animal study.Twelve publications on pure Mg,Mg alloys and Zn alloys were finally included and reviewed after extraction from a collected database of 2122 publications.Compared to controls of traditional non-degradable metals or resorbable polymers,biodegradable metals showed mixed or contradictory outcomes of fracture repair and degradation in animal models.Although quantita-tive meta-analysis cannot be conducted because of the data heterogeneity,this systematic review revealed that the quality of evidence for biodegradable metals to repair bone fractures in animal models is'very low'.Recommendations to standardize the animal studies of biodegradable metals were proposed.Evidence based biomaterials research could help to both identify reliable scientific evidence and ensure future clinical translation of biodegradable metals for bone fracture repair.

Characteristic atom arranging crystallogphy of alloy phases for Au-Cu system

In this paper,it is pointed out that the descriptions of alloy phase structures are dependent on structural unit sequence.In the systematic science of alloys(SSA),the alloy phase structures are described by means of the symmetry element sequence combining with characteristic atom sequence.It is named the characteristic atom arranging structure,which can display the characteristic atoms at the lattice sites and the micro-inhomogeneity,besides the symmetry.Each characteristic atom has its own characters:neighboring configuration,potential energy,volume and electronic structure.The micro-inhomogeneity of alloy phases can be described by concentrations and short-range ordered parameters of characteristic atoms.The differences between the electronic structures of alloy phases and electronic structures of characteristic atoms in the alloy phases are also discussed.