Bibliometric Characteristics of a "Paradigm Shift": The 2012 Nobel Prize in Medicine

This research-in-progress paper reports bibliometric characteristics that illustrate and give credence to the claim of the Nobel Prize committee that its 2012 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded for a “paradigm shift”. An all-author co-citation analysis (ACA) of stem cells research 2004-2009 provides an interesting characterization of this paradigm shift, which was triggered by a mid-2006 publication by the younger of the two 2012 laureates. In particular, while ACAs of 2-year time slices for the period consistently indicate the presence of a single cohesive subfield in which the “paradigm shift” occurred, with some fluctuation in membership throughout the period, an ACA of the entire six year period shows instead a closely interlinked pair of subfields, which on closer inspection turn out to represent the preand post-paradigm shift states of the same subfield. This bibliometric characterization also correctly identifies the name of the researcher primarily responsible for the paradigm shift, namely, Shinya Yamanaka, as that of the dominant post-shift cited author in that subfield. The relative lack of dominant figures in the subfield in the pre-shift period also underlines the area’s preparadigmatic state of multiple conflicting and relatively unsuccessful research directions attempting to address a fundamental crisis in that field at that point. Conference Topics Mapping and Visualization; Citation and Co-citation Analysis; Methods and Techniques