中国科研产出2020年或赶超美国

　　英国皇家学会3月28日发布了一份名为《知识、网络和国家：21世纪的全球科研合作》的报告。报告显示，中国的科研论文发表数量从第六位上升到全球第二。尽管排在前十名的很多都是西方大国，但它们发表的研究论文数量正在减少，中国、巴西、印度等国发表的研究论文越来越多。到2020年，中国科研产出有可能超过美国，成为世界第一。

　　该报告对全球所有国家发表的科研论文的多项数据进行了分析，并对各国在1993—2003年和2004—2008年这两个时间段的论文数量进行比较。结果显示，美国在科研论文数量上仍是世界第一，但其所占比重下降了5个百分点；中国所占比重则从4.4%上升到了10.2%。

　　China has shot into second place in the world in terms of thenumber of scientific articles that are published in internationalmagazines and the country's scientists are set to take the top spot fromthe United States in the next few years, according to a new report。

　　"China has already overtaken the UK and is the second leadingproducer of research publications, but some time before 2020 it isexpected to surpass the US," said the report from the Royal Society inLondon。

　　While the top 10 is still dominated by major Western powers, their share of published research papers is falling, it noted。

　　Brazil and India are among countries that are quickly making their way up the list。

　　"The US leads the world in research, producing 20 percent of theworld's authorship of research papers, dominating world universityleague tables, and investing nearly $400 billion per year in public andprivate research and development," said the report, which was releasedon Monday。

　　"The UK, Japan, Germany and France each also command strongpositions in the global league tables, producing high qualitypublications and attracting researchers to their world-classuniversities and research institutes."

　　China was in sixth place between 1999 and 2003 (with 4.4 percent ofthe total) but shot up to the second place with 10.2 percent for theyears 2004 to 2008, overtaking several countries, including Japan, whichhad been in second place。

　　While the US remained in top spot, it saw its share shrink from 26.4 percent to 21.2 percent。

　　"China's rise up the rankings has been especially striking," said the report。

　　"China has heavily increased its investment in R&D (researchand development)， with spending growing by 20 percent per year since1999 to reach over $100 billion a year today."

　　The investment amounted to 1.44 percent of the country's GDP in 2007.

　　"China is also turning out huge numbers of science and engineeringgraduates, with 1.5 million leaving its universities in 2006," said thereport。

　　The Royal Society's findings were in a report entitled Knowledge,Networks and Nations: Global Scientific Collaboration in the 21stCentury。