Indo-German Collaborative Research during 2004-09: An Quantitative Assessment* 1

Indo-German Collaborative Research during 2004-09: An Quantitative Assessment*

1 B.M. Gupta and 2 Torsten Fischer

1 National Institute of Science, Technology & Development Studies, New Delhi 110 012 (India)Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG),

2 German Research Foundation, DFG Office India, Nyaya Marg, Chanakyapuri, 110 021 New Delhi, INDIA [email protected], [email protected]

AbstractThis article traces the history of cooperation and collaboration in science and technology between India and Germany during the last thirty years providing a comparative analysis of S&T output of India and Germany during 2004-09. It analyses the growth of India’s collaboration research with 12 significant countries during 2004-09. The analyses of the Indo-German collaborative research is centered on the overall level as well as broad and narrow subjects during 2004-09 in terms of growth, impact and quality, weak and strong areas of collaboration, geographical distribution, nature and type of institutional participation and collaborative linkages between institutions of two countries.

Keywords: Science and Technology, Research collaboration, India, Germany

1. IntroductionAlthough scientific cooperation and exchanges between In-

dia and Germany is five-decade old, a broad and intensive R&D collaboration has developed only during the past three decades. At present, India is a priority partner of Germany in Asia and sci-ence and technology cooperation (STC) is one of the important strategic goals for the future Indian-German relations.

Scientific exchanges between India and Germany date back to five decades. However, a broad and intensive R&D collabo-ration has developed only during the past 30 years. At present, India is a priority partner for Germany in Asia. Science and Tech-nology Cooperation (STC) is one of the important strategic goals for future Indo-German relations.

An Indo-German Commission on Science and Technology, which meets every 18 months, alternately in India and Germany, coordinates the Indo-German cooperation in science and technol-ogy research. The DST, Government of India, and German Fed-eral Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), Government of Germany, are the nodal agencies for the implementation of bilateral agreements at the inter-governmental level.

Under various Indo-German programs, so far more than 2,000 joint projects have been successfully undertaken, resulting in more than 7,000 short-term/long-term exchanges of scientists, more than 6,000 joint publications and more than 400 Indo-Ger-man workshops and seminars. At present, more than 170 joint projects are in progress and the number is on the rise (Matussek, 2011). Additionally, from 1996 to 2010 (15 years), 11,161 Indo-German joint collaborative papers have been published, based on the Scopus database searched on May 27th, 2011.

Within the bilateral umbrella of agreements, a number of special co-operative arrangements have been concluded and ac-tivities implemented by a number of agencies from the Indian

and German side. Some of the departments and organisations in-volved from the Indian side are: DST, DBT, DAE, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), CSIR, ICMR, Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES), MNRE, MoEF and Indian National Science Academy (INSA). From the German side, some of the institu-tions involved are: Forschungszentrum Jülich, German Aero-space Centre (DLR), Helmholtz Association (HGF), German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), Society for Research in Radiation & Environment (GSF), Max Planck Society (MPG), Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, German Research Foundation (DFG) and the BMBF. To coordinate S&T cooperation, both countries have posted Science Counsellors in their respective Embassies since mid-1980s.

Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (AvH)1The exchange programs of AvH started shortly after India

became independent. Since then, approximately 1,600 Indian scholarship holders of the AvH have travelled to Germany for short-term and long-term research projects. India ranks third, after USA and Japan in terms of the number of students who re-ceive scholarships from the AvH all over the world. Agreements for the exchange of scientists were also concluded between the AvH and University Grants Commission (UGC).

German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD)DST-DAAD collaboration focuses on project-based person-

nel exchange programmes with special emphasis on further aca-demic & specialized training for young researchers. Under the Indo-German DST-DAAD programme, the activities included are support to joint research projects with special emphasis on specialized academic training to young scientists and PhD stu-dents through project-based exchange visits.

1 The AvH, DAAD, and DFG already have offices in India located at the “German Centre for Research and Education” in New Delhi.

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The exchange programs of the DAAD have been a strong pillar of Indo-German collaboration in S&T, starting shortly after India became independent. Since then, more than 5,000 Indian DAAD scholarship holders have travelled to Germany for short-term and long-term research projects.

In addition, agreements for the exchange of scientists were also concluded between DAAD and UGC as well as with CSIR.

Under the academic exchange program fostered by leading Indian and German institutions, more than 4000 Indian students got the opportunity to study and work in different projects in Germany. In 1999-2009, more than 7,520 Indian students and researchers came to Germany on DAAD scholarship. In 2009 alone, DAAD funded 1,107 Indians to study in Germany. Cur-rently, about 4,500 Indian students are studying in Germany, while only a few hundred German students are enrolled at Indian universities.

The DAAD on behalf of the BMBF has been promoting the new initiative “A New Passage to India”2 since 2008. From 2009 onwards, the BMBF will provide about €4.3 million annually for this programme with the aim of increasing exchanges with India. As part of this initiative, under funding line III “Indo-German Centres” and in cooperation with selected German universities (mainly TU 9), an Indo-German Centre for Sustainability (IGCS) has been inaugurated in December 2010 at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Chennai. During a visit of the German Federal Minister of Education and Research, Dr. Schavan to Indian In-stitute of Technology (IIT) Chennai in 2008, a MoU was signed by the DAAD and Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Chennai, setting down the establishment of IGCS.

German Research Foundation (DFG)DFG signed an agreement with the INSA in 1993 and with

DST in 2004 (implemented in 2006) for cooperation in basic re-search in different fields of science and technology.

In the framework of the MoU with INSA, a DFG-INSA joint programme existing since 1994 supports scientists’ exchange. Since 1994, DFG and INSA have been funding and organizing visits of German and Indian scientists and faculty members re-spectively to Indian and German universities and research insti-tutions.

DST-DFG collaboration is based on project-based coopera-tion. Under the Indo-German DST-DFG programme, the activi-ties supported are full-fledged joint research projects for sys-tematic/structural doctoral training and cooperation in the ‘top segment’. In addition, the DFG funds joint workshops, joint re-

2 The driving concept behind the ‘New Passage to India’ package, sponsored by BMBF and implemented by the DAAD, is to promote greater academic ex-change between India and Germany. Under this programme, funds will be made available to students and researchers in both countries for study and research stays within academic cooperation arrangements ranging from one month to one year. Grants will also be provided to highly qualified graduates from Germany, largely on India-specific cultural and economic issues, to do their internships with well-established Indian companies.

search training groups, exchange visits of scientists for utilisation of major research facilities, project development and fact finding missions etc.

Under the two DST-DFG Joint Calls for Research Proposals announced in 2007 and 2009, in all, 35 projects (in 2007 – 24 projects and in 2009-10 – 11 projects) have been selected and granted funds. Almost 50% of the selected projects (17 to be pre-cise) were awarded to the faculty members of the various IITs. The rest were granted to faculty members and scientists at the departments of leading universities, CSIR institutes, Indian Insti-tute of Science (IISc) Bangalore etc.

The third joint DST-DFG call announced in March 2011 was for collaborative research proposals for building-up institutional partnerships in the field of ‘Computational Algorithmics’ with special focus on Algorithm Engineering. For the first time, the whole call, review and financing procedure was carried out en-tirely on a joint basis – a big step ahead in the Indo-German fund-ing collaboration.

Since 2010, the DFG has been funding a special scheme focussing on cooperation between research groups forming an ‘International Research Training Group (IRTG)’ (Internationales Graduiertenkolleg) in Germany and in India aimed at the joint qualification of doctoral candidates in both countries. Indian and German partners should jointly formulate a high quality research and qualification programme to be implemented by researchers in both the countries. The programme should provide for regular exchange of scientists, academic staff, post-doctoral fellows and doctoral students working in the defined project for the purpose of joint research and training.

Since 2001, DFG and DST have jointly created a platform for interaction among German and Indian scientists at the an-nual Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting in Germany. In 2009, India became the first designated partner country at this annual get-together. For the past two years, the participating candidates for this meeting have been jointly nominated by DFG and DST.

Max Planck Society (MPG)The MPG has been expanding its activities more actively

since 2004. The Partner Groups (currently 17) of MPG fellows at Indian research institutions are highly respected and success-ful. Their number is to be extended with the financial support of the DST in India. By 2010, there were 21 Max Planck Partner Groups in operation in India, more than in any other country3.

3 Some of the existing Partner Groups are: Partner Group on Approx-imation Algorithms at Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi/MPI for Comput-er Science, Saarbrücken; Partner Group for Unraveling Chemical Bonding and Physical Properties of Novel Materials using Wannier-like Functions at the S.N. Bose National Centre for Basic Science, Calcutta/MPI for Solid State Research, Stuttgart; Partner Group for Developing a Pest Protection Strategy for Chickpea based on Proteinase Inhibitor Defences at the National Chemical Laboratory, Pune/MPI for Chemical Ecology, Jena; Partner Group for Megacities & Global Change at the Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee/MPI for Chemistry, Mainz; Partner Group for Laser Science at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai/MPI for Nuclear Physics, Heidelberg.

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Exchange of letters has taken place between CSIR and MPG.

1.1 Distinguishing Features of Earlier Studies One of the major bibliometric studies entitled “Measures of

Progress of Science in India” by B.M.Gupta and S.M.Dhawan1 examined India’s status in science and technology, its global share and rank, strong and weak areas of research, quantity and qual-ity of research output and dynamics of research across institu-tions, sectors, geographical regions and subjects. Rao and Gupta2 analysed Indo-German collaborative research output as reflected in co-authored papers during 1996-2000 by main and sub-fields and the impact of such collaboration in different fields of sci-ence and technology. Parent, Bertrand, Cote and Archambault3

analysed Indo-Canadian collaboration in science and technology. It studied overall research output and collaborative output pub-lished during 1990 to 2001 by sector, institution and individual researchers, as well as studied their interlinkages. Another study by a German Research Group4, entitled “Bibliometric Analysis on the Scientific Output of India“, analysed Indo-German publi-cations output in science and technology published during 1996 to 2005 as indexed in Web of Science database. The Indian re-search institutes were ranked on the strength of their total output and their citations in select broad subject areas. It analyzed Indo-German collaboration at overall level. Another study entitled “Bibliometric Study of India’s research output and international collaboration”5 measured India’s research activity and its impact on global research in terms of publications output. In particular, it analysed Indo-UK collaborative research at institutional level and the impact of collaborative research.

2. Objectives The main objectives of this study are: (i) To provide a com-

parative analysis of S&T output of India and Germany during 2004-09; (ii) To study and analyse the growth of India’s collabo-ration research with 12 significant countries during 2004-09 and (iii) To analyse the Indo-German collaborative research at the overall level as well as broad and narrow subjects during 2004-09 in terms of growth, impact and quality, weak and strong ar-eas of collaboration, geographical distribution, nature and type of institutional participation and collaborative linkages between institutions of two countries.

3. Methodology This publications data on India, Germany and 11 other lead-

ing countries in science and technology forms the basis of this study. The study derived its data on publications output from Scopus database. Noteably, Scopus is an international multidisci-plinary database indexing over 18,000 titles from more than 5000 international publishers, including 16500 peer reviwed journals, 600 trade publications, 350 book series and 3.6 million confer-ence papers.It includes 40 million records, of which 20 million

records go back to 1966. It has a worldwide coverage, of which more than half of the scopus contents orginates from Europe, Latin Amerca and the Asia & Pacfic region. Scopus coverage of Indian journals is much higher, compared to Web of Science da-tabase.

Scopus database has identified 20 subject categories of S&T for classification of papers in the database. These 20 subject ce-tegories have been re-grouped under four broad disciplines, viz. physical sciences, engineering sciences, life sciences and health sciences. Physical sciences include subject areas of physics, chemistry, mathematics, earth & planetary sciences and environ-mental sciences. Life sciences include agricultural & biological sciences, biochemistry, genetics & molecular biology, pharma-cology, toxicology & pharmaceutics, immunology & microbiolo-gy and neurosciences. Engineering sciences include engineering, materials science, computer science, chemical engineering and energy. Health sciences include medicine, veterinary science, public health, dentistry and nursing. In addition, Scopus cover-age extends to social sciences and humanities. Given the fact that Scopus coverge of social sciences is not international, hence this discipline is not covered for analysis in the present report.

Classification of papers by subject in the database is based on the classification of journal titles. Each journal title is classed into broad and narrow subject category. Few journal titles have been classified into more than one subject category. There is a substantial overlapping among subjects in terms of journals cov-ered. As a result, when publication output (for each column in a table) is added for a country or for broad fields, its sum total is always higher than the actual output (100%). However, this is an accepted international practice.

This study analysed all publication types covered in Sco-pus including papers, reviews, short notes, editorials, and articles presented in conferences/seminars, etc.

For analysis, partcipitating Indian institutions have been grouped as universities & colleges, research institutes, institutes of national importance, industry, hospitals, medical colleges and others. German institutions have also been grouped likewise.

In this report, India’s research output has been compared with 12 other comparator countries, namely United States, Ja-pan, United Kingdom, Germany, France, China, Canada, Rus-sia Federation, Australia, South Korea, Brazil and South Africa. The period covered in this report is six years from 2004 to 2009. Wherever possible, comparison of data has been undertaken from 2004-06 to 2007-09.

The study used absolute and relative indicators in this report for making systematic comparison of scientific output and as-sessing country’s status in science at institutional, subject and geographical level. Publications count of country papers, inter-national collaborative papers and raw citation count are some examples of absolute indicators. The count of scientific papers published in peer reviwed journals provides an estimate of the



volume of research activity and related knowledge generation. The citations received by these papers provide an idea about the transfer and utilization of published knowledge and its impact and visiblity. On the other hand, activity index/specialization in-dex is an example of relative indicators used to assess the strength and weakness of the country or a region on relative basis.

For assessing the quantum of of research output of a country, the raw count of publications output by subject and institution have been undetaken. In addition, raw count of international collabo-rative papers has been used to assess global research linkages at subject, institutional, and country level. H-index, average citations per paper (computed on three-year citation window), the number and share of high-cited papers and uncited papers have been used to assess the quality and visibility of Indian science.

4. Analysis

4.1 Comparison of India and GermanyThe world has published 11055906 publications during

2004-09, compared to 272110 publications (2.46% world share) by India and 632862 publications (5.72% world share) by Ger-many. The annual average growth rate of Indian publications out-put was 12.64% compared to 4.23% in Germany during 2004-09. In terms of growth rate of cumulative publications output from 2004-06 to 2007-09, the India achieved a growth rate of 42.17% compared to 9.39% in Germany Table 1. In terms of h-index for total publications during 2004-09, India recorded the value of 145 compared to 347 for Germany. In terms of high-cited publi-cations (receiving 100 or more citations since their publications till the end of November 2010), India had only 313 publications compared to 4569 papers for Germany.

Table 1. Annual S&T Publication Growth of India and Germany, 2004-09

YearS&T Publications

India Germany2004 32829 957362005 36942 1023582006 42592 1041412007 47516 1047002008 52726 1083872009 59505 1175402004-06 112363 3022352007-09 159747 3306272004-09 272110 632862

As per publications output data for 2004-09, India’s re-search profile by broad discipline emerges as follows. Physical science subjects together contributed the highest publication share (40.54%), followed by engineering sciences (33.96%), life sciences (29.87%) and health sciences (22.77%) in cumulative national publication output of India during 2004-09. Compared

to India, Germany also laid maximum emphasis on physical sci-ences with 38.22% publication share, followed by health scienc-es (29.29% share), life sciences (28.93% share) and engineering sciences (27.49% share) (Table 4.2).

Although raw number of publications is a potent indicator of scientific strength, it is often insightful to analyze the country’s degree of specialisation in different field. Therefore, we have used the specialisation index, which indicates when a country has a more important share in the world scientific production in one field relative to its overall share of world scientific production. Table 2 presents the specialisation index for India and Germany by subject field using publication data during 2004-09.

Table 2. India and Germany: Research Output & Specialization Index, 2004-09

Broad Subject

Cumulative Number of Publications, 2004-09

Specialisation Index

Germany India World Germany India

Agricultural & Biological Sciences

42154 30409 743610 0.99 1.66

Biochemistry, Genetics & Molecular Biology

99655 36245 1337734 1.30 1.10

Chemical engineering 22663 16965 470912 0.84 1.46

Chemistry 58977 44063 809124 1.27 2.21Computer Science 46738 19976 937011 0.87 0.87

Earth & Planetary Sciences 37301 11456 467245 1.39 1.00

Energy 10209 6419 249410 0.72 1.05Engineering 84403 43623 2108798 0.70 0.84Environmental Science 24157 17327 441427 0.96 1.59

Immunology & Microbiology 25321 10692 348181 1.27 1.25

Materials Science 56269 35273 889777 1.10 1.61Mathematics 39354 12767 557443 1.23 0.93Medicine 177503 55102 2996036 1.04 0.75Pharmaology, Toxicology & Pharmaceutics

20906 19890 383241 0.95 2.11

Physcis 113350 39171 1210422 1.64 1.31Neurosciences 26805 3541 299747 1.56 0.48Veterinary Science 5220 5849 108390 0.84 2.19

Public Health 9873 1439 108727 1.59 0.54Dentistry 3329 1459 60184 0.97 0.98Nursing 4112 882 175212 0.41 0.20Total 632862 272110 11055906



The important fields in which India has shown higher val-ues of specialisation index over Germany are: chemistry (2.21), veterinary sciences (2.19), pharmacology, toxicology & pharma-ceutics (2.11), agricultural & biological sciences (1.66), materi-als science (1.61), environmental sciences (1.59), chemical en-gineering (1.46), energy (1.05)(Table 4.2). The important fields in which Germany has shown higher value of specialisation in-dex are: physics & astronomy (1.64), public health (1.59), neu-rosciences (1.56), biochemistry, genetics & molecular biology (1.30), immunology & microbiology (1.27), mathematics (1.23) and medicine (1.04) (Table 4.2). A look at the specialisation in-dex of both countries reveals that there is a strong potential for collaboration as in this case between India and Germany in fields where both countries are more strong as shown above and as shown in Table 2.. India can learn from Germany in fields where it specializes the most. In contrast, Germany can learn from India in fields, wherein India specializes comparatively stronger.

4.2 India’s International CollaborationIndia is collaborating with several developed and devel-

oping countries in S&T over the years. This collaboration has resulted in 46042 papers in six years between 2004 and 2009. The 12 significant partner countries that published the most col-laborative papers with India from 2004 to 2009 are depicted in Table 3. United States is the largest India’s collaborating partner with 15928 collaborating papers, accounting for 34.59% share in India’s total collaborative papers during 2004-09. Germany and United Kingdom is the second and third largest collaborators, having published 5954 and 5769 papers with India and account-ing for 12.93% and 12.53% share of India’s total collaborative papers during 2004-09. They are followed by Japan with 4154 collaborative papers (9.02% share), France (3571 papers, 7.76% share), South Korea (2975 papers, 6.46% share), Canada (2644 papers and 5.74% share), Australia (2071 papers and 4.50% share), China (1733 papers and 3.76% share), Russia (1148 pa-pers and 2.49% share), Brazil (1043 papers and 2.27% share) and South Africa (601 papers and 1.31% share).

Table 3. India’s Collaborative Publications with Twelve Signifi-cant Countries, 2004-09

S. No. Country

International Collaborative Papers2004 2009 2004-09

1 United States 2051 3401 159282 Germany 826 1138 59543 United Kingdom 701 1180 57694 Japan 596 789 41545 France 367 810 35716 South Korea 236 772 29757 Canada 279 599 26448 Australia 219 504 20719 China 180 425 1733

10 Russia 124 259 114811 Brazil 104 236 104312 South Africa 52 162 601

Total India 5640 10062 46042

India’s annual average growth of international collaborative papers during 2004-09 was 12.28%, increasing from 5640 pa-pers in 2004 to 10060 in 2009.The India’s partner collaborating countries have experienced annual average growth rate in publi-cations varying from 6.03% to 27.05%. Within the comparator group of partner collaborating countries, South Korea showed the largest annual average growth rate of 27.05% in collabora-tive publications with India during 2004-09, followed by South Africa (26.15%), China (19.01%), Brazil (18.78%), Australia (18.53%), France (17.59%), Canada (17.03%), Russia (16.84%), United Kingdom (11.19%), United States (10.65%), Germany (6.80%) and Japan (6.03%)(Table 4).

Table 4. Number of International Collaborative Papers of Twelve Significant Countries with India during 2004-09

Number of International Collaborative Papers with India

2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 TotalUSA 2051 2259 2463 2708 3046 3401 15928Germany 826 941 924 1051 1074 1138 5954UK 701 796 983 1035 1074 1180 5769Japan 596 689 705 664 711 789 4154France 367 497 588 619 681 810 3571Canada 279 384 421 465 496 599 2644South Korea 236 338 429 549 651 772 2975Australia 219 279 307 329 435 504 2071China 180 217 234 298 379 425 1733Russia 124 178 173 188 226 259 1148Brazil 104 152 167 192 192 236 1043S. Africa 52 69 77 98 143 162 601

Between 2004 and 2008, the number of international col-laborative publications of India increased from 236 to 772 (mul-tiplying by a factor of 3.27) with South Korea, followed by increase from 52 to 162 (multiplying by a factor of 3.11) with South Africa, from 104 to 236 (multiplying by a factor of 2.49) with Brazil, from 180 to 435 (multiplying by a factor of 2.36) with China, from 219 to 504 (multiplying by a factor of 2.30) with Australia, from 367 to 810 (multiplying by a factor of 2.21) with France, from 279 to 599 (multiplying by a factor of 2.15) with Canada, from 701 to 1180 (multiplying by a factor of 1.68) with United Kingdom, from 2051 to 3401 (multiplying by a fac-tor of 1.66) with United States, from 826 to 1138 (multiplying by a factor of 1.38) with Germany and from 596 to 789 (multiplying by a factor of 1.32) with Japan (Table 4).



Between 2004 and 2009, the ranking of countries within the comparator group in terms of international collaborative papers with India has improved in case of United Kingdom (from 3rd to 2nd), France (from 5th to 4th) and South Korea (from 7th to 6th), while it decreased in case of Germany (from 2nd to 3rd), Japan (from 4th to 5th) and Canada (from 6th to 7th) (Table 4).

4.3 Analyses of Overall Indo-German Collaborative Publications4.3.1 Overall Growth and Impact

Germany is the second most productive partner collaborat-ing with India in S&T research as reflected in the co-authored pa-pers after USA, accounting for 12.93% publications share during 2004-09. Germany ranked 2nd based on Indo-German publica-tions output in 2004, but slipped to 3rd position in 2009. Germany is the second most productive partner in collaborative research with India in nine out of 15 subject areas studied in this paper: physics, materials science, chemistry, biochemistry, genetics & molecular biology, mathematics, earth & planetary sciences, chemical engineering, computer science and energy during 2004-09. Germany was the third most productive collaborative partner with India in five subject areas, i.e. engineering, agricultural & biological sciences, environmental sciences, immunology & mi-crobiology and pharmacology, toxicology & pharmaceutics. In medicine, Germany was the fifth most productive collaborative partner with India during 2004-09.

India-Germany overall scientific collaboration, as reflected in their joint co-authored research output during 2004-09 has grown at an average annual growth rate of 6.78%. But, certain broad subject areas have shown higher annual average growth rate in Indo-German collaborative research than the national av-erage of all disciplines (6.78%) during the same period, namely in computer science (23.59%), immunology & microbiology (18.88%), medicine (18.21%), environmental science (17.46%), materials science (16.28%), energy (15.55%), agricultural & biological sciences (14.38%), physics (13.56%) and chemistry (13.22%).

The Indo-German collaborative papers published during 2004-09 showed high h-index of 79. Among 15 broad subjects, the h-index was highest in physics (58), followed by biochemis-try, genetics & molecular biology (37), chemistry (34), medicine (33), materials science (28), agricultural and biological sciences (27), earth & planetary sciences (26), mathematics (23), immu-nology & microbiology (21), engineering (20), chemical engi-neering (20), pharmacology, toxicology and pharmaceutics (18), environmental science (16), energy (12) and computer science (9) during 2004-09.

The Indo-German collaboration was significant at quantita-tive level, but not as much at qualitative level. Indo-German col-laborative output witnessed decline in impact computed as aver-age citations received per paper from 10.51 during 2004-06 to

5.13 during 2007-09. The average annual citation per paper was 7.56 during 2004-09. Here publications for 2007-09 got simply less time (not complete three year citation window) to receive citation and as a result were cited less frequently. The average ci-tations per paper for Indo-German collaborative output for differ-ent subject areas varied between 0.80 and 11.74 during 2004-09. It was highest (11.74) in medicine, followed by physics (8.44), biochemistry, genetics & molecular biology (6.69) and chemistry (6.22), etc.

On studing the citation profile (as reflected in citations re-ceived from the date of publications till September 2010) of 5982 Indo-German collaborative papers during 2004-09, it was found that 76.02% (4551) of the total collaborative papers have received 1 or more citations and 23.98% (1426) of the papers received zero citations. Of the cited Indo-German collaborative papers, 0.94% (56 papers) received 100 or more citations, 2.04% (122 papers) 50-99 citations, 4.96% (295 papers) 25-49 citations and 68.08% (4053 papers) 1-24 citations.

The percent share of high-cited papers (receiving 50 or more citations per paper since their publication until September 2010) was low, 2.98% (178 papers) in total Indo-German collaborative output during 2004-09. At subject level, only two subject areas showed publications share of high–cited papers above average: medicine (5.61%) and biochemistry, genetics & molecular biol-ogy (2.90%). 4.3.2 Subject-Wise Break up of Collaborative Papers

The subject-wise break up of cumulative Indo-German re-search output during 2004-09 can be visualized at the following four levels: (i) Most Productive Collaborative Subject Fields: These included physics (2539 papers, 42.66% publications share), materials science (1147 papers, 19.27% share) and chemistry (1035 papers, 17.39% share) and biochemistry, genetics & molecular bi-ology (930 papers, 15.63% share); (ii) Medium Productive Col-laborative Subject Fields: These covered engineering (601 papers, 10.10% share), agricultural & biological sciences (456 papers, 7.66% share), medicine (444 papers, 7.46% share), mathematics (444 papers, 7.46% share), earth & planetary sciences (393 papers, 6.60% share); (iii) Low Productive Collaborative Subject Fields: These included chemical engineering (497 papers, 4.97% share), computer science (234 papers, 3.93% share), environmental sci-ence (216 papers, 3.63% share), immunology & microbiology (204 papers, 3.43% share), pharmacology, toxicology & pharma-ceutics (146 papers, 2.45% share) and energy (97 papers, 1.63% share), and (iv) Least Priority Collaborative Subject Fields: These comprised as neurosciences (56 papers, 0.94% share), veterinary science (19 papers, 0.32% share), nursing (9 papers, 0.15% share), public health (6 papers, 0.10% share) and dentistry (6 papers and 0.10% share) and contributed less than one per cent share of total Indo-German collaborative papers during 2004-09.

In terms of broad subject classification, the distribution of



Indo-German collaborative papers is shown in Table 5 and de-scribed as follows: (i) Physical Sciences: The maximum empha-sis has been on physical sciences. The five sub-fields of physical sciences (physics - 2539 papers, chemistry - 1035 papers, math-ematics - 444 papers, earth & planetary sciences - 393 papers and environmental sciences - 216 papers) have together contrib-uted 3993 papers, accounting for 66.75% share of the total Indo-German research output during 2004-09. The share of physical sciences papers in total Indo-German collaborative papers has increased from 64.77% (1743 papers) during 2004-06 to 69.28% (2280 papers) during 2007-09.The average citation impact of to-tal Indo-German collaborative papers in physical sciences dur-ing 2004-09 was 7.70; (ii) Engineering Sciences: It is the second major field of emphasis in Indo-German collaborative research. The five sub-fields (materials science - 1147 papers, engineer-ing - 601 papers, chemical engineering - 497 papers, computer science - 234 papers and energy - 97 papers) of engineering sciences have together contributed 1911 papers, accounting for 31.95% share of the total Indo-German research output during 2004-09. The share of engineering sciences papers in total Indo-German collaborative papers has increased from 30.62% (824 papers) during 2004-06 to 33.03% (1087 papers) during 2007-09.The average citation impact of total Indo-German collabora-tive papers in engineering sciences during 2004-09 was 2.98; (iii) Life Sciences: These areas of life sciences included biochemistry, genetics & molecular biology (930 papers), agricultural & bio-logical sciences (456 papers), immunology & microbiology (204 papers), pharmacology, toxicology & pharmaceutics (146 pa-pers), and neurosciences (56 papers). These five sub-fields of life sciences together contribute 1473 papers, accounting for 24.62% share of the total Indo-German research output during 2004-09. The share of life sciences papers in total Indo-German collabora-tive papers has increased from 24.19% (651 papers) during 2004-06 to 24.98% (822 papers) during 2007-09.The average citation impact of total Indo-German collaborative papers in life sciences during 2004-09 was 6.28; (iv) Health Sciences: This field of least priority included medicine (444 papers), veterinary sciences (19 papers), public health (6 papers), nursing (9 papers) and dentistry (6 papers) and together contributed only 467 papers, accounting for 7.81% share of the total Indo-German research output during 2004-09. The share of health sciences papers in total Indo-Ger-man collaborative papers has increased from 6.58% (177 papers) during 2004-06 to 8.81% (290 papers) during 2007-09.The aver-age citation impact of total Indo-German collaborative papers in medical sciences was 9.97 during 2004-09.

Since there is some overlapping of papers published in jour-nals under different subject fields, the combined output of collab-orative papers under physical sciences, engineering, life sciences and health sciences is more than 100 per cent.

Table 5. Distribution and Citation Impact of Indo-German Collaborative Papers by Broad Subject, 2004-09

To analyze the growth/decline of various subject fields in Indo-German collaborative output, we have normalized the Indo-German cumulative collaborative research output data for different subject fields for two cumulative time block periods, 2004-06 and 2007-09 and it has been reflected in specialization index (SI) values shown in Table 6. According to this table, the subject fields which have shown growth (as reflected in SI val-ues) in Indo-German collaborative research output from 2004-06 and 2007-09 are physics & astronomy (with SI value increasing from 88.60 to 109.32), materials science (from 87.41 to 110.30), chemistry (from 94.07 to 104.85), biochemistry, genetics & mo-lecular biology (from 91.31 to 107.11), medicine (from 83.61 to 113.40), mathematics (from 97.63 to 101.94), computer science (from 81.70 to 114.96), immunology & microbiology (from 88.26 to 109.60), energy (from 84.79 to 112.43), neurosciences (from 87.33 to 110.36), veterinary science (from 93.60 to 105.23) and nursing (from 74.10 to 121.18). In contrast, subject fields, which have shown comparative decline in the Indo-German collabora-tive research output from 2004-06 and 2007-09 are: engineering (with SI value decreasing from 102.09 to 98.29), agricultural & biological sciences (from 102.86 to 97.66), earth & planetary sci-ences (from 100.68 to 99.44), chemical engineering (from 114.15 to 88.43), pharmacology, toxicology and pharmaceutics (from 117.24 to 85.90), public health (from 111.15 to 90.88) and den-tistry (from 222.30 to 0.00) (Table 6).

Broad Subject

Number of Papers Number of Citations Average Citation Impacts Per Paper

04-0

6

07-0

9

04-0

9

04-0

6

07-0

9

04-0

9

04-0

6

07-0

9

04-0

9

Physical Sciences 1743 2280 3993 19670 11100 30770 11.28 4.87 7.70

Engi-neering Sciences

824 1087 1911 3748 1946 5694 4.55 1.79 2.98

Life Sciences 651 822 1473 5281 3963 9244 8.11 4.82 6.28

Health Sciences 177 290 467 2069 2588 4657 11.69 8.92 9.97

Total 2691 3291 5982 28294 16747 45041 10.51 5.09 7.53



Table 6. Indo-German Collaborative Output by Subjects and Specialization Index, 2004-09

SubjectNo. of Collaborative Papers Specialization Index

(SI)

2004-06 2007-09 2004-09 2004-06 2007-09

Physics & Astronomy 1012 1527 2539 88.60 109.32Materials Science 451 696 1147 87.41 110.30Chemistry 438 597 1035 94.07 104.85Biochemistry, Genetics & Molecular Biology 382 548 930 91.31 107.11

Engineering 276 325 601 102.09 98.29Agri. & Biol. Sciences 211 245 456 102.86 97.66Medicine 167 277 444 83.61 113.40Mathematics 195 249 444 97.63 101.94Earth & Planetary Sciences 178 215 393 100.68 99.44Chemical Engineering 152 144 296 114.15 88.43Computer Science 86 148 234 81.70 114.96Environmental Science 100 116 216 102.92 97.62Immunology & Microbiology 81 123 204 88.26 109.60Pharmacology, Toxicology & Pharmaceutics 77 69 146 117.24 85.90

Energy 37 60 97 84.79 112.43Neurosciences 22 34 56 87.33 110.36Veterinary Science 8 11 19 93.60 105.23Nursing 3 6 9 74.10 121.18Public Health 3 3 6 111.15 90.88Dentistry 6 0 6 222.30 0.00Total 2691 3291 5982 100.00 100.00

4.3.3 Impact & Quality of Collaborative PapersIn terms of quality, as reflected in the average citation impact per paper measured on a three-year citation window for all joint

Indo-German collaborative papers published during 2004-09, the maximum citation impact per paper has been depicted by medicine (11.74), followed by physics & astronomy (8.44), biochemistry, genetics & molecular biology (6.69), chemistry (6.22), agricultural & biological sciences (5.48), earth & planetary sciences (5.52), immunology & microbiology (4.66), mathematics (4.290), chemical engineering (3.97), materials science (3.91), pharmacology, toxicology & pharmaceutics (2.68), energy (2.68), engineering (2.55), environmental sciences (2.44) and computer science (0.80) (Table 7).

Table 7. Research Output and Impact of Indo-German Collaborative Papers by Subjects, 2004-09

SubjectNP NC ACPP

04-06 07-09 04-09 04-06 07-09 04-09 04-06 07-09 04-09Physics & Astronomy 1012 1527 2539 13599 7827 21426 13.44 5.13 8.44Materials Science 451 696 1147 2317 2165 4482 5.14 3.11 3.91Chemistry 438 597 1035 3749 2687 6436 8.56 4.50 6.22Biochemistry, Genetics & Molecular Biology

382 546 908 3442 2633 6075 9.51 4.82 6.69

Engineering 276 326 602 1033 505 1538 3.74 1.55 2.55Agri. & Biol. Sci. 211 244 455 1416 1076 2492 6.71 4.41 5.48Medicine 167 279 446 2571 2663 5234 15.40 9.54 11.74Mathematics 195 250 445 1293 617 1910 6.63 2.47 4.29Earth & Planetary Sciences 178 205 383 1063 1051 2114 5.97 5.13 5.52

Chemical Engineering 152 144 296 753 422 1175 4.95 2.93 3.97



Computer Science 86 149 235 50 139 189 0.58 0.93 0.80Environmental Science 100 116 216 311 215 526 3.11 1.87 2.44

Immunology & Microbiology 81 124 205 596 450 946 7.36 3.63 4.66

Pharmacology, Toxicology & Pharmaceutics

77 69 146 221 170 391 2.87 2.46 2.68

Energy 42 60 102 213 200 413 2.87 2.46 2.68Total 2691 3291 5982 28294 16747 45041 10.51 5.09 7.53

NP=Number of Papers; NC = Number of Citations; ACPP = Average Citation Impact Per Paper

On comparing the citation impact as reflected in average ci-tation impact per paper of various subjects fields from 2004-06 and 2007-09, it is observed that it has decreased in all subjects: medicine (from 15.40 to 9.54), physics & astronomy (from 13.44 to 5.13), biochemistry, genetics & molecular biology (from 9.51 to 4.82), chemistry (from 8.56 to 4.50), agricultural & biological sciences (from 6.71 to 4.41), earth & planetary sciences (from 5.97 to 5.13), immunology & microbiology (from 7.36 to 3.63), mathematics (from 6.63 to 2.47), energy (from 2.87 to 2.46), chemical engineering (from 4.95 to 2.93), materials science (from 5.14 to 3.11), pharmacology, toxicology & pharmaceutics (from 2.87 to 2.46), engineering (from 3.74 to 1.55), environmental sci-ences (from 3.11 to 1.87) and computer science (from 0.58 to 0.93). The citation impact during 2007-09 in fact decreased here, simply because the publications during this period did not have complete citation window of three years. As a result, the actual citation impact is not completely reflected here (Table 7).4.3.4 Geographical Distribution of Collaborative Papers

In terms of geographical distribution of Indo-German collab-orative output during 2004-09, it was found that the 36 German cities have contributed 50 and more collaborative papers during 2004-09: Darmstadt (428 papers. 7.19% share); Berlin (421 pa-pers, 7.07% share), Dresden (382 papers, 6.42% share), Bonn (352 papers, 5.91% share), Frankfurt (348 papers, 5.85% share), Mainz (345 papers, 5.80% share), Aachen (302 papers, 5.07% share); Stuttgart (279 papers, 4.69% share), Garching (257 pa-pers, 4.32% share) and Freiburg (252 papers, 4.23% share). The top Ten German Cities together contributed 56.55% share (3366 papers) share in total Indo-German collaborative output during 2004-09.

Compared to Germany, 25 Indian cities have contributed 50 and more collaborative papers to Indo-German collaborative output during 2004-09: Mumbai (1073 papers, 18.03% share), Delhi (749 papers, 12.58% share), Kolkata (597 papers, 10.03% share), Bangalore (485 papers, 8.15% share), Chandigarh (435 papers, 7.31% share), Chennai (360 papers, 6.05% share), Man-galore (319 papers, 5.36% share), Hyderabad (265 papers, 4.45% share), Pune (258 papers, 4.33% share) and Kanpur (239 papers, 4.02% share). The top Ten Indian Cities together contributed 80.31% share (4780 papers) share in total Indo-German collabo-

rative papers during 2004-09. 4.3.5 Institutional Participitation

In all, 77 German organisations (contributing 20 or more papers) have participated in Indo-German collaborative research during 2004-09. Of these 77 German organisations, 47 are uni-versities and 30 research institutes and their cumulative contribu-tion account for 89.33% and 23.32% share, respectively in total Indo-German collaborative output during 2004-09. The contribu-tion of 47 German universities have increased from 79.12% and 97.75% and 30 research institutes from 23.26% to 23.37% from 2004-06 to 2007-09 in total Indo-German collaborative output (Table 8).

Table 8. Number of German Participating Institutions and their Research Output, 2004-09

S.No. Institution Type

No. of Participating Institutions,

2004-09

No. of Collaborative Papers

2004-06 2007-09 2004-09

1 Universities 47 2129 3217 5344

2 Research Institutes 30 626 769 1395

Total of all institutions 77 2691 3291 5982

Among the 47 German universities, the largest contribution (351 papers) to Indo-German collaborative research during 2004-09 had been made by Technical University, Darmstadt, followed by Ludwig Maximilians Universität, Münich (305 papers), Uni-versity of Bonn (301 papers), RWTH Aachen Uiversity, Aachen (288 papers), Johannes Gutenberg University, Mainz (281 pa-pers), Johann Wolfgang Goethe–Universität, Frankfurt (280 pa-pers), University of Freiburg (from 232 papers), University of Münster, Münster (173 papers), Bergische Universitat, Wupper-tal (160 papers) and University of Göttingen (160 papers). Of the total German participating universities, the contribution to Indo-German collaborative output have decreased in 10 out of 47 universities from 2004-06 to 2007-09 (Table 9).

Among the 30 German research institutes, the largest con-tribution (143 papers) to Indo-German collaborative research during 2004-09 had been made by Forschungszentrum Jülich, followed by Max Planck Institute for Physics, Werner Heisen-



berg Institute, Munchen (112 papers), Hahn-Meitner-Institute Berlin (HMI) (83 papers), Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems, Dresden (76 papers), Deutsche Elektronen Synchroton (DESY), Hamburg (73 papers), Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics, Albert Einstein Institute, Golm (73 pa-pers), Leibniz Institute for Solid State and Materials Research, Dresden (71 papers), Gesselschaft fur Schwerionenforschung (GSI), Darmstadt (66 papers), Max Planck Institute for Chemi-cal Physics of the Solids, Dresden (57 papers) and Max Planck Institute for Solid State Physics, Stuttgart (53 papers). Of the to-tal German participating research institutes, the contribution to Indo-German collaborative research has decreased in 12 out of 30 research institutes from 2004-06 to 2007-09 (Table 9)

Table 9. Leading German Organizations Participating in Indo-German Collaborative

Research, 2004-09

S.NoName of German Participitating Organiza-tions

Number of Indo-German Collaborative Papers

2004

-06

2007

-09 2004-09

Tota

l

%

Shar

e

1 Technical University, Darmstadt 79 272 351 5.90

2 Ludwig Maximilians Uni-versität, Münich 109 196 305 5.12

3 University of Bonn 94 207 301 5.06

4 RWTH Aachen Uiversity, Aachen 119 169 288 4.84

5 Johannes Gutenberg Uni-versity, Mainz 85 196 281 4.72

6 Johann Wolfgang Goethe –Universität, Frankfurt 141 139 280 4.70

7 University of Freiburg 76 156 232 3.90

8 University of Münster, Münster 73 100 173 2.91

9 University of Strassbourg 50 119 169 2.84

10 Bergische Universitat Wuppertal 33 127 160 2.69

11 University of Göttingen 62 98 160 2.69

12 Technical University, Münich 78 81 159 2.67

13 University of Stuttgart 69 86 155 2.6014 Forschungszentrum Jülich 65 78 143 2.40

15 University of Erlan-gen-Nürnberg, Erlangen 75 61 136 2.28

16 University of Bo chum 58 76 134 2.25

17 Technical University, Dresden 59 69 128 2.15

18 Karlsruhe Institute of Technology 51 68 119 2.00

19Max Planck Institute for Physics Werner Heisenberg Institute, Munchen

48 64 112 1.88

20 University of Karlsruhe 51 61 112 1.8821 University of Heidelberg 46 61 107 1.80

22 University of Würzburg, Würzburg 50 54 104 1.75

23 University of Duisburg-Es-sen 35 60 95 1.60

24 University of Hannover 41 50 91 1.53

25 Hahn-Meitner-Institute Berlin (HMI) 44 39 83 1.39

26 University of Cologne 41 38 79 1.3327 University of Hamburg 43 38 79 1.33

28 Technical University, Kai-serslautern 31 47 78 1.31

29Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems, Dresden

19 57 76 1.28

30 Deutsche Elektronen Syn-chroton (DESY), Hamburg 32 41 73 1.23

31

Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics Albert Einstein Institute, Golm

30 43 73 1.23

32Leibniz Institute for Solid State and Materials Re-search, Dresden

36 35 71 1.19

33 Humbolt University, Berlin 34 37 71 1.19

34 University of Leipzig, Leipzig 29 40 69 1.16

35Gesselschaft fur Schwe-rionenforschung (GSI), Darmstadt

35 31 66 1.11

36 University of Ulm, Ulm 25 39 64 1.08

37 Technical University, Berlin 33 29 62 1.04

38Max Planck Institute for Chemical Physics of the Solids, Dresden

21 36 57 0.96

39 University of Kiel, Kiel 26 30 56 0.94

40 Justus Liebig University, Giessen 17 39 56 0.94

41 University of Marburg, Marburg 26 28 54 0.91

42Max Planck Institute for Solid State Physics, Stuttgart

27 26 53 0.89

43 Martin Luther University, Halle-Wittenberg 28 25 53 0.89

44 University of Dortmund, Dortmund 25 27 52 0.87

45 University of Magdeburg, Magdeburg 32 20 52 0.87

46 University of Potsdam, Potsdam 23 28 51 0.86



47 University of Bielefeld, Bielefeld 18 32 50 0.84

48 Friedrich Schiller Univer-sity, Jana 16 29 45 0.76

49 University of Bremen, Bremen 26 18 44 0.74

50Lebniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research, Gatersleben

16 28 44 0.74

51Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, Katlenburg-Lindau

22 19 41 0.69

52 German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg 19 18 37 0.62

53 Saarland University, Saar-brucken 19 17 36 0.60

54 Leibniz Institute for Poly-mer Research, Dresden 17 18 35 0.59

55 University of Regensburg, Regensburg 15 20 35 0.59

56 Charite Universitatmedizin, Berlin 9 25 34 0.57

57 Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics, Garching 13 20 33 0.55

58 Max Planck Institute for Kernphysics, Heidelberg 12 21 33 0.55

59Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics, Garching

13 19 32 0.54

60 European Southern Obser-vatory, Garching 13 19 32 0.54

61 Technical University, Clausthal 14 18 32 0.54

62 Technical University, Braunschweig 14 18 32 0.54

63 University of Greifswald, Greifswald 9 23 32 0.54

64 University of Hohenheim, Stuttgart 12 19 31 0.52

65 Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society, Berlin 24 6 30 0.50

66Max Planck Institute for Colloids & Interfaces, Golm

19 11 30 0.50

67 University of Paderborn, Paderborn 15 15 30 0.50

68

Max Planck Institute for Dynamics of Complex Technical Systems, Mag-deburg

16 13 29 0.49

69Institute of Ion Beam Phys-ics and Materials Research, Dresden

11 17 28 0.47

70 University of Rostock 15 12 27 0.45

71Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in the Scienc-es, Leipzig

1 24 25 0.42

72 Max Planck Institute for Informatics, Saarbrucken 10 14 24 0.40

73

The Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences at the University of Kiel (IFM-GEOMAR), Kiel

9 15 24 0.40

74 Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology, Jena 6 17 23 0.39

75Paul Drude Institute for Solid State Electronics, Berlin

12 11 23 0.39

76Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, Katlenburg-Lindau

10 12 22 0.37

76 German Research Center for Geosciences, Potsdam 12 10 22 0.37

77 Max Planck Institute for Metals Research, Stuttgart 14 7 21 0.35

Table 10. Number of Indian Participating Institutions and their Research Output, 2004-09

Organization Type

No. of Participating

Organizations, 2004-09

No. of Collaborative Papers

2004-06 2007-09 2004-09

1 Universities 31 945 1428 2373

2 Research Institutes 28 886 1133 2019

3Institutes of National Importance

8 617 746 1363

Total of all institutions 69 2691 3291 5982

In all, 69 Indian organisations (contributing 20 or more pa-pers) have participated in Indo-German collaborative research during 2004-09. Of these 69 Indian organisations, 31 are uni-versities, 28 research institutes and 10 institutes of national importance and they account for 39.67%, 33.75% and 22.79% share, respectively in the total Indo-German collaborative re-search output during 2004-09. The contribution of these Indian organisations to Indo-German collaborative research output have increased from 35.12% to 43.39% in universities and 32.92% to 34.43% in research institutes, as against decrease from 22.93% to 22.67% in institutes of national importance from 2004-06 to 2007-09 (Table 10).

Among the 31 Indian universities, the largest contribution (416 papers) to Indo-German collaborative research output dur-ing 2004-09 had been made by Panjab University, Chandigarh, followed by Mangalore University (304 papers), University of Delhi (242 papers), Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi (137 papers), University of Mysore (118 papers), University of Ra-jasthan, Jaipur (110 papers), University of Jammu (96 papers), University of Hyderabad (92 papers), Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Pune (85 papers) and Jadavpur



University, Kolkata (76 papers). Of the total Indian partcipitat-ing universities, the contribution to Indo-German collaborative research output have decreased in 14 out of 31 universities from 2004-06 to 2007-09 (Table 11).

Among the 28 Indian research institutes, the largest contribu-tion (447 papers) to Indo-German collaborative research output during 2004-09 had been made by Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai, followed by Bhabha Atomic Research Cen-tre, Mumbai (295 papers), Institute of Physics, Bhubaneswar (128 papers), Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, Kolkata (108 papers), Variable Energy Cyclotron Centre, Kolkata (99 papers), Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science, Kolkata (82 papers), SN Bose National Centre for Basic Sciences, Kolkata (77 papers), National Chemical Laboratory, Pune (73 papers), Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Bangalore (59 papers) and Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad (58 papers). Of the total Indian partcipitating research institutes, the contribution to Indo-German collaborative research output have decreased in 9 out of 28 research institutes from 2004-06 to 2007-09 (Table 11).

Among the 10 Indian institutes of national importance, the largest contribution (254 papers) to Indo-German collaborative research during 2004-09 had been made by Indian Institute of Technology, Mumbai, followed by Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur (226 papers), Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur (209 papers), Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore (202 papers) and Indian Institute of Technology, Chennai (164 papers).Of the total Indian partcipitating institutes of national importance, the contribution to Indo-German collaborative research output have decreased in 3 out of 10 institutes of national importance from 2004-06 to 2007-09 (Table 11).

There were 3892 collaborative linkages between top most productive 10 Indian and German organizations during 2004-09. The largest number of collaborative linkages (214 linkages) is between RWTH Aachen University, Aachen and Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Mumbai, followed by 208 col-laborative linkages between Technical University, Darmstadt and Mangalore University and 192 collaborative linkages between RWTH Aachen University, Aachen and Punjab University, Chan-digarh (Table 12).

5. Discussion and ConclusionIndia and Germany have had over five decades of coopera-

tion and exchanges in the field of science and technology. Of late there has been increase in the number of MoUs and agreements signed between the funding agencies and institution of both countries for collaborative research.

From the analysis of Indo-German collaborative papers dur-ing 2004-09, it is clear that the research collaboration between India and Germany is comparative stronger in physical and en-gineering sciences. In terms of specific fields, it is focussed on fields such as physics, materials science, chemistry, biochemis-

try, genetics & molecular biology and engineering. Besides, both India and Germany accord higher priorities to these fields in S&T research due to both countries tradition of quality scientific re-search and long experience in international collaboration. In ad-dition, it is observed that the important fields in which India has shown higher values of specialization index (SI) are: chemistry (2.21), veterinary sciences (2.19), pharmacology, toxicology & pharmaceutics (2.11), agricultural & biological sciences (1.66), materials science (1.61), environmental sciences (1.59), chemi-cal engineering (1.46), energy (1.05). The important fields in which Germany has shown higher value of specialization index are: physics & astronomy (1.64), public health (1.59), neurol-ogy (1.56), biochemistry, genetics & molecular biology (1.30), immunology & microbiology (1.27), mathematics (1.23) and medicine (1.04). In other fields, where the specialisation index is weak; both countries should also collaborate to raise their re-search output for competing globally. India can learn from Ger-many in fields where it specialises the most. In contrast, Germany can learn from India in fields, wherein India specializes compara-tively stronger. It is also suggested that the focus of future Indo-German collaborative research should move from physical and engineering sciences sub-fields to life and health sciences sub-fields, where the larger potential exists in India. Within physical sciences, the collaborative research should be focussed through bilateral mode, rather through multilateral approach.

Table 11. Leading Indian Organisations Participating in Indo-German Collaborative

Research, 2004-09

S.No Name of Indian Participi-tating Organizations

Number of Indo-German Collaborative Papers

2004

-06

2007

-09 2004-09

Tota

l

%

Shar

e

1Tata Institute of Funda-mental Research (TIFR), Mumbai

197 250 447 7.51

2 Panjab University, Chan-digarh 185 231 416 6.99

3 Mangalore University, Mangalore 31 273 304 5.11

4 Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC), Mumbai 132 163 295 4.96

5 Indian Institute of Tech-nology (IIT), Mumbai 133 121 254 4.27

6 University of Delhi, Delhi 72 170 242 4.07

7 Indian Institute of Tech-nology (IIT), Kanpur 112 114 226 3.80

8 Indian Institute of Tech-nology (IIT), Kharagpur 86 123 209 3.51

9 Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore 70 132 202 3.39



10 Indian Institute of Tech-nology (IIT), Chennai 63 101 164 2.76

11 Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi 57 80 137 2.30

12 Institute of Physics (IOP), Bhubaneswar 62 66 128 2.15

13 University of Mysore, Mysore 44 74 118 1.98

14 Indian Institute of Tech-nology (IIT), Delhi 66 52 118 1.98

15 University of Rajasthan, Jaipur 55 55 110 1.85

16 Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics (SINP), Kolkata 28 80 108 1.81

17 Variable Energy Cyclotron Centre (VECC), Kolkata 50 49 99 1.66

18 University of Jammu, Jammu 49 47 96 1.61

19 University of Hyderabad, Hyderabad 38 54 92 1.55

20Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astro-physics (IUCAA), Pune

31 54 85 1.43

21 Indian Institute of Tech-nology (IIT), Roorkee 34 50 84 1.41

22Indian Association for Cultivation of Science (IACS), Kolkata

33 49 82 1.38

23SN Bose National Centre for Basic Sciences (SNBNCBS), Kolkata

21 56 77 1.29

24 Jadavpur University, Kolkata 34 42 76 1.28

25 National Chemical Labo-ratory (NCL), Pune 38 35 73 1.23

26 Jawaharlal Nehru Univer-sity, New Delhi 43 29 72 1.21

27 P.A.College of Engineer-ing, Mangalore 0 62 62 1.04

28 Indian Institute of Astro-physics (IIA), Bangalore 25 34 59 0.99

29 Physical Research Labora-tory (PRL), Ahmedabad 28 30 58 0.97

30 Anna University, Chennai 39 19 58 0.97

31All India Institute of Med-ical Sciences (AIIMS), New Delhi

28 28 56 0.94

32 Inter University Accelera-tor Centre, New Delhi 32 23 55 0.92

33 Institute of Plasma Re-search (IPR), Gandhinagar 20 35 55 0.92

34Indian Institute of Chem-ical Technology (IICT), Hyderabad

21 29 50 0.84

35Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research (IG-CAR), Kalpakkam

28 20 48 0.81

36

Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research (JNCASR), Bangalore

15 28 43 0.72

37 University of Pune, Pune 24 14 38 0.64

38 North-Eastern Hill Uni-versity, Shillong 23 12 35 0.59

39 Institute of Mathematical Sciences (IMS), Chennai 20 15 35 0.59

40 Raman Research Institute (RRI), Bangalore 15 19 34 0.57

41 National Institute of Oceanography (NIO), Goa 18 15 33 0.55

42 Central Drug Research In-stitute (CDRI), Lucknow 16 16 32 0.54

43 University of Calcutta, Kolkata 18 14 32 0.54

44National Metallurgical Laboratory (NML), Jam-shedpur

12 19 31 0.52

45

International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRI-SAT), Patancheru

12 19 31 0.52

46Centre for Cellular & Mo-lecular Biology (CCMB), Hyderabad

18 12 30 0.50

47National Institute of Tech-nology (NIT), Tiruchirap-palli

13 17 30 0.50

48 Aligarh Muslim Universi-ty, Aligarh 15 14 29 0.49

49 UGC Consortium for Sci-entific Research, Indore 5 23 28 0.47

50 Goa University, Goa 12 16 28 0.47

51 Indian Institute of Tech-nology (IIT), Guwahati 16 11 27 0.45

52 University of Chennai, Chennai 18 9 27 0.45

53Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), New Delhi

16 11 27 0.45

54 National Physical Labora-tory (NPL), New Delhi 9 17 26 0.44

55National Geophysical Re-search Institute (NGRI), Hyderabad

6 19 25 0.42

56 Tata Memorial Hospital (TMH), Mumbai 16 9 25 0.42

57 CCS Harayana Agricultur-al University, Hisar 10 15 25 0.42

58 Andhra University, Vi-sakhapatnam 17 8 25 0.42

59 Bharthidasan University, Tiruchirappalli 7 17 24 0.40

60 Christian Medical College (CMC), Vellore 8 16 24 0.40



61 Mahatma Gandhi Univer-sity, Kottayam 15 9 24 0.40

62 Indian Statistical Institute (ISI), Kolkata 9 14 23 0.39

63Indian Institute of Chemical Biology (IICB), Kolkata

9 14 23 0.39

64 Devi Ahila University, Indore 15 7 22 0.37

65 University of Lucknow 16 6 22 0.37

66 Center for Advanced Technology (CAT), Indore 13 8 21 0.35

67 University of Mumbai, Mumbai 7 14 21 0.35

68 Guru Nanak Dev Univer-sity, Amritsar 13 7 20 0.34

69 University of Burdwan 7 13 20 0.34

Table 12. Collaborative Linkages between Top 10 Most Produc-tive Indian & German Organizations, 2004-09

Institutions

TIFR

-Mum

bai

Punj

ab U

niv.

-Ch

Man

galo

re U

niv

BARC

-Mum

bai

IIT -

Mum

bai

Uni

v. o

f Del

hi

IIT –

Kan

pur

IIT-K

hara

gpur

IISc-

Bang

alor

e

IIT-C

henn

ai

Technical University, Darmstadt

208 21 9 17 13 14

Ludwig Maximilians Universität, Münich

177 185 7 149 11 10

University of Bonn 154 168 19 151 5 13 6

RWTH Aachen Uiversity, Aachen

214 192 6 4 158 13 7

Johannes Gutenberg University, Mainz

159 159 9 142

Johann Wolf-gang Goethe –Universität, Frankfurt

85 73 48 3 4

University of Freiburg 173 185 152 5

University of Münster, Münster

University of Strassbourg 162 167 21

Bergische Universitat Wuppertal

144 144 144 2

It was also observed that Indo-German collaborative re-search output is widely scattered across very large number of in-stitutions and subject themes and also not focussed on few major themes relevant to both countries. In addition, the intensity of research collaboration is not very strong across high productiv-ity institutions. A large part of collaborative research does not come from official bilateral agreements and projects signed be-tween the science funding agencies and institutions of the two countries. A substantial part of the collaborative research output comes from isolated initiatives taken by leading researchers in the leading institutions of both countries or through multilateral collaborative projects.

In order to increase the quantity and quality of Indo-German research and make it more focussed, there is an urgent need to create a stronger institutional mechanism, with much larger fund-ing commitment from both the sides. In addition, the number of joint seminars and workshops between the institutions and sci-entists of the two countries have to be increased substantially, which will help to increase the contacts between scientists of the two countries and help to identify the future areas of S&T col-laboration.

The analysis of the Indo-German collaborative research as presented in terms of identification of weak and strong areas of collaborative research and the contribution of the different type of Indian and German institutions. This analysis can guide the German research agencies to choose the future areas of collabo-rative research and encourage collaboration with different types Indian research organizations. For example, from the German side, the large contribution to the Indo-German collaborative re-search comes from the universities, but the contribution from re-search institutions is comparatively small and from hospitals and industry almost negligible. In future, Germany should encourage its research institutions, hospitals and industry to more actively participate in future Indo-German collaborative research. From the Indian side, the contribution from universities and research institutions is good, but from institutes of national importance is comparatively week and almost negligible from industry and hospitals & medical colleges.

The focus of future Indo-German collaboration should be on selective institutions, which are comparatively more focussed, high productive and involved in quality research on both the sides. In addition, the intensity of collaboration among institu-tions should increase with time, which will be of more mutual benefit to both the countries in terms of meeting their national goals of research and of industrial importance.

Both countries can plan fresh collaborative programmes in the subject areas of their strength and also in areas of mutual interest. In choosing the specific areas of bilateral collaboration, Germany can be guided by the India’s research priories in dif-ferent fields of science and technology at the research agency/department and institutional level as listed in its 11th S&T Five



Year Plan Document6

6. References1. Gupta, B.M. and Dhawan, S.M. Measures of Progress of Sci-

ence in India: An Analysis of the Publication Output in Scienceand Technology. New Delhi; Office of the Principal Scientif-ic Adviser to the Government of India.2006 (PSA/2006/4).(http://psa.gov.in/writeraddata/11913286541_MPSI.pdf)

2. Rao, M.K.D. and Gupta, B.M. Indo-German collaboration inS&T: An analysis through co-authored publications. Annalsof Library & Information Studies June 2004, 51(2), 64-71.

3. Parent, Alexandre, Bertrand, F, Cote, G., Archambault, G.Scientometric Study on Collaboration between India andCanada, 1990-2001.Phase 1 of the 2004.Canada-IndiaMapping Study. Department of Foreign Affairs Canada, In-ternational Trade Canada and Industry Canada. 2003.

4. Mattermaier, B, Tunger, D, Burkard, U, Ramowsky, S andLexis, H. Bibliometric Study on the Scientific Output of In-dia. Forschungzentrum Julich, Germany.2007

5. http://kooperation-international.de/en/indien/themes/info/detail/data/1642/backpid/12/ ?PHPSESSID=f46 F3edc-685c6181987dffae83f98a9f

6. Bibliometric Study of India’s Research Output and Interna-tional Collaboration: A report commissioned on behalf ofResearch Councils UK. Leeds: Evidence, Thomas Reuters,June 2010 (http://www.india.rcuk.ac.uk/reslandscape/bib-liometrics.htm

7. Government of India, Planning Commission. Report of theSteering Committee on Science and Technology for Elev-enth FiveYear Plan (2007-12). New Delhi; Office of thePrincipal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India. De-cember 2006 (http://psa.gov.in)



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Indo-German Collaborative Research during 2004-09: An Quantitative Assessment* 1

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