Mapping Knowledge

A new map of knowledge based on electronic data searches in which users moved
from one journal to another, thus establishing associations between them.

A new map of knowledge has been assembled by scientists at the research
library of the Los Alamos National Laboratory. It is based on electronic data searches in which
users moved from one journal to another, thus establishing associations between them.

The map includes both the sciences and the humanities in a hub and wheel
arrangement, with the humanities at the center and the sciences arrayed around
them. The arrangement fell out naturally from the data and is not contrived,
said Johan Bollen, the leader of the research team.

In the map, published in the current issue of PLoS One, it has some great clustering and is excellant to realise through distance and colour their revelance to each other. The journals are color-coded as follows: physics, light purple; chemistry, blue; biology, green; medicine, red; social sciences, yellow; humanities, white; mathematics, purple; and engineering, pink. The interconnecting lines reflect the probability that a reader will click from one journal to another on the computer screen.

Similar maps have long been constructed on the basis of footnotes in one journal’s articles that refer to articles in other journals. Dr. Bollen believes that his electronic click map better represents scholars’ behavior than does citation analysis, as the footnote method is called.

from: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/16/science/16visuals.html?_r=2


found here: http://www.twine.com/item/123nz0p3g-ry/visual-science-map-of-knowledge-nytimes-com