Social Network to Map the Research

FAS.research of Vienna touts its graphs as a high tech solution to the problem of funding science and, by implication, art. Social network analysis offers an ingenious answer. When it comes to scientific research, the most important gauges of success are peer review and citation. Who is citing whom, and how often? Mapping these relationships and distilling them into a single eyeful reveals which projects have the most impact. They also offer a nice overview of the field in the paper: The Science of Measuring, Visualizing and Simulating Social Relationships. I particularly like the part about the Rapid Vienna football game analysis. Where are the weak points of Rapid’s play? Which players do I have to “shut down” to achieve maximum distruption of the flow of Rapid’s play.