Most UK scientists who publish extremely highly-cited papers do not secure funding from major public and charity funders. Stavropoulou et al. (2019)

[ME/CFS Skeptic]

Abstract
The UK is one of the largest funders of health research in the world, but little is known about how health funding is spent. Our study explores whether major UK public and charitable health research funders support the research of UK-based scientists producing the most highly-cited research. To address this question, we searched for UK-based authors of peer-reviewed papers that were published between January 2006 and February 2018 and received over 1000 citations in Scopus. We explored whether these authors have held a grant from the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR), the Medical Research Council (MRC) and the Wellcome Trust and compared the results with UK-based researchers who serve currently on the boards of these bodies. From the 1,370 papers relevant to medical, biomedical, life and health sciences with more than 1000 citations in the period examined, we identified 223 individuals from a UK institution at the time of publication who were either first/last or single authors. Of those, 164 are still in UK academic institutions, while 59 are not currently in UK academia (have left the country, are retired, or work in other sectors). Of the 164 individuals, only 59 (36%; 95% CI: 29–43%) currently hold an active grant from one of the three funders. Only 79 (48%; 95% CI: 41–56%) have held an active grant from any of the three funders between 2006–2017. Conversely, 457 of the 664 board members of MRC, Wellcome Trust, and NIHR (69%; 95% CI: 65–72%) have held an active grant in the same period by any of these funders. Only 7 out of 655 board members (1.1%) were first, last or single authors of an extremely highly-cited paper. There are many reasons why the majority of the most influential UK authors do not hold a grant from the country’s major public and charitable funding bodies. Nevertheless, the results are worrisome and subscribe to similar patterns shown in the US. We discuss possible implications and suggest ways forward.

 

[ME/CFS Skeptic]

New paper by Ioannidis, which I thought was interesting.

"Our study provides evidence that the majority of the most influential UK health scientists do not receive funding from the country’s three main public and charity funders. Only 36.2% of these authors have currently an active grant as PIs from the MRC, the Wellcome Trust or the NIHR. The results are comparable to the findings of Nicholson and Ioannidis [5], who showed that only 39.7% of extremely highly-cited authors in the US held an active grant from the NIH in 2012. [...] Contrasted with the picture of the highly-cited authors, we show that over two-thirds of the members of boards in the three main UK funding bodies receive funding from the same body they serve."

 

[Andy]

The 'old boy network', https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_boy_network, in full effect, though I have to admit that I would have thought that all the 'old boys' would be citing each other left, right and centre as well. Perhaps they don't see the need.

 

[Jonathan Edwards]

I would have thought that all the 'old boys' would be citing each other left, right and centre as well. Perhaps they don't see the need.

They cite each other, but since they all have 600 publications, none of any great interest, none of the papers scores 1000 citations.

It is interesting to see that only 1,370 papers scored 1000 citations in the period. I have a paper with 2000 citations in that period. And I never got funding from the big three. But I never had any illusions things were going to be otherwise.

And of course the rate of citation is not necessarily a sign of a good paper.

It does bring the point home though.