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QUALITY OF ACADEMIC RESEARCH

Prof K P Mohandas, Senior Member IEEEDean Academic M E S College of Engg &Former Dean PG Studies & Research NIT Calicut (kpmdas@ieee.org)

Overview of this talk

Quality of research?

Invention or discovery?

Patents of products or processes

Publications

Journals and rating of journals

Open Access journals

Reputation of journals and citation index

Criticisms on Impact factor

Why not Conference papers

Research without patents or papers

Peer review

Open seminars and colloquiums

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Quality of research

Not easily defined. Academicians are still in search of a proper objective criterion.

Ideally, any research work should be useful for the society at large.

Theoretical research may not find immediate application

Applied research in Engineering and Medicine appears to be more useful to the humanity at large.

Let us not expect that all research work will be good enough to win Nobel prize

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Why quality of research?

Guides and institutions want the research to be of high quality for publicity

Perfectionists among researchers want their work to be worth winning a Nobel price !!!

A few wants to complete the work some how and get a degree with minimum effort

“LESS EFFORT MORE COMFORT , ENJOY MORE AND GET YOUR DEGREE”

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Accepted norms

Publications in reputed peer reviewed journals

Patents on products or processes

Conference papers in conferences organized with technical support from reputed professional societies

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Invention or discovery?

Research work leading to a totally new invention or discovery is definitely useful.

But how do we assess the usefulness of a product or a device?

Claims have to be substantiated.

Commercial production may be necessary to establish claims

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Many inventions have been used after a long time

Thermoelectricity was discovered in 1820

Photovoltaic cells : 1839

Faraday’s laws : 1831

First Transmission line : 1887 (Edison & Graham Bell)

Nikolai Tesla induction motor 1885-87

Charles Babbages Analytic Engine with programs by Ada Lovelace : 1837

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Hot areas of research

Energy saving gadgets

New energy sources, renewable sources.

Nanotechnology and applications in medicine, biology and manufacturing

Biotechnology & Biomedical engg

Impact of new technology on human life like use of mobiles, living under power lines, EMI etc

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Patents

Can be obtained for a new product or

A new process

Patenting procedures are too cumbersome.

Commercial use can be after filing a patent

Approval takes a long time.

Many patents have not been commercially utilized, but remains in the cupboard or on the drawing room wall

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Publications

Journals

Peer reviewed printed journals

On line journals

Open access journals

Conference publications

Conferences with technical support by

professional societies like IEEE, IEI, IEE..

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Which journals to choose ?

Review process for reputed journals rigorous

At least five reviewers , mostly blind reviews

Acceptance requires approval by at least three and no serious adverse remarks buy others.

Revision may be required to reduce pages : full paper to short paper, short paper to correspondence etc.

On the average it takes 12-15 months for a paper to appear in print.

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Relative rating of journals

Many measures are available

Most of them arte based how often the published papers in that journal is referred toby others in comparison.

Citation index

Impact factor etc

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Impact factor for journals

The impact factor devised by Eugene Garfield, the founder of the Institute for Scientific Information.

Impact factors are calculated yearly starting from 1975 for those journals that are indexed in the Journal Citation Reports

I impact factor for 2012 = A/B.

A = the number of times that all items published in that journal in 2010 and 2011 were cited by indexed publications during 2012.

B = the total number of "citable items" published by that journal in 2010 and 2011. ("Citable items" for this calculation are usually articles, reviews, proceedings, or notes; not editorials or letters to the editor).

Note that 2012 impact factors are published in 2013; they cannot be calculated until all of the 2012 publications have been processed by the indexing agency.

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Agencies calculating IF

Scientific and technical journals :Thomson-Reuters

SCI – Science Citation Index is a multidisciplinary index and fully indexes over 8,500 major journals across 150 disciplines – 1988 to present.

Humanities and social sciences India http://www.indiancitationindex.com/

Global Impact factor : http://globalimpactfactor.com/

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Reliability of Impact factor & citation index

The agencies do not disclose the details of data used.

Cannot be verified by an Independent audit.

Publishers may have personal interests.

Cannot be compared for different journals.

Many reputed journals like IEEE Transactions have poor IF / citation index.

Considered useful measure in the absence of any other quantitative measure

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Open Access Journals

Articles can be downloaded free

Authors are to bear the cost of publication.

Journals promise quick reviews and publication within a few weeks.

Most of them are on-line journals

Very few OA journals are printed

Very few are trust worthy, as profit making may be the intention.

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Be careful when papers to OA Journals

Visit their website, if they have one.

See the review process and earlier reviewers.

See some of the earlier publications in your area.

Verify the quality of the paper s in consultation with colleagues and teachers.

See whether the cost to be paid by the author reasonable or is it too much

Academic reputation of members on the Editorial/Advisory boards

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Why not conference papers?

Large number of conferences are held these days.

Review procedures not so thorough

Organizers tend to accept poor quality papers for better participation.

Revenue generation from registration fee.

Prefer conferences with technical support from well known professional bodies.

With assured publication in IEEE Explore etc.

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Benefits from good conferences

Meet senior researchers in the area.

Presenting your work in front of them.

If the work is good, will catch attention from them.

Meet friends working in your area.

Making contacts and exchange of ideas.

Good food and merry-making (?)

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Research without patents or papers?

Cannot be considered as poor quality

But assessment is difficult & often subjective.

Peer (expert) evaluation is required.

Reviews of papers even if not accepted may give ideas for improving quality of work.

More ideas for research available from good reviews

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Other avenues for quality assessment

Open seminars or colloquiums

Interaction with researchers in the same area

Opinions from experts in conferences.

Discussions with your friends in the group.

Group work is better than individual work.

Collecting feed back on seminars from teachers

Evaluation of thesis by examiners who are up to date in the area of research

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Conclusions

Quality assurance of results of theoretical work not easy.

Presently only publications in reputed peer reviewed journals and or

Patents for products or processes.

Evaluation by guides, members of Doctoral Committee, friends in the group etc.

Stage by stage evaluation and frequent feedback will be desiraable

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THANK YOU

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