Thomson Reuters announces India Research Front Awards 2009

Mumbai-Thomson Reuters' Healthcare and Science business has announced the "Thomson Reuters Research Excellence - India Research Front Awards 2009." India's leading eight scientists were honoured for their research and influential contribution to global R&D on four research fronts. Eight awardees were presented with the accolade after their research was analysed using Thomson Reuters Research Front Methodology to assess their level of influence on specific scientific fields. Research Front Methodology looks at patterns of intense communication between scientists and is compiled, using citation analysis of a list of highly cited papers, defined as the top 1 per cent of papers in each of 22 disciplines. Discovering how these highly cited works are related and determining how often these papers have been jointly cited (frequency of co-citation of the two highly cited papers) is achieved by Essential Science Indicators (ESI) from Thomson Reuters, and is called research front analysis. This tool can assist in identifying areas where important work is being conducted and where the scientific community is focusing its attention. Based on the findings, the four research front areas where Indian scientists have had greatest emphasis and world-class influence are: Research Front #1751 - Professors Aniruddha B Pandit, Dr. Parag Ratnakar Gogate, Institute of Chemical Technology, University of Mumbai; for their contribution to research into advanced oxidation processes and techniques. Research Front #6810 - Dr. R Panneerselvam, Dr. Gopi Ragupathi, Dr. Abdul Jaleel Cheruth, Dept of Botany, Annamalai University, Tamil Nadu; for their contribution to research into antioxidant metabolism and defence system in higher plants.Research Front #7435 - Dr. GPS Raghava, Dr. Manoj Bhasin, Bioinformatics Centre, Institute of Microbial Technology, Chandigarh, for their contribution to research into MHC class I binding peptides, using SVMHC.Research Front #9007 - Dr. Ayyappan Pillai Ajayaghosh, National Institute for Interdisciplinary Science and Technology (NIIST), Triuvanathapuram, for his contribution to research into chirality-sensing supramolecular systems. The awards ceremony was held at Le Meridien New Delhi, is part of a series of Asia Pacific Research Days hosted by Thomson Reuters. These events recognise research excellence in countries and regions demonstrating they are leading the world through innovation in their respective fields. The guests-of-honour were Dr. Rajagopala Chidambaram, principal scientific adviser to the Govt of India and Prof. Deepak Pental, Vice-Chancellor, University of Delhi. Wong Woei Fuh, commercial director, Asia Pacific, Thomson Reuters, Said: "India has become an important contributor to the global research community - and the steadfast pursuit of scientific discovery by these eight award winners certainly bears testimony to this. At Thomson Reuters, we understand the importance of trusted information, be it scientific literature or citation indexing data, to help the research community accelerate research, discovery and innovation, and make better decisions faster. Our methodology has helped Indian researchers identify the fields where they are taking the global lead and making a significant contribution. We hope to continue working closely with India's institutions to help them identify research excellence."