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A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Sustainable Engineering and Science".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 March 2023) | Viewed by 16771

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Special Issue Editors

Dr. Jie Li

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Guest Editor

National Science Library, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China
Interests: safety science; emergency management; mapping knowledge domains
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Dr. Jie Xue

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Guest Editor

Safety and Security Science, Faculty of Technology, Policy and Management, Delft University of Technology, 2628 BX Delft, The Netherlands
Interests: scientometrics; bibliometrics; modeling and optimization; machine learning; decision making; maritime traffic safety and management; autonomous ships; accident analysis

Prof. Dr. Dengsheng Wu

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Guest Editor

Institute of Policy & Management, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China
Interests: scientometrics; intellectual structure, journal evaluation, risk analysis, risk perception

Prof. Dr. Xiaolong Zheng

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Guest Editor

The State of Key Laboratory of Management and Control for Complex System, Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China
Interests: scientometrics; machine learning; decision making; social computing

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Quantitative science studies using bibliometric, scientometric, or informetric analysis are applied to characterize the structure and research trends of specific scientific fields by applying various quantitative methodologies. A comprehensive spectrum of analysis methods can uncover patterns, trends, and key themes in bibliographic data. When augmented with visualization techniques, often focusing on the network topology of a particular research domain, these patterns can be interpreted, insights obtained, and future research directions formulated.

This Special Issue aims to provide scholars and stakeholders with an opportunity to advance scientific insights on the evolution of safety and sustainability research and to discuss future development paths. The focus is on the application of safety science scientometric (SafeMetrics) methods to support these insights, but narrative review articles are considered as well. Original research and review papers of quantitative science studies covering various research subdomains such as safety management, safety behavior (e.g., emergency evacuation), safety psychology, safety culture, safety education, inherently safety design, human and organizational factors of safety, accident prevention, risk analysis and management, risk perception, disaster mechanisms, disaster preparedness and response, emergency response, risk and safety in the context of sustainable development, etc., are warmly welcome for submission to this Special Issue.

Papers employing state-of-the-art and innovative bibliometric, scientometric, or informetric analysis approaches and focusing on the latest developments and techniques (e.g., artificial intelligence) in safety engineering design and practice as well as experimental or theoretical research, applied to the above topics, are the main target for submissions to the Special Issue. Contributions that aim to promote a sustainable coexistence of man and nature, and support social and economic sustainable development by focusing on topics at the interface of scientific domains, are especially welcome. This Special Issue is open to any subject related to quantitative studies for safety and sustainability science, with topics including but not limited to the listed suggestions:

Theories and methods for SafeMetrics research;
Quantitative features and characteristics in safety, risk, disaster, crisis, or sustainability research;
Quantitative methods to identify hot topics, intellectual structure, research fronts of safety, risk, disaster, crisis, or sustainability subdomains;
Mapping knowledge domains of safety, risk, disaster, crisis, or sustainability-related research;
Scientific collaboration network in safety, risk, disaster, crisis, or sustainability subdomains;
Bibliometrics review of widely used methods, software, theories in the safety-related area;
Knowledge organization, diffusion, communication, and integration in safety-related topics;
Citation behavior analysis in safety science research;
Historical roots analysis of safety-related research;
Measuring complexity or interdisciplinary of the safety sciences;
Research activities after the major events, accidents, or disasters (e.g., Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Disaster);
Developing indicators to measure scientific activity in safety, risk, disaster, crisis, and sustainability domains;
Citation analysis to identify the scientific evolution in safety, risk, disaster, crisis, and sustainability research;
Patents analysis in safety, risk, disaster, crisis, and sustainability research areas;
Event Logic Graph in safety, risk, disaster, crisis, and sustainability research based on reports or online data;
Computational social science in safety/security areas. e.g., using social media (e.g., Twitter, Weibo, and Wechat) data to analyze safety and risk (e.g., disaster response);
Other topics related to bibliographic data-driven safety, risk, disaster, crisis, or sustainability science.

Dr. Jie Li
Dr. Jie Xue
Prof. Dr. Dengsheng Wu
Prof. Dr. Xiaolong Zheng
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

SafeMetrics
altmetrics
safety science
safety management
safety behavior
safety psychology
safety culture
safety education
inherently safe design
human and organizational factors of safety
risk analysis and management
risk perception
disaster mechanisms
disaster preparedness and response
accident prevention
emergency response
sustainability science
sustainability assessment
sustainable development
sustainability indicators
bibliometrics analysis
scientometric analysis
informetric analysis
mapping knowledge domains
quantitative science review

Published Papers (8 papers)

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Research

14 pages, 1431 KiB

Open AccessArticle

A Cross-Comparative Analysis of Transportation Safety Research

by Monika Blišťanová, Peter Koščák, Michaela Tirpáková and Magdaléna Ondicová

Sustainability 2023, 15(9), 7609; https://doi.org/10.3390/su15097609 - 5 May 2023

Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1787

Abstract

This article aims to identify the main trends of safety research in relation to different transportation modes (aviation, rail, road, and ship) based on the chosen methods, emphasizing the same and different features in the research topics. In the context of the main goal, quantitative content analysis was chosen, which identified the trends and domains of safety research, and text-mining software Leximancer was used for processing concept maps and reports showing semantic structures. The article found that the dominant topics in all modes of transportation are safety issues, mostly related to incidents/accidents. All modes of transportation have similarities in research (e.g., management, safety, and legislation are discussed), but differences regarding the specific operation prevail. The article emphasizes what trends in safety research dominate and how they differ. It has also been proven that, even though it is safety research, security issues can also appear because the two concepts form an indivisible complex in many ways. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue SafeMetrics-Quantitative Science Studies for Safety Science)

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15 pages, 4347 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Research on Lithium Technology Safety Issues: A Bibliometric Analysis

by Kai Li, Qiudan Su, Xiaofan Ma and Haifeng Zhang

Sustainability 2023, 15(5), 4128; https://doi.org/10.3390/su15054128 - 24 Feb 2023

Viewed by 1179

Abstract

(1) Background: Lithium plays an extremely important role in the national economy. However, the chemical activity of lithium metal leads to many safety problems in the application of lithium technology, which is the bottleneck problem restricting the development of lithium technology. The purpose of this paper is to describe the research status of lithium technology safety issues visually and dynamically, elucidate the pressing issues in this field and reveal future development trends. (2) Methods: In this paper, metrology literature analysis and knowledge graph methods were adopted. With the help of visualization tools, namely, CiteSpace and VOSviewer, literature data exported from the Web of Science were analyzed in a multi-angle and all-round way. (3) Results: The number of papers in the field of lithium technology safety showed an accelerating trend. Close collaboration between authors and institutions. The scope of the research has gradually shifted from the early focus on the medical application of lithium and the resulting safety issues to the health and safety of lithium batteries. (4) Conclusions: Lithium technology safety is a hot topic in the current academic community. Future research trends will continue to focus on the safety problems and solutions of lithium technology, and pay more attention to sustainable development, especially the research on the improvement and optimization of lithium-ion battery performance. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue SafeMetrics-Quantitative Science Studies for Safety Science)

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29 pages, 8662 KiB

Open AccessArticle

A Bibliometric Analysis and Disruptive Innovation Evaluation for the Field of Energy Security

by Yuyan Jiang and Xueli Liu

Sustainability 2023, 15(2), 969; https://doi.org/10.3390/su15020969 - 5 Jan 2023

Cited by 4 | Viewed by 1974

Abstract

The field of energy security is an important, complex and evolving field with important implications at the international, national and regional levels. Considering that no scholars have conducted bibliometric studies on the current energy security field, the authors of this study chose to use a bibliometric approach to conduct a search on the Web of Science using “energy security” as the keyword, and they conducted a systematic review of 5236 papers published between 2005 and 2022 to determine the current status and development of research in the field of energy security by addressing the following six questions: (1) What are the characteristics of the types of literature in the field of energy security? (2) What are the annual publication and citation frequency trends in the field of energy security? (3) What is the distribution of source journals, countries/regions, institutions, scholars and topics in the field of energy security? (4) What are the research hotspots in the field of energy security in the recent development history? (5) What are the most influential studies and the most disruptive studies in the field of energy security? (6) What are the characteristics of the different levels of cooperation networks in the field of energy security? Finally, we concluded the following: (1) In terms of publication dynamics, the number of annual publications and the citation frequency in the field of energy security maintain an upward trend, with a large number of source journals and a wide range of topics. The number of countries, institutions and scholars involved in research in the field of energy security keeps increasing, but the cooperation is fragmented and geopolitical. (2) From the perspective of research themes, research in the field of energy security has both strong technical characteristics and is associated with social science research themes. The contradictions between energy security and social, economic, environmental, land and climate issues, the interplay between energy supply systems and complex geopolitical and international relations issues and the important role of renewable energy and related technologies in maintaining national/regional energy security are the main issues of concern to researchers. (3) In terms of research centers, although the UK and the US still retain a first-mover advantage in this field, China has gradually overtaken and has become the country with the largest output of literature in recent years. The center of research in the field has also gradually shifted from Europe and the US to the East and South Asia regions. Overall, the governance of energy security issues still requires a combination of policy, economic and technological aspects. The results will help scholars systematically understand the current status of research, research frontiers and future trends in the field of energy security. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue SafeMetrics-Quantitative Science Studies for Safety Science)

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25 pages, 6660 KiB

Open AccessArticle

A Bibliometric Retrospection of CSR from the Lens of Finance and Economics: Towards Sustainable Development

by Samreen Hamid, Asif Saeed, Umar Farooq and Faisal Alnori

Sustainability 2022, 14(24), 16852; https://doi.org/10.3390/su142416852 - 15 Dec 2022

Viewed by 1747

Abstract

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) research is diversified and yet fragmented sustainable development literature. CSR literature is growing at a fast pace in the era of globalization. This article presents a bibliometric analysis of CSR in growing finance and economics literature between 2000 and 2021 using Scopus database extraction of 1134 articles out of 50,435 total articles through lemmatizing, stemming, and clustering. This study used bibliometric coupling to part the research front of CSR and then studied each theme’s conceptual structure and influential aspects separately. The analysis divided the literature into four main themes: (1) CSR performance theme (CSPR), (2) CSR and responsible investment theme (CSRI), (3) CSR market settings theme (CSMS), and (4) CSR and corporate strategy theme (CSCS). This research proposed a future research agenda for the advancement of each theme of CSR in finance and economics. Using meta-literature, 41 future research questions are proposed along with subjective propositions by the authors. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue SafeMetrics-Quantitative Science Studies for Safety Science)

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13 pages, 4594 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Global Scientific Research and Trends Regarding Microbial Induced Calcite Precipitation: A Bibliometric Network Analysis

by Mazhar Ali Jarwar, Stefano Dumontet, Rosa Anna Nastro, M. Esther Sanz-Montero and Vincenzo Pasquale

Sustainability 2022, 14(23), 16114; https://doi.org/10.3390/su142316114 - 2 Dec 2022

Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1400

Abstract

Microbial induced calcite precipitation (MICP) offers a host of interesting features, from both theoretical and practical standpoints. This process was firstly investigated as a geo-biological mechanism involved in carbonate mineral formation in both rocks and soil. The interest in its practical use has significantly increased in recent years, as MICP has been used in different fields, such as oil recovery, the improvement of soil geotechnical characteristics, and concrete healing. To the best of our knowledge, this work is the first attempt to carry out a bibliometric descriptive study of publications concerning MICP. We analyzed data from the Web of Science Core Collection (WoSCC), which provides comprehensive information for bibliometric analysis, including the Science Citation Index Expanded (SCI-E) and the Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI). The bibliometric analysis was carried out on 1580 publications, from 2000 to August 2022, and included publication output; author; institution; country; collaborations between authors, institutes, and countries; and citation frequency. We created visualization maps, including research collaborations, using the VOSviewer program. MICP, carbonate precipitation, cementation, and soil improvement in terms of geotechnical properties are frequently used keywords. Although in the year 2000, only two papers were published on MICP, the number of publications has increased rapidly since 2014. In 2021, 333 papers were published. China leads the pack as the most productive country, followed by the USA and Australia. According to our results, the number of research papers has dramatically increased in the last 5 years. MICP use for concrete healing/cementation and soil geotechnical improvement, as well as the low environmental impact of such a technique, are becoming very popular topics among researchers. With the aging of concrete buildings, as well as with the worsening of environmental pollution and soil alterations, the research regarding MICP will play an ever increasing and crucial role in civil engineering and geotechnical fields, as well as in soil science. MICP also address Sustainable Development Goal 11, “building sustainable cities and communities.” Nevertheless, our study pointed out a concentration of the MICP studies in just a few countries. Russia and Brazil, for instance, seem to poorly contribute to MICP research. Greater cooperation among countries, along with the extension of the research network on this topic, would foster more rapid progress in MICP studies, from both practical and speculative standpoints. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue SafeMetrics-Quantitative Science Studies for Safety Science)

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23 pages, 9131 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Visualizing the Knowledge Base and Research Hotspot of Public Health Emergency Management: A Science Mapping Analysis-Based Study

by Kai Chen, Xiaoping Lin, Han Wang, Yujie Qiang, Jie Kong, Rui Huang, Haining Wang and Hui Liu

Sustainability 2022, 14(12), 7389; https://doi.org/10.3390/su14127389 - 16 Jun 2022

Cited by 6 | Viewed by 2647

Abstract

Public health emergency management has been one of the main challenges of social sustainable development since the beginning of the 21st century. Research on public health emergency management is becoming a common focus of scholars. In recent years, the literature associated with public health emergency management has grown rapidly, but few studies have used a bibliometric analysis and visualization approach to conduct deep mining and explore the characteristics of the public health emergency management research field. To better understand the present status and development of public health emergency management research, and to explore the knowledge base and research hotspots, the bibliometric method and science mapping technology were adopted to visually evaluate the knowledge structure and research trends in the field of public health emergency management studies. From 2000 to 2020, a total of 3723 papers related to public health emergency management research were collected from the Web of Science Core Collection as research data. The five main research directions formed are child prevention, mortality from public health events, public health emergency preparedness, public health emergency management, and coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). The current research hotspots and frontiers are climate change, COVID-19 and related coronaviruses. Further research is needed to focus on the COVID-19 and related coronaviruses. This study intends to contribute inclusive support to related academia and industry in the aspects of public health emergency management and public safety research, as well as research hotspots and future research directions. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue SafeMetrics-Quantitative Science Studies for Safety Science)

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18 pages, 6379 KiB

Open AccessArticle

A Bibliometric Analysis of Risk Management in Foreign Direct Investment: Insights and Implications

by Lili Pan, Lin Wang and Qianqian Feng

Sustainability 2022, 14(12), 7078; https://doi.org/10.3390/su14127078 - 9 Jun 2022

Cited by 4 | Viewed by 2602

Abstract

Aiming to identify the intellectual structure of risk management in foreign direct investment and its evolving trends, this paper introduces bibliometric analysis to systematically review the 1231 articles published between 1995 and 2022. Through the analysis of publication trends, influential indicators, cooperative networks, and citations, we draw the following important conclusions. From 1995 to 2021, the average annual growth rate of scientific production in the field reached 21.4%, with scholars from the United States and China contributing the most. Regarding the cooperation network, its structure is relatively dispersed, and the deep cooperation among a wide range of researchers has not yet been formed. As for research topics, the popularity of interest in environmental protection, carbon dioxide emissions, energy consumption, and climate change has increased significantly in recent years. Moreover, this paper points out that future research directions include new risks and challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic and the effects of climate risks on foreign direct investment. These results are helpful for scholars to systematically understand the current research status, research frontiers, and future trends of risk management in foreign direct investment. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue SafeMetrics-Quantitative Science Studies for Safety Science)

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21 pages, 6112 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Topic Evolution of Chinese COVID-19 Policies Based on Co-Occurrence Clustering Network Analysis

by Lu Wei, Na Liu, Junhua Chen and Jihong Sun

Sustainability 2022, 14(4), 2411; https://doi.org/10.3390/su14042411 - 20 Feb 2022

Cited by 4 | Viewed by 1870

Abstract

This study aims to explore the changes of Chinese coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) policy topics in the eclipse, outbreak, and convalescent stage of COVID-19 based on 4982 textual policies. By using the co-occurrence clustering network method, we find that the strict prevention and control of the epidemic is the only topic of policies in the eclipse stage. In the outbreak stage, strict epidemic prevention and control is still the most important policy topic. The policies of resuming work of “essential” enterprises and stabilizing market prices are important support and guarantee for fighting against COVID-19. In the convalescent stage, as the prevention and control of COVID-19 has become regular, promoting and ensuring the resumption of work in all sectors of society is the most important topic of the policies. Moreover, the success of Wuhan City’s fight against COVID-19 reflects China’s governance characteristics of “concentrating power to do a major event”. Finally, the possible improvements for Chinese COVID-19 policies are discussed, which can provide practical suggestions for government departments on how to effectively respond to public health emergencies. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue SafeMetrics-Quantitative Science Studies for Safety Science)

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