From bioweapon to biodefense

The biological arms race could have been considered a closed chapter in the Cold War history. However, the growth of different terrorist groups and organisations has increased the threat of biological weapon (BW) use. The goal of this pilot scientometric project was to trace changes in biodefense re...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inScientometrics Vol. 53; no. 1; pp. 21 - 38
Main Authors Markusova Valentina, Wilson, Concepción S, Davis, Mari
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Dordrecht Springer Nature B.V 01.01.2002
Subjects
Biological weapons
Content analysis
Health care
Health care policy
Health policy
Public health
Scientometrics
Security
United States > US
Russia
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Summary:The biological arms race could have been considered a closed chapter in the Cold War history. However, the growth of different terrorist groups and organisations has increased the threat of biological weapon (BW) use. The goal of this pilot scientometric project was to trace changes in biodefense research and the activities of its main players, Russia and the US. Data were collected from the SCI via the Dialog information system for1991-2000, the period covering the post-soviet era. In-depth content analysis was performed on selected papers from the 2870 publications identified as BW-related. During the period examined, the publication flow increased by 250 percent. The main contributors to this literature were shown to be the US, Russia, UK, France and Germany. The results presented in this paper are of interest to security analysts (following the attacks in the US of 11th September 2001), to public health care policy researchers and to politicians.
ISSN:0138-9130
1588-2861
DOI:10.1023/A:1014827819263