Twelve UMass Researchers Among ‘Most Highly Cited’ in the World for 2022

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A dozen UMass Amherst researchers representing a wide range of disciplines have been recognized as among the world’s most highly cited researchers in 2022.  

The list is generated by the Web of Science database of analytics provider Clarivate. The highly cited papers rank in the top 1% by citations for their field and publication year, span 69 countries or regions and are spread across a diverse range of research fields in the sciences and social sciences.  

The highly cited UMass Amherst researchers for 2022 are three food scientists: Professor Eric Decker, Distinguished Professor David Julian McClements and Professor and Clydesdale Scholar of Food Science Hang Xiao; two microbiologists: Kelly Nevin and Derek Lovley; Distinguished Professor in Chemistry Vincent Rotello; Armstrong/Siadat Endowed Professor of Chemical Engineering Nianqiang "Nick" Wu; Director of Stockbridge School of Agriculture and Professor of Environmental and Soil Sciences Baoshan Xing; Silvio O. Conte Distinguished Professor of Polymer Science and Engineering Thomas Russell; Hospitality and Tourism Management Provost Professor Muzaffer “Muzzo” Uysal; Associate Dean of Undergraduate Academic Affairs and School of Public Health and Health Sciences Professor Laura Vandenberg; and Electrical and Computer Engineering Professor Qiangfei Xia. 

This year, Clarivate’s Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) teamed with Retraction Watch to deepen qualitative analysis of the list to improve detection of potential misconduct such as plagiarism, image manipulation and fake peer review. Researchers found to have committed scientific misconduct in formal proceedings conducted by a researcher’s institution, a government agency, a funder or a publisher were excluded from the list of Highly Cited Researchers. 

“Research misconduct is an ever-increasing concern in our world. Activities such as unusual citation activity and fake peer review may represent efforts to game the system and create self-generated status,” says David Pendlebury, head of research analysis at ISI. “This is why we’ve expanded our qualitative analysis this year to ensure the Highly Cited Researchers list reflects genuine, community-wide research influence. Our efforts are part of a wider responsibility across the whole research community to better police itself and uphold research integrity.” 

The complete list of Highly Cited Researchers for 2022, as well as the methodology used to choose them, can be found here.