Taiwan's world share of science and social-science papers over a recent five-year period, expressed as a percentage of papers in each of 21 fields in the Thomson Scientific database. Also, Taiwan's relative citation impact compared to the world average in each field, in percentage terms.
 

Between 2002 and 2006, Thomson Scientific indexed 68,602 papers that listed at least one author address in Taiwan. Of those papers, the highest percentage appeared in journals classified under the heading of computer science, followed by engineering and materials science. In the latter field, as the right-hand column shows, the impact of Taiwan-based research in materials registered at 91% of the world average (or 9% below: 2.40 cites per paper for Taiwan, versus a world average of 2.64 cites per paper). In agricultural sciences, on the other hand, Taiwan's relative-impact score was 1% above the world average. The nation's performance was also comparatively strong in geosciences, plant & animal sciences, and mathematics.

SOURCE: National Science Indicators, 1981-2006 (containing listings of output and citation statistics for more than 170 countries; available in standard and deluxe versions from the Research Services Group).