Analyzing China’s research collaboration with the United States in high-impact and high-technology research

This study investigates China’s international research collaboration with the United States through a bibliometric analysis of coauthorship over time using historical research publication data. We investigate from three perspectives: overall, high-impact, and high-technology research collaborations using data from Web of Science (WoS), Nature Index, and Technology Alert List maintained by the U.S. Department of State. The results show that the United States is China’s largest research collaborator and that in all three aspects, China and the United States are each other’s primary collaborators much of the time. From China’s perspective, we have found weakening collaboration with the United States over the past 2 years. In terms of high-impact research collaboration, China has historically shared a higher percentage of its research with the United States than vice versa. In terms of high-technology research, the situation is reversed, with the United States sharing more. The percentage of the United States’ high-technology research shared with China has been continuously increasing over the past 10 years, while in China the percentage has been relatively stable.