{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,4,8]],"date-time":"2026-04-08T09:08:04Z","timestamp":1775639284796,"version":"3.50.1"},"reference-count":29,"publisher":"Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences","issue":"45","content-domain":{"domain":["www.pnas.org"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A."],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2008,11,11]]},"abstract":"<jats:p>\n            We study the distributions of citations received by a single publication within several disciplines, spanning broad areas of science. We show that the probability that an article is cited\n            <jats:italic>c<\/jats:italic>\n            times has large variations between different disciplines, but all distributions are rescaled on a universal curve when the relative indicator\n            <jats:italic>\n              c\n              <jats:sub>f<\/jats:sub>\n            <\/jats:italic>\n            =\n            <jats:italic>c<\/jats:italic>\n            \/\n            <jats:italic>c<\/jats:italic>\n            <jats:sub>0<\/jats:sub>\n            is considered, where\n            <jats:italic>c<\/jats:italic>\n            <jats:sub>0<\/jats:sub>\n            is the average number of citations per article for the discipline. In addition we show that the same universal behavior occurs when citation distributions of articles published in the same field, but in different years, are compared. These findings provide a strong validation of\n            <jats:italic>\n              c\n              <jats:sub>f<\/jats:sub>\n            <\/jats:italic>\n            as an unbiased indicator for citation performance across disciplines and years. Based on this indicator, we introduce a generalization of the h index suitable for comparing scientists working in different fields.\n          <\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1073\/pnas.0806977105","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2008,11,1]],"date-time":"2008-11-01T00:46:03Z","timestamp":1225500363000},"page":"17268-17272","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1073\/pnas.cm10313","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":648,"title":["Universality of citation distributions: Toward an objective measure of scientific impact"],"prefix":"10.1073","volume":"105","author":[{"given":"Filippo","family":"Radicchi","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Complex Networks Lagrange Laboratory, Institute for Scientific Interchanged Foundation, 10133 Torino, Italy; and"}]},{"given":"Santo","family":"Fortunato","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Complex Networks Lagrange Laboratory, Institute for Scientific Interchanged Foundation, 10133 Torino, Italy; and"}]},{"given":"Claudio","family":"Castellano","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Centre for Statistical Mechanics and Complexity, National Institute for the Physics of Matter-Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, and Dipartimento di Fisica, \u201cSapienza\u201d Universit\u00e0 di Roma, Piazzale A. Moro 2, 00185 Roma, Italy"}]}],"member":"341","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2008,11,11]]},"reference":[{"key":"e_1_3_2_1_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1073\/pnas.0507655102"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_2_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1007\/s11192-006-0144-7"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_3_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1073\/pnas.0707962104"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_4_2","unstructured":"The use of bibliometrics to measure research quality in UK higher education institutions. Available at: http:\/\/bookshop.universitiesuk.ac.uk\/downloads\/bibliometrics.pdf. 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