Two professors in the College of Science at the University of Notre Dame have been named Highly Cited Researchers by Clarivate Web of Science.
Stuart Jones, associate professor in the Department of Biological Sciences, and associate director of research for the University of Notre Dame Environmental Research Center (UNDERC), was named for the first time this year. Prashant Kamat, the Rev. John A. Zahm Professor of Science in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, has been on the list annually since 2014.
Jones attributes his addition to the list to the success of two papers from 2011 that each received more than 1,000 citations. One, “A guide to the natural history of freshwater lake bacteria” and “Microbial seed banks: The ecological and evolutionary implications of dormancy.”
“The one is a sort of field guide for bacteria that live in lakes, similar to a field guide for birds,” said Jones, who is also affiliated with the Environmental Change Initiative. By using DNA sequences, researchers can figure out where they might see certain bacteria in lakes in different parts of the world. The other paper focused on hibernation in bacteria—they can hibernate for thousands of years and reawaken.
Kamat’s 71,000 total citations include more than 2,700 for the 2008 article, “Quantum dot solar cells: Semiconductor nanocrystals as light harvesters” and “TiO2-Graphene Nanocomposites: UV-Assisted Photocatalytic Reduction of Graphene Oxide” from the same year. He has authored three other papers that have more than 2,000 citations as well.
"It is exciting to receive this recognition for the research carried out at Notre Dame,” said Kamat, who is affiliated with ND Energy, NDnano, and the Radiation Laboratory. “I am proud of our students and postdoctoral researchers, whose research contributions have made such an accolade possible." In addition to the Clarivate honor, Thomson-Reuters has featured him as one of the most cited researchers each year since 2014.
Jones said it is nice to be recognized because it demonstrates the impact of an idea that is being built upon by other researchers.
“Being a professor can be kind of isolating, or a little lonely, even though you might be teaching to 100 students three days a week,” Jones said, “We researchers spend most of our time on a computer or working on a grant, but this is evidence that the stuff I’m doing alone on my computer gets out into the world, and has an effect on somebody else.”