The impact of foreign-born scientists and engineers on American nanoscience research

This paper assesses the contribution of foreign-born scientists and engineers to nanoscience innovation. While studies have assessed immigrants’ general contributions to American science and engineering, less is known about their presence within emergent, cutting-edge, and multidisciplinary fields. Multiple sources are utilized to determine the nativity of researchers within nanotechnology, a platform technology with important implications for economic growth, industrial competitiveness, and numerous fields of scientific research. Specifically, it examines the authors of the most highly-cited articles published in the period 1999–2009. Based on comparisons with the prevalence of foreign-born in the scientific and engineering community and general population, the study’s findings reveal that researchers were disproportionally foreign-born, a trend that has grown over time. Additionally, although over-represented among high-impact researchers, there were no significant differences between the institutional locations (academia versus industry) and research activities (productivity and patterns of collaboration) of foreign and native scientists and engineers.