IvoryTowers
a Visualization
Created by David Bradway / @davidbradway
(Scroll down first, then right)
Methods
- For this project, the coauthor network MATLAB file was reformatted as an adjacency list in Python, since it was a fairly sparse graph
- I implemented a breadth-first search (BFS) in Python based on a post by Edd Mann
- For every combination of two authors, the links are traversed until the first (shortest) path is found.
- In the BFS algorithm, all links from the current node are checked before moving to the next depth of linked nodes.
Force Diagram of Entire Network
- The crescent shape are all notes that are not densely connected, or have no connections
- The star shape is highly connected and is likely where are the long chains are found
Results
- In Hollywood, the largest current "Kevin Bacon number" is 10. (There is only one actor ten links from Kevin Bacon)
- Our longest chains are 13 links and 14 co-authors
- Interestingly, they all contain this series of co-authors: Michael C. Munger - John Aldrich - D. Sunshine Hillygus - Jerome P. Reiter
- The papers span wide variety of disciplines connected via related topics
- The following slides are an example 13-link chain
- Notice the paper topics and department names
Example 13-link Chain
- The color bars represent different departments
- The lines are papers authored by connected faculty
- There is no shorter path between any authors in the chain
Daniel Julio Lew
Pharmacology & Cancer Biology
Modeling vesicle traffic reveals unexpected consequences for Cdc42p-mediated polarity establishment.
Anita T. Layton
Mathematics
Anita T. Layton
Mathematics
Preface: Special issue on fluid dynamics, analysis and numerics
Thomas Peter Witelski
Mathematics
Thomas Peter Witelski
Mathematics
A driven system of impacting pendulums: Experiments and simulations
Lawrence N. Virgin
Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science
Lawrence N. Virgin
Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science
Nonlinear dynamics of the CAM circadian rhythm in response to environmental forcing.
Amilcare Porporato
Civil and Environmental Engineering
Amilcare Porporato
Civil and Environmental Engineering
Sari Palmroth
Environmental Sciences and Policy
Sari Palmroth
Environmental Sciences and Policy
Sustained effects of atmospheric [CO2] and nitrogen availability on forest soil CO2 efflux
Ram Oren
Environmental Sciences and Policy
Ram Oren
Environmental Sciences and Policy
James S. Clark
Environmental Sciences and Policy
James S. Clark
Environmental Sciences and Policy
Inference for Size Demography From Point Pattern Data Using Integral Projection Models
Alan E. Gelfand
Statistical Science
Alan E. Gelfand
Statistical Science
Imputation of confidential data sets with spatial locations using disease mapping models
Jerome P. Reiter
Statistical Science
Jerome P. Reiter
Statistical Science
D. Sunshine Hillygus
Political Science
D. Sunshine Hillygus
Political Science
Blame, Responsibility, and the Tea Party in the 2010 Midterm Elections
John Aldrich
Political Science
John Aldrich
Political Science
Michael C. Munger
Political Science
Michael C. Munger
Political Science
H. Geoffrey Brennan
Political Science
Discussion: Hollywood vs Academia
Movies
- Movies have a lot of actors!
- Besides the big names, think of all the small roles and unnamed characters that fill up the credits
- Actors play different types of characters in different genres
- This leads to greater connectedness and lower "Bacon Numbers"
Discussion: Hollywood vs Academia
Articles
- Journal articles, on the other hand, typically have only a few authors, from a small number of fields
- Authors' publishing tendencies are usually very focused, not jumping around to different fields
- This leads to the title of this project, "Ivory Towers", or isolated silos that are not densely connected to each other