Forty years development of marine geology in China: Evidence from scientometrics

Modern marine geology was initiated in 1949 in China right after the founding of the People’s Republic. It has experienced a long terms of data accumulation. However, since the Government adopted the policy of reform and opening-up in late 1970s, the marine geology in China has made great progress and rapid development and become an independent scientific discipline. Based on the analysis on all the literatures published in the journal of "Marine Geology and Quaternary Geology", we made a brief evaluation of the past 40 year development of marine geology in China in this paper by means of scientometrics approaches. Several indicators were extracted through key word frequency statistics, co-word analysis, and knowledge graphs. The research results suggest that: (1) In the past 40 years, the number of new key words in all articles and the annual red point factor (RPF) have remained stable, indicating that the rapid development of marine geology is a complete process. And this trend will continue for 15-20 years or more; (2) According to the "high-frequency key word set", the research hot areas of Chinese marine geology remain with China Seas, the western Pacific, and the parts of polar oceans. The hot fields include sedimentology and environment, geochemistry and bio-geology, structural geology, Quaternary geology, petroleum geology of China offshore basins, paleoclimate and global changes, etc.; (3) According to the "burst key words", the frontiers of marine geology research are focused on new energy resources dominated by natural gas hydrates, western Pacific geodynamics related to plate subduction, and the deep oil and gas accumulated in the Mesozoic and Paleozoic. In addition, the resources and environment and the tectonics of Indian Ocean ridge are also the interests of researches. The development of all disciplines will follow a cyclical process from accumulation to explosion and then to maturity. In the past 40 year history of marine geology in China, it is regrettable that no turning point has been observed so far. To consider the development of earth sciences as a whole, the continuous expansion of research areas is doubtlessly the basis for the development of disciplines. And the adoption and application of new technology and updated survey methods remain the keys to the development. To observe all branches of marine geology in China, both research hot fields and research frontiers appear alternately. So, the development model from frontiers to hot fields and finally to basic knowledge is worthy of further discussion.