[Paper Review] Sleeping Beauties Cited in Patents: Is there also a Dormitory of Inventions?

van Raan, F J Anthony|arXiv (Cornell University)|Apr 19, 2016

Genetics, Bioinformatics, and Biomedical Research25 references3 citations

TL;DR

This study investigates whether 'Sleeping Beauties'—scientific papers that remain unnoticed for years before gaining sudden attention—are cited in patents, exploring the existence of a 'dormitory of inventions.' Using tunable co-citation analysis, it finds that patent citations can occur before or after awakening, and inventor-author self-citations are rare; the study identifies key application-oriented works linked to Sleeping Beauties through citation networks.

ABSTRACT

A Sleeping Beauty in Science is a publication that goes unnoticed (sleeps) for a long time and then, almost suddenly, attracts a lot of attention (is awakened by a prince). In our foregoing study we found that roughly half of the Sleeping Beauties are application-oriented and thus are potential Sleeping Innovations. In this paper we investigate a new topic: Sleeping Beauties that are cited in patents. In this way we explore the existence of a dormitory of inventions. We find that patent citation may occur before or after the awakening and that the depth of the sleep, i.e., citation rate during the sleeping period, is no predictor for later scientific or technological impact of the Sleeping Beauty. Inventor-author self-citations occur only in a small minority of the Sleeping Beauties that are cited in patents, but other types of inventor-author links occur more frequently. We analyze whether they deal with new topics by measuring the time-dependent evolution in the entire scientific literature of the number of papers related to both the precisely defined topics as well as the broader research theme of the Sleeping Beauty during and after the sleeping time. We focus on the awakening by analyzing the first group of papers that cites the Sleeping Beauty. Next, we create concept maps of the topic-related and the citing papers for a time period immediately following the awakening and for the most recent period. Finally, we make an extensive assessment of the cited and citing relations of the Sleeping Beauty. We find that tunable co-citation analysis is a powerful tool to discover the prince and other important application-oriented work directly related to the Sleeping Beauty, for instance papers written by authors who cite Sleeping Beauties in both the patents of which they are the inventors, as well as in their scientific papers.

Motivation & Objective

• To investigate whether Sleeping Beauties—scientific papers that gain sudden attention after long dormancy—are cited in patents, suggesting a potential 'dormitory of inventions.'
• To determine if the depth of sleep (citation rate during dormancy) predicts later scientific or technological impact.
• To analyze the role of inventor-author links, especially self-citations, in Sleeping Beauties cited in patents.
• To assess whether cited papers introduce new topics by tracking the evolution of related literature over time.
• To map topic-related and citing papers around the awakening period to identify key application-oriented works.

Proposed method

• Identifying Sleeping Beauties cited in patents using citation data from scientific and intellectual property databases.
• Measuring the time-dependent evolution of literature related to the precise topic and broader research theme of each Sleeping Beauty during and after the sleeping period.
• Analyzing the first group of citing papers to study the awakening event and its immediate impact.
• Creating concept maps of topic-related and citing papers for the period right after awakening and for the most recent time frame.
• Applying tunable co-citation analysis to detect the 'prince'—key application-oriented works—and other influential papers linked to the Sleeping Beauty.
• Identifying papers authored by inventors who cite Sleeping Beauties both in patents and in scientific publications to uncover dual-purpose contributions.

Experimental results

Research questions

• RQ1 Do Sleeping Beauties cited in patents experience a technological awakening before or after their scientific awakening?
• RQ2 Is the citation rate during the sleeping period a reliable predictor of later scientific or technological impact?
• RQ3 How frequently do inventor-authors self-cite Sleeping Beauties that are cited in patents?
• RQ4 Do Sleeping Beauties cited in patents introduce new research topics, as indicated by the growth of related literature?
• RQ5 Can tunable co-citation analysis effectively identify the 'prince'—i.e., key application-oriented works—directly linked to a Sleeping Beauty?

Key findings

• Patent citations to Sleeping Beauties can occur both before and after their scientific awakening, indicating that technological relevance may emerge independently of scientific recognition.
• The depth of sleep—measured by citation rate during dormancy—does not predict later scientific or technological impact of the Sleeping Beauty.
• Inventor-author self-citations to Sleeping Beauties in patents are rare, occurring in only a small minority of cases.
• Other types of inventor-author links—such as citing the same paper in both patents and scientific works—are more frequent and indicate potential dual-use contributions.
• Tunable co-citation analysis successfully identifies the 'prince' and other key application-oriented works linked to the Sleeping Beauty, including papers by authors who cite the same work in both patents and scientific literature.
• The evolution of literature related to the Sleeping Beauty's topic shows measurable shifts in focus and growth following the awakening, confirming the emergence of new research trajectories.