ResearchGate, a Scientific Social Network, which Is Working as Growing Database and Cannot be Ignored neither Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons nor Publishers

Abstract

ResearchGate (RG) was launched in May 2008 by two physicians (Ijad Madisch and Sören Hofmayer) and computer scientist Horst Fickenscher as a social network platform for scientists, which is counting 20 million users.2 RG is also named as networked socio-technical system for scholarly communication3, academic social network site3, and academic social network site4. Citations, reads, RG Score, h-index, comments, personal communication via the platform and much more functions of RG are so impressive for every author. Moreover, the collection of articles` titles and abstracts/summaries with a “search” option made RG a new sophisticated database. The principles of RG are helping to increase the dissemination of practical orientated science like the oral and maxillofacial surgery (OMS). In RG`s we can find the articles from open access OMS journals like Journal of the Korean Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons,5,6 Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery Cases,7,8 etc. RG option “Citations” is more than useful for editorial offices and publishers as it helps to track the citation in the journals included to Scopus. It facilitates monitoring of the implementation/ compliance of one of the 14 journal selection criteria for inclusion into Scopus. “Citednes of journal articles in Scopus” is important criteria from a category Journal Standing.9 Citation of the articles published in our journal is easy to track with the RG. For example: the article of Le et al10,11 was cited at June 16, 2021 by Weyh et al12,13 published in Atlas of the Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery Clinics. In summary, although discussions about the operation of the ResearchGate exist,14 the benefits of this growing platform as a database should not be underestimated.