Paper short abstract:

Social network analysis facilitates new ways of conceptualising the actors and institutions involved in African trypanosomiasis research, and of understanding their relationships. We have created visual representations of the global trypanosomiasis network and interpreted the findings.

Paper long abstract:

The nature of research and control of tropical and infectious diseases has dramatically changed over the past few decades. New approaches to drug discovery, new funding mechanisms, new approaches to science, new priorities and new health threats means that the networks of institutions and experts that conduct research, develop technologies and attempt to control disease have become markedly more international, flexible and complex. Understanding how these networks are evolving in relation to Africa is important given the disease burden and weak health systems to be found there. Understanding the intent, scope, and dynamics of these research networks is important as we await their outputs, which in many instances are decidedly ambitious: new knowledge and tools to assist in the elimination of an ancient zoonotic disease, which has served to perpetuate poverty and underdevelopment across Africa.

Social network analysis is a methodological approach that facilitates new ways of conceptualising the actors and institutions involved in researching complex systems. This paper will present preliminary results from our analysis of the networks that engage with the neglected tropical disease African trypanosomiasis, and of understanding their relationships to one another. We searched academic databases for publications on African trypanosomiasis; then used text mining tools to retrieve the institutional affiliations of the publications' authors and co-authors, and to establish the themes of the research; finally we used UCINET, a software package for the analysis of social networks, to create visual representations of the global African trypanosomiasis research network. We present and interpret our findings here.