Two themes, both of which have challenged astronomers and cosmologists, are played out in the Special Topics two-year and ten-year lists of the hottest papers in the field of dark matter and dark energy: the first is the absence of luminous mass in the universe, and the second is the presence of a repulsive force accelerating the expansion of the universe.

Over the past decade, the Special Topics ranking of the hottest papers in the field is dominated by analyses of the dark matter halos of galaxies and how they constrain possible dark matter cosmologies. Nearly half of the top 20 papers are on this theme. Other papers on the decade’s top 20 list include a review of possible supersymmetric dark matter candidates and studies of what the cosmic ray background anisotropies and the Lyman-alpha spectral absorption lines say about the nature of cold dark matter.

Over the past two years, the hottest papers are dominated by those examining dark energy and the cosmological constant. A half dozen of the hottest papers examine possible dark-energy candidates and their consequences. Another half dozen papers follow the theme of the decade and stay on the structure and dynamics of dark matter in galactic halos, although with a new twist involving the revelations that emerge from studies of gravitational lens galaxies. Other papers on two-year list include an update on a cryogenic search for WIMPs (Weakly Interacting Massive Particles), and two reports on the use of supernovae as dark-energy probes.

Methodology

To construct this database, papers were extracted based on title- supplied keywords for Dark Matter and Dark Energy. The keywords used were as follows: 

dark matter
    or
dark energy

The baseline time span for this database is 1994-2004 (third bimonthly). The resulting database contained 1,988 (10 years) and  756 (2 years) papers; 2,955 authors; 54 countries; 138 journals; and 702 institutions.

Rankings

Once the database was in place, it was used to generate the lists of top 20 papers (two, and ten years periods), authors, journals, institutions, and nations, covering a time span of 1994-2004 (third bimonthly).

The top 20 papers are ranked according to total cites. Rankings for author, journal, institution, and country are listed in three ways: according to total cites, total papers, and total cites/paper. The paper thresholds used to determine scientist, institution, country, and journal rankings according to total cites/paper were as follows: 15, 14, 11, and 8, respectively. These thresholds correspond to the top 1% of authors, 1% of institutions, 50% of countries and 20% of journals by total papers.

Return to previous page