Evidence map›Paper›PMID 37368928›Full record

ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2023

Caught in the crossfire: Fears of Chinese-American scientists.

Yu Xie, Xihong Lin, Ju Li, Qian He, Junming Huang

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
8citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

8 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Article
  2. Shifting power asymmetries in scientific teams reveal China's rising leadership in global science.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025
    Article
  3. Article
  4. Article
  5. The impact of US-China tensions on US science: Evidence from the NIH investigations.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2024
    Article
  6. Article
  7. Article
  8. The high price of overzealously defending the US research enterprise against theft by China.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2023
    Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors.

Yu XiePaul and Marcia Wythes Center on Contemporary China, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544.ORCID 0000-0002-3240-8620
Xihong LinDepartment of Biostatistics, Harvard University, Boston, MA 02115.ORCID 0000-0001-7067-7752
Ju LiDepartment of Nuclear Science and Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139.ORCID 0000-0002-7841-8058
Qian HePaul and Marcia Wythes Center on Contemporary China, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544.ORCID 0000-0001-6321-2244
Junming HuangPaul and Marcia Wythes Center on Contemporary China, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544.ORCID 0000-0002-2532-4090

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

The US global leadership in science and technology has greatly benefitted from immigrants from other countries, most notably from China in the recent decades. However, feeling the pressure of potential federal investigations since the 2018 launch of the China Initiative, scientists of Chinese descent in the United States now face higher incentives to leave the United States and lower incentives to apply for federal grants. Analyzing data pertaining to institutional affiliations of more than 200 million scientific papers, we find a steady increase in the return migration of scientists of Chinese descent from the United States to China. We also conducted a survey of scientists of Chinese descent employed by US universities in tenured or tenure-track positions (n = 1,304), with results revealing general feelings of fear and anxiety that lead them to consider leaving the United States and/or stop applying for federal grants. If the situation is not corrected, American science will likely suffer the loss of scientific talent to China and other countries.

Indexed as

academic freedomAmerican scienceChinaChina initiativeimmigrant scientists

Identifiers

PMID37368928
PMCPMC10318999

What OpenQuestion holds

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Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.