The Evolution of Structure and Characteristics of International Collaborative Network of Publications about 3D Printing Technology

The development of 3D printing technology has attracted worldwide concern, most of countries have funded actively in technology research and development. Based on the publications data from the Web of Science, the paper conducts a systematic analysis on international collaborative network of publications about 3D printing technology from the perspective of institutions. By using the social network analysis methods such as density, average path length, clustering coefficient, collaborative network centrality and collaborative strength to analyze the evolution of its structure and characteristics, the paper finds that more and more institutions from different countries joined the international collaborative network gradually, and there are significant differences in the structure and characteristics of the international collaborative network of the institutions in different stages.