RESUMO
Objective To summarize the funding of scientific research projects on solid organ transplantation by National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) from 1998 to 2014 as well as the publications produced by these projects, and to display the hotspots of scientific research on solid organ transplantation.Method A systemic search was performed for the information of projects supported by NSFC from 1998 to 2014 and their papers published in Science Citation Index (SCI) journals.The indicators for analysis included the number of projects, total investment, average investment in each project, the number of papers published in SCI journals, total number of citations, average number of citations of each paper, H index and average investment in each paper.The research direction of each project was decided based on title, summary and key words provided by the profile of each project.Result The total investment on solid organ transplantation by NSFC was 1.55 million with a total of seven projects.It increased year by year and reached the peak in 2011.The investment in 2011 was 42.7 million yuan RMB with a total of 78 projects.The investment and number of projects remained stable after 2011.The median investment in each project was increased by 380 thousand yuan RMB from 1998 to 2014.From 1998 to 2010, the number of papers and total number of citations increased.H index increased steadily and slowly before 2005, followed by a surge in 2005.It stayed stable between 13 and 19 from 2005 to 2010.Investment in each SCI paper had never exceeded 110 thousand since 2004.Through analysis of research direction of all the projects, we found that the investment in the research projects on immune regulation and immune tolerance,ischemia-reperfusion injury and inflammation and immune rejection dominated total investment from 1998 to 2014.Investment in the research projects on artificial organs and xenotransplantation was distributed unevenly.Projects associated with stem cell had received increasing investment.Conclusion The fundingby NSFC has largely promoted the development and progress of research on science of organ transplantation.More investment will be required for the scientific research in this field.