19th International CODATA Conference
Category: Open Communication
Growth of literature and data from the seventeenth century to today
Heinrich Behrens (Heinrich.Behrens@t-online.de),
Irmgard Lankenau, Universitätsbibliothk,
Universität Koblenz-Landau, Landau, Germany
The growth of Science is investigated for the disciplines of Astrophysics/Astronomy,
of Physics and of Chemistry. This is illustrated by the growth of the corresponding
literature, of important books, of essential inventions and of some other data
in the last four centuries by considering all available data.. This includes
the derivation of the laws of growing by applying different mathematical models
for the growth. The results for this different growth models (linear, quadratic,
exponential, hyperbolic etc.) will be compared. It is shown that the exponential
growth model which is normally applied is not necessary the best to describe
the growth of the data. Other models are often and in certain epochs better
suitable to explain the growth.