Applied Network Science

Applied Network Science is an electronic-only, fully open-access journal from SpringerOpen, part of Springer Nature, and it has published without interruption since 2016 without ever issuing a print edition.《应用网络科学》是 SpringerOpen 出品的纯电子全开放获取期刊，SpringerOpen 隶属 Springer Nature，该刊自 2016 年起连续出版，从未发行印刷版。

Its 2025 Journal Impact Factor is 1.9, the five-year figure is 2.2, and the title sits in Clarivate's Emerging Sources Citation Index rather than in the core science edition.该刊 2025 年影响因子为 1.9，五年影响因子 2.2，收录于 Clarivate 的 Emerging Sources Citation Index，尚未进入核心的科学引文索引。

Scope

• Network science sits at the centre of the remit, and the journal asks for work in which the network formalism does real explanatory work on a problem, avoiding the decorative use of graphs.网络科学处于办刊范围的中心，刊物要求稿件里的网络形式化框架真正承担解释问题的任务，避免把图当成装饰。
• Social networks and social media take the largest share, covering online interaction, political communication, news diffusion and the platform structures on which millions of users leave traces.社会网络与社交媒体占的份额最大，涵盖在线互动、政治传播、新闻扩散，以及承载数百万用户行为痕迹的平台结构。
• Biological applications run from brain connectomes and neural dynamics to protein interaction maps, ecological food webs and the spread of infection through host populations.生物学应用从脑连接组与神经动力学，延伸到蛋白质相互作用图谱、生态食物网，以及感染在宿主群体中的扩散。
• Technological and infrastructure networks are treated with equal seriousness, among them the Internet, the web, power grids, transport systems and the water and gas lines cities depend on.技术与基础设施网络受到同等重视，互联网、万维网、电网、交通系统，以及城市赖以运转的供水供气管线都在其列。
• Economic and financial work examines trade flows, interbank exposure, correlation networks built from asset returns and the spillovers that travel along those links during a crisis.经济与金融方向考察贸易流、银行间敞口、由资产收益率构造的相关网络，以及危机期间沿这些连边传导的溢出效应。
• Information networks cover citation graphs, hyperlink structure, knowledge flows between cities and countries, and the ranking algorithms written to make sense of them.信息网络涵盖引文图、超链接结构、城市与国家之间的知识流动，以及为解读这些结构而写的排序算法。
• Community detection and the broader question of mesoscale organisation, meaning modules, cores and overlapping groups, remain a standing methodological interest of the journal.社区发现以及介观组织这个更大的问题长期受刊物关注，模块、核心与相互重叠的群体都在讨论范围之内。
• Multilayer formulations and studies that track how wiring changes over time are welcomed, since many empirical systems carry several relations between the same pair of nodes.多层网络的建模与追踪连边随时间变化的稿件同样受到欢迎，许多经验系统在同一对节点之间承载着好几种关系。
• Dynamics on networks draws steady attention, whether the process is epidemic contagion, opinion formation, innovation adoption, synchronisation of coupled oscillators or cascading failure.网络上的动力学过程持续吸引来稿，传染病扩散、意见形成、创新采纳、耦合振子同步与级联失效都在此列。
• Methodological papers must demonstrate the proposed technique on real data, and graph embedding, machine learning on networks, null models and statistical tests of structure all fall inside the scope.方法类论文须在真实数据上演示所提技术，图嵌入、网络上的机器学习、零模型与结构统计检验都属于本刊范围。
• Data-driven studies form the bulk of what appears, and authors are encouraged to deposit the datasets and the code behind their results so that others can repeat the analysis.以数据为据的研究构成主体，刊物鼓励作者存放结果背后的数据集与代码，方便他人重做同样的分析。
• Claims about structure are expected to survive comparison with suitable null models, which is why randomised baselines and significance tests appear so regularly in the pages.对网络结构的论断须经得起与合适零模型的比较，随机化基线与显著性检验因此在版面上出现得相当频繁。
• The readership is deliberately mixed, since physicists, computer scientists, sociologists, epidemiologists and engineers all publish here and bring their own vocabulary to the same objects.读者群有意保持混杂，物理学家、计算机科学家、社会学家、流行病学家与工程师都在此发表，各自用不同的词汇称呼同一批对象。
• Urban systems, mobility traces, collaboration records and communication logs all count as legitimate sources, provided the application teaches something about networks in general.城市系统、出行轨迹、合作记录与通讯日志都可作为合法数据来源，前提是这些应用能为一般性的网络问题提供见识。

History

• Volume 1 opened in 2016, and every article since has carried a number inside an annual volume rather than a page range stitched across an issue.第 1 卷于 2016 年开卷，此后的每篇文章都在年度卷内编一个号码，不用跨期拼合的页码区间标识。
• An editorial signed by the two founding editors stood at the head of that volume and set out what the journal meant by applied, a word it has kept ever since.首卷卷首是一篇由两位创刊主编联署的社论，其中交代了刊物赋予「应用」一词的含义，这个用法一直沿用。^[1]
• Hidalgo's trans-disciplinary review appeared in the same year and asked whether network science was disconnected, fragmented or united, a question that still recurs in the field.同年刊出 Hidalgo 的跨学科综述，追问网络科学究竟处于割裂、碎片化还是统一的状态，这个问题至今在领域内反复出现。^[2]
• That opening year also carried empirical papers on retweet networks in the European Parliament, on face tracking in television news and on the social ties reconstructed for the biblical Moses.开卷之年还登出实证论文，内容涉及欧洲议会的转推网络、电视新闻中的面部追踪，以及为圣经人物摩西重建的社会关系。
• Publication has not paused since, with sixteen DOIs registered in 2016, fifty-one in 2018, a peak of 131 in 2019 and between seventy and eighty papers in each year since 2023.此后出版未曾中断，2016 年登记 16 个 DOI，2018 年为 51 个，2019 年达到 131 个的高点，2023 年以来每年稳定在七十至八十篇。
• About 822 DOIs now sit under the title, and the rhythm has settled into one volume and one issue number each year, with articles told apart by number alone.该刊名下现在约有 822 个 DOI，节奏已固定为每年一卷一号，文章之间只靠编号区分。
• Volume numbers follow the calendar only loosely, so volume 10 covered most of 2025 while papers published that December already carried volume 11.卷号与日历年的对应只是大致如此，第 10 卷覆盖了 2025 年的大部分时间，那年 12 月见刊的论文已归入第 11 卷。
• There has been no change of title, no merger and no split in the decade since launch, and the journal still answers to the name it received in 2016.创刊十年间没有更名，没有合并，也没有分拆，刊物至今仍用 2016 年定下的名字。
• The publishing arrangement has remained inside Springer Nature, whose SpringerOpen programme carries the title alongside the group's other fully open journals.出版安排始终留在 Springer Nature 之内，刊物由该集团的 SpringerOpen 计划承载，与该集团其他完全开放获取的期刊并列。
• Open access was the only route from the first issue onward, so full texts are released under a Creative Commons licence with copyright left with the authors.开放获取从第 1 期起就是唯一路径，全文以知识共享许可发布，著作权保留在作者手中。
• Authors pay an article processing charge rather than a subscription, and the publisher quotes the rate separately in euro, dollar and sterling.作者支付文章处理费而非订阅费，出版方分别以欧元、美元与英镑标出费率。
• The title was accepted into Clarivate's Emerging Sources Citation Index and received its first Journal Impact Factor in the 2023 release, the year the index began assigning JIFs.该刊先被收入 Clarivate 的 Emerging Sources Citation Index，2023 年版报告首次给出影响因子，也正是该索引开始赋予 JIF 的那一年。
• Reported values have climbed from 1.3 in 2023 to 1.5 in 2024 and 1.9 in 2025, on 1583 citations and roughly 74 papers in the latest counting year.已公布的影响因子从 2023 年的 1.3 升到 2024 年的 1.5，2025 年达到 1.9，最近一个统计年度总被引 1583 次，载文约 74 篇。
• A cited half-life of 5.2 years and a JCI of 0.38 describe a back list that is consulted at a modest but dependable rate.被引半衰期 5.2 年、JCI 0.38，说明旧文被引用的频率不算高，却一直稳定。
• In OpenAlex the journal holds 831 works, an h-index of 45 and an i10 index of 304, which makes it one of the larger open titles in the field.在 OpenAlex 中该刊登记 831 项成果，h 指数 45，i10 指数 304，在本领域的开放期刊里规模偏大。
• The 2025 JCR ranks it 73rd among 146 titles in computer science, theory and methods and 64th among 140 in multidisciplinary sciences.2025 年版期刊引证报告把它排在计算机理论与方法类 146 种期刊中的第 73 位，多学科科学类 140 种中的第 64 位。

Editors

• Hocine Cherifi of the University of Burgundy in Dijon and Ronaldo Menezes are named as the journal's editors, the same pair who signed the launching editorial in 2016.刊物的主编是第戎勃艮第大学的 Hocine Cherifi 与 Ronaldo Menezes，两人正是 2016 年创刊社论的联署者。
• Cherifi works on complex networks, and his publications run through community detection, node ranking and the analysis of large empirical graphs.Cherifi 研究复杂网络，发表成果集中在社区发现、节点排序与大型实证图的分析上。
• Menezes reached the field through complex systems and self-organising systems, and he co-wrote the editorial that opened volume 1.Menezes 由复杂系统与自组织系统进入这一领域，并与 Cherifi 合写了开启第 1 卷的那篇社论。
• Review is single anonymous, so referees learn who wrote the paper while authors never learn who reviewed them, a model the journal registers with the open-access directory.评审采用单向匿名，审稿人知道论文作者是谁，作者却始终不知道审稿人身份，这一模式记录在刊物的开放获取登记信息中。
• Because articles are numbered rather than paged, an accepted paper goes live once it is typeset, without waiting for an issue to be closed.文章按编号排布而不编页码，录用稿排版完成即可上线，不必等一期凑齐。
• Manuscripts arrive through the publisher's online submission system, and one guidance page gathers the article types, licence terms and fee schedule together.稿件经出版方的在线投稿系统进入，一页投稿指南把文章类型、许可条款与费用标准集中列出。
• The editorial board is drawn from several countries and several disciplines, which suits a field whose practitioners seldom share a single department.编委会成员来自多个国家与多个学科，这与网络科学从业者很少同处一个院系的情形相合。
• Nothing on the platform sits behind a paywall, so a reader outside any subscribing institution can open every paper from the first volume onward.平台上没有任何内容藏在付费墙后，不在订阅机构内的读者也能打开从第 1 卷起的每一篇论文。
• Each paper receives a DOI at publication, and a citation points to the article number inside a volume rather than to a page range.每篇论文发表时取得 DOI，引用指向卷内的文章编号，而不用页码区间。
• A selection of papers is also indexed in PubMed, a route that follows the biomedical and epidemiological work the journal regularly carries.部分论文同时被 PubMed 收录，这条通道对应刊物经常登载的生物医学与流行病学研究。