The geographical distribution of scientific wealth in Iran.

<table><tr><td><p dir="ltr">The increase in the scientific activities of researchers and higher education centers in recent years has led to a remarkable growth in the number of scientific and research publications in Iran at both national and international levels. Although the sustainability and effectiveness of the country's scientific movement require balanced and sustainable scientific development across various regions, it seems that the development process in different areas of the country has not been uniform. In other words, there is a possibility that different geographical regions of the country have not equally contributed to the increase in scientific production. For this reason, the share of regions in the production of science and their level of benefit from the practical results of the produced knowledge, which is collectively referred to as scientific wealth, is an issue that has been addressed in this research. The present study has a geographical basis and aims to examine the level of participation of Iranian provinces in the production of science on one hand and their utilization of the scientific outputs of the country on the other. The main objective of this research is to investigate the existing situation and determine the pattern of geographical distribution of scientific wealth in different provinces of Iran. This research has been implemented and completed in three phases. In the first phase, while reviewing the existing scientific background regarding scientometrics and scientific investment, and conducting a pilot study on five provinces, the concept of scientific wealth was defined and its determining indicators were extracted. The second phase of the research focused on studying the distribution of scientific wealth in different regions of Iran. Thirty-one provinces of the country were examined based on the indicators and patterns extracted in the first phase, and to determine two general criteria: participation in the production of science and benefit from the scientific achievements of the country, a scientific ranking of the provinces was created using five different indicators, identifying the wealthy and deprived scientific provinces of the country. The results showed that 70% of the scientific wealth of the country belongs to 20% of the provinces of Iran, with the share of Tehran province in the scientific wealth of the country being considered based on all indicators. The third phase of this research involved designing a conceptual model for an information system to visually display the scientific wealth of different regions of Iran on interactive maps. For this purpose, suitable conceptual models were proposed for designing a spatial system to display the trends of production and distribution of science in the country based on bibliographic data sources, and the results were visualized on Google Earth maps as well as network mapping software. The results of the research can lead to the creation of indicators for measuring the sustainability and distribution of scientific wealth in the country.</p></td></tr></table><p></p>