H-Lens

Bibliometric transparency dashboard — analyse any researcher's h-index, detect pivotal self-citations, mutual citation rings, and decompose index inflation across 15 free open databases.

Built as the implementation backbone for a two-study empirical research programme on pivotal self-citation rates (target journal: Scientometrics).

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What it does

Feature	Description
Author search	Name search (OpenAlex), Name + Affiliation (ORCID registry), or direct ORCID iD lookup
Self-citation analysis	Sandnes (2026) pivotal self-citation plot + PSCR score (binary, count, weighted)
Mutual citation detection	"You cite me, I cite you" ring detection with Mutual Citation Score (MCS) per pair
Index decomposition	h-index and i10-index with and without self-citations; SC inflation score
Multi-database enrichment	Cross-references OpenAlex with PubMed/iCite (NIH), Europe PMC, Crossref, ORCID
Batch upload	CSV/Excel upload for up to 500 authors; results exportable as CSV
Data quality warning	Confidence-scored name-match recovery for papers with disambiguation failures

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Quick start

1. Backend

cd H-index

# Install Python dependencies
pip install fastapi uvicorn pyalex habanero arxiv semanticscholar \
            biopython requests pandas networkx python-multipart

# Start the API server
PYTHONPATH=src uvicorn api.main:app --port 8000 --reload

API docs available at http://localhost:8000/docs

2. Frontend

cd frontend
npm install
npm run dev

Open http://localhost:5173

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Databases used

#	Database	Role	Cost
1	OpenAlex	Primary: h-index, works, citations	Free
2	PubMed / PMC	Life Sciences full-text	Free
3	ORCID	Author identity anchor	Free
4	Semantic Scholar	CS/Eng validation	Free
5	Crossref	DOI bridge + references	Free
6	arXiv	Physics/CS full-text	Free
7	Europe PMC	EU-funded papers	Free
8	CORE	Social sciences OA	Free
9	bioRxiv/medRxiv	Preprint comparison	Free
10	INSPIRE-HEP	High-energy physics	Free
11	DBLP	CS conference papers	Free
12	Lens.org	Patent cross-citations	Free
13	Unpaywall	OA fallback retrieval	Free
14	ROR	Institution registry	Free
15	Wikidata	Prestige proxy	Free
+	iCite / NIH	Field-normalised RCR	Free
+	OpenCitations	Citation graph	Free
+	Dimensions.ai	Cross-validation	Free (key)

Total cost: $0 - all databases are freely accessible for academic research use.

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API endpoints

Method	Endpoint	Description
GET	/search?q={name}	Quick author name search
GET	/search/orcid?name=X&affiliation=Y	Precise ORCID lookup
GET	/search/orcid?orcid_id=0000-...	Direct ORCID iD lookup
GET	/author/{id}	Author overview + position stats
GET	/author/{id}/self	Sandnes plot + PSCR analysis
GET	/author/{id}/mutual	Mutual citation network
GET	/author/{id}/decompose	Index decomposition
GET	/author/{id}/multi	Multi-database comparison
GET	/author/{id}/patents	Patent self-citations (Lens.org)
POST	/upload	Batch CSV analysis

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Research background

This tool implements the empirical infrastructure for:

• Study 1 - Pivotal Self-Citation Rates Across Disciplines, Career Stages, and Demographics: A Large-Scale Empirical Analysis Using OpenAlex (target: Scientometrics)
• Study 2 - Inside the Pivotal Self-Citation: A Citation Context Analysis of Why Authors Pivotally Self-Cite (target: Journal of Informetrics)

Both studies extend Sandnes (2026): Understanding the h-index with self-citation visualizations, Scientometrics, 131, 1979-1989.

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Key concepts

Pivotal self-citation - a self-citation to an h-core paper where removing that citation would drop the paper below the h-threshold (making it critical to the h-index).

PSCR (Pivotal Self-Citation Rate) - proportion of h-core papers containing at least one pivotal self-citation.

MCS (Mutual Citation Score) - min(A cites B, B cites A) / max(A cites B, B cites A). Score of 1.0 = perfectly symmetric; flagged when MCS > 0.6 and mutual count >= 3.

RCR (Relative Citation Ratio) - NIH iCite field-normalised citation impact. RCR > 1.0 means above average for the field.

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Environment variables

Variable	Description	Required
CORE_API_KEY	CORE.ac.uk free API key	Optional
S2_API_KEY	Semantic Scholar API key	Optional
LENS_API_KEY	Lens.org free API key	Optional
DIMENSIONS_API_KEY	Dimensions.ai free API key	Optional
NCBI_API_KEY	PubMed higher rate limit	Optional

All optional - the system works without any keys using public rate limits.

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License

Code: MIT
Data: All source databases are CC0 or equivalent open licence.

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Citation

If you use H-Lens in your research:

H-Lens: Bibliometric transparency dashboard for pivotal self-citation analysis.
Built for: Pivotal Self-Citation Rates Across Disciplines, Career Stages, and Demographics (2026).