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Dashun Wang

@dashunwang.bsky.social
163 followers 34 following 7 posts

Kellogg Chair of Technology, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University

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Reposted by Dashun Wang
Zander Furnas @alexanderfurnas.com · 03/09/2026
New preprint w/ Jian Gao, @yianyin.bsky.social & @dashunwang.bsky.social. We link campaign finance, faculty rosters, voter files, a ~7,000-scientist survey & bibliometrics to ask if scientists' politics show up in the science that gets made & used. 🧵 osf.io/preprints/so...

Scientific institutions are designed to produce and evaluate claims through shared evidentiary and disciplinary standards, yet they are embedded in an increasingly polarized society. This fundamental tension raises the question of whether scientists’ partisan alignment is associated with the production, circulation, and uptake of scientific knowledge. Here we integrate campaign-finance records, faculty rosters, voter-registration data, an original survey of approximately 7,000 active U.S. scientists, bibliometric data, and measures of uptake in policy documents, patents, and news coverage to map the partisan composition of the scientific workforce, the knowledge it produces, and its uptake within and beyond science. We find that U.S. science is politically asymmetric without being ideologically homogeneous: scientists who make political contributions are overwhelmingly Democratic-aligned, and this asymmetry has widened over time, yet the broader workforce includes many Independents and substantial ideological heterogeneity within partisan groups. Among scientists with strong, behaviorally observed partisan alignments, Democratic- and Republican-authored papers are systematically distinguishable in semantic content across all fields, even after conditioning on fine-grained topic and year. Differences in total scientific citation rates are modest and have narrowed over time, whereas citations occur more often within the same partisan author communities than expected under topic- and year-preserving null models. Uptake beyond science also varies by partisan authorship and domain, with the clearest directional selectivity among ideological think tanks. These findings reveal an uneven profile of partisan association across U.S. science, visible in published content and directional attention, but comparatively limited in aggregate scientific recognition. party composition of donors from 1980-2022voter registration (E) and partisan self identification from a survey (F)
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Reposted by Dashun Wang
yifanqian.bsky.social @yifanqian.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
How is generative AI shaping the public funding landscape? Check out our latest paper in @pnas.org: The Rise of Large Language Models and the Direction and Impact of US Federal Research Funding: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... 1/n
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Dashun Wang @dashunwang.bsky.social · 24/06/2026
Exciting tenure-line hiring at Kellogg!! Led by Northwestern Innovation Institute. Open to all ranks, including junior, adv junior, and senior. Can be hosted in any Kellogg dept as the tenure home. focus area: innovation / science of science / AI.
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Reposted by Dashun Wang
Alton B.H. Worthington @abhw.bsky.social · 06/06/2026
Good thread, and has me thinking of @alexanderfurnas.com, @dashunwang.bsky.social, et al's recent Science, too: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
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Reposted by Dashun Wang
Carl T. Bergstrom @carlbergstrom.com · 25/04/2026
Very nice story on risk in science from @georgemusser.com, featuring @cbo.bsky.social, @dashunwang.bsky.social, and me.
qspace.fqxi.org
FQxI Article: Risky Business: How Science Plays Things Too Safe
The Foundational Questions Institute, FQxI, catalyzes, supports, and disseminates research on questions at the foundations of science, particularly new frontiers and innovative ideas integral to a dee...
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Reposted by Dashun Wang
Zander Furnas @alexanderfurnas.com · 22/04/2026
I've got a paper "Bipartisan-cited science is rare, unevenly distributed, and disproportionately influential" published today at @pnas.org with @dashunwang.bsky.social. www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Bipartisan-cited science is rare, unevenly distributed, and disproportionately influential
Alexander C. Furnas https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8006-7798 and Dashun Wang 

Abstract
This study offers a systematic analysis of scientific papers cited in both Republican and Democratic policy documents. Using data from Overton and Dimensions, we examine congressional reports, hearings, and think tank publications. We find that bipartisan citations, while rare, highlight papers of exceptional scientific influence. Policy documents citing these papers also receive more citations, amplifying their policy impact. Yet, bipartisan-cited science is unevenly distributed—concentrated in monetary policy and healthcare, but notably absent in climate, inequality, and race and gender. These results show that bipartisan engagement, though limited, marks a uniquely influential core of science in both research and policy.
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Dashun Wang @dashunwang.bsky.social · 02/03/2026
AI agents are "airplanes for the mind" - check out my latest piece in Nature. The question is not whether machines replace scientists, but what kind of scientist emerges when we learn to fly. www.nature.com/articles/d41...
nature.com
AI agents are ‘aeroplanes for the mind’: five ways to ensure that scientists are responsible pilots
As artificial-intelligence systems take on more of the scientific workflow, the central goal should not be complete automation, but designing platforms that preserve creativity, responsibility and sur...
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Reposted by Dashun Wang
Zander Furnas @alexanderfurnas.com · 17/02/2026
I've got a piece out today @theatlantic.com with @dashunwang.bsky.social on how the Republican Party in Congress continues to fund science, pushing back against the Trump Administration's most anti science funding proposals. (gift link) www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0...
theatlantic.com
The Republicans Made Peace With Science
The Trump administration’s hostility to science is real, but it isn’t matched by the rest of the GOP’s.
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Reposted by Dashun Wang
Nature Computational Science @natcomputsci.nature.com · 09/12/2025
📢Out now! @dashunwang.bsky.social and colleagues introduce SciSciGPT, a prototype AI collaborator for the domain of science of science that streamlines a wide range of empirical and analytical research tasks. www.nature.com/articles/s43... #cssky
nature.com
SciSciGPT: advancing human–AI collaboration in the science of science - Nature Computational Science
SciSciGPT is an open-source prototype AI collaborator that explores the use of LLM research tools to automate workflows, support diverse analytical approaches and enhance reproducibility in the domain...
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Dashun Wang @dashunwang.bsky.social · 23/01/2026
Postdoc openings at Kellogg/Northwestern! Review begins Feb 15 (rolling until filled). Apply / details: www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/academics-re...
kellogg.northwestern.edu
Join the CSSI Team
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Reposted by Dashun Wang
Amaral Lab @amarallab.bsky.social · 26/07/2025
This was a very insightful read! There is a price to pay for making hard pivots in science and technology. By @dashunwang.bsky.social's group. Read here: doi.org/10.1038/s415...
doi.org
The pivot penalty in research - Nature
An analysis of millions of scientific papers and patents reveals a ‘pivot penalty’ when researchers shift direction, with the impact of studies decreasing rapidly the further they move from their prev...
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Reposted by Dashun Wang
Mary Elizabeth Sutherland @meharpist.bsky.social · 29/05/2025
What happens when scientists leave their original research theme to explore a new field? A new @nature.com paper by @dashunwang.bsky.social et al quantifies this "pivot" and shows that it comes at a cost: work in new fields receives relatively fewer citations 🧪 www.nature.com/articles/s41...
nature.com
The pivot penalty in research - Nature
An analysis of millions of scientific papers and patents reveals a ‘pivot penalty’ when researchers shift direction, with the impact of studies decreasing rapidly the further they move from their prev...
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Reposted by Dashun Wang
celestebiever.bsky.social @celestebiever.bsky.social · 25/04/2025
Do US politicians listen to science? Democrat-led congressional committees and leftwing think tanks cite research papers more than their rightwing counterparts, finds vast analysis by @dashunwang.bsky.social @alexanderfurnas.com www.nature.com/articles/d41... With comments from @ejfagan.com
Line graphic showing how left-leaning and right-leaning think tanks cite science papers over time.
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