Researchers based in China or with Chinese surnames face lower publication rates in prestigious US science journals than their US and Canadian peers, according to a study analyzing over 110,000 manuscripts submitted to Science and Science Advances from 2015 to 2020.

The study found that only 2.5% of submissions from China-based researchers were accepted, compared with an 8.3% acceptance rate overall for submissions from North America. Furthermore, even US-based scientists with Chinese surnames had lower publication rates than those without, as reported in Science Advances on July 15, 2026.

Sam Zhang, lead author and computational social scientist at the University of Vermont, suggested that China's research system, which offers career and financial incentives to publish in elite journals like Science, might encourage submissions even when some studies do not align well with the journals' broad scientific scope.

The findings highlight disparities in publication success that may be influenced by systemic factors in research evaluation and submission practices.

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