The Birth of the Research Field of COVID-19: Factors Determining the Evolution Supporting Discoveries and Technological Paradigm Shift with New MRNA Vaccines

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is an infectious disease caused by the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, that appeared in late 2019 generating a high number of deaths and socioeconomic issues in human society. One of the fundamental questions in social studies of science is to analyze the evolution of new research fields during environmental threats, such as COVID-19 global pandemic crisis. This study analyzes the emergence and evolution of the research field of COVID-19 compared to other scientific fields concerning respiratory disorders, such as Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) and Lung Cancer, to explain the dynamics of science that is generating scientific breakthroughs in a short period of time. This study shows that the scientific production of the research field of COVID-19 has increased from January 2020 with an unparalleled velocity generating manifold scientific advances, discoveries and innovative drugs for a paradigm shift in the treatment of infectious diseases with mRNA vaccines. In particular, results reveal that acceleration of science in the research field of COVID-19, measured with scientific production, is equal to a growth of 1.71% daily, which is a level much higher than evolution of a normal research field that has a growth of scientific production of about 0.5% daily (e.g., COPD and Lung Cancer). These findings are generalized in properties of the dynamics of science to explain the characteristics of science that generate scientific breakthrough in the presence of environmental threats. Overall, then, this study clarifies, as far as possible, some novel characteristics of the origin of new research fields, crisis-driven, that support discoveries and innovations for guiding scientific and technological progress in society.