OBJECTIVETo identify the characteristics of the articles published in Zhonghua Nan Ke Xue (National Journal of Andrology, NJA) and the distribution of the authors in the andrological world.

METHODSArticles published in NJA between 2009 to 2012 were collected and analyzed using statistic and bibliometric methods. The indicators include cooperation degree, core authors, distribution of grant articles, and geographical distribution of authors.

RESULTSDuring the 4 years, 1064 articles were published in NJA, of which 998 (93.80%) were coauthored, with a cooperation degree of 4.72. Totally, 909 authors, including 792 (87.13%) of the first authors, published 1 article each; 272 (25.56%) papers were written by 117 (12.87%) core authors, and 396 granted by 619 foundations. There were 13 high-productivity institutions, which published a total number of 257 (24.15%) articles. As for geographical distribution, Jiangshu, Guangdong and Beijing ranked as the top three, contributing 215 (20.21%), 105 (9.87%) and 102 (9.59%) of the published papers, respectively. Among the published papers, 132 were cited for 185 times by 119 journals in SCI, and another 418 cited for 701 times by 94 journals in CSCD.

CONCLUSIONNJA has a high cooperation degree and a wide geographical distribution of authors, with Jiangshu, Guangdong and Beijing as the top three areas in andrological research, though the overall geographical distribution is not well balanced. NJA is receiving more and more attention from both domestic and international researchers.