Fig. 2

a Displays relative abundance profiles for Iraq, the UK and Greece. While the decline in relative share of global publications from the UK is clear, it is difficult to compare with other countries due to differing overall levels of production. Thus in b we display the average prevalence for the same three countries (in same colours as a)—it is clear that while the relative share of the UK has slowly declined, for Greece it was increasing until 2010 (the subsequent decline may be due to the imposition of austerity). For Iraq we see a period of decline (during conflict) between 1990–2010, from which it is now recovering. In c we show the average prevalence of five groups of countries obtained from clustering their historical profiles. Two clusters display rapid growth in recent periods (red and purple), while two others display high variability (yellow and green). The final group (blue) features countries with stable or moderately declining profiles. Finally, in d we map these groups (in same colours as c), with the majority of the Global North belonging to stable or declining clusters while the Global South remains dynamic