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Science & Technology Strategy and Policy

Science and Technology for Advancing Maritime Strength

—Frontier Identification, Evolutionary Logic, and China's Strategic  Choices in Marine Science and Technology 

Chen Yue1 , Xie Junjie1 , Chen Jin2, 3 

(1.The Institute of Science of Science and S&T Management & WISE Lab, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian 116024, China; 2.School of Economics and Management, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China; 3.Research Center for Technological Innovation, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China)

Abstract: Marine science and technology constitute a fundamental basis for building China  into a strong maritime country and advancing the Chinese path toward maritime strength. To systematically identify research frontiers in marine science and technology and clarify their strategic significance, this study uses publications in the field from 2000 to 2025 and applies change  point detection, keyword co-occurrence analysis, co-citation clustering, and burst term analysis  to characterize the staged evolution of research themes. It further integrates patent text topic  identification with paper-patent citation relationships to examine the pathways through which  scientific frontiers are transformed into technological applications. The results show that marine  science and technology have generally evolved through three stages: remote sensing observation  and ecological monitoring, climate response and resource application expansion, and AIempowered intelligent ocean. Research frontiers have gradually expanded from traditional areas  such as marine environmental monitoring, marine geology, and ocean engineering to emerging directions including marine energy development, polar and regional ocean governance, intelligent marine equipment, multi-source sensing, and emerging pollutant monitoring. Patent topic analysis indicates that technological transformation in marine science and technology mainly centers  on capabilities related to observation and sensing, equipment operation, engineering utilization, and intelligent decision-making. Scientific frontiers are translated into technological directions  such as underwater detection and autonomous sensing, marine big data and intelligent forecasting, and marine renewable energy and integrated utilization through knowledge absorption, technological integration, and application-scenario traction. This study argues that the essence of  marine science and technology frontiers lies not in isolated technological breakthroughs, but in  the reconstruction of systematic capabilities oriented toward building a strong maritime country. Looking ahead, China should promote the Chinese path toward maritime strength through selfreliance and self-strengthening in marine science and technology, and build an innovation system with strategic foresight, technological autonomy, industrial support, and ecological sustainability around seven types of capabilities: understanding the ocean, knowing the ocean, entering  the ocean, utilizing the ocean, connecting through the ocean, developing the ocean, and protecting the ocean.

Key words: marine science and technology; research frontier identification; scientometrics; technological transformation; strong maritime country; maritime strength; green development; smart ocean