The boundary-spanning mechanisms of Nobel Prize winning papers

The breakthrough potentials of research papers can be explained by their boundary-spanning qualities. Here, for the first time, we apply structural variation analysis (SVA) model and its affiliated metrics to investigate extent which such qualities characterize a group Nobel Prize winning papers. We find that these share remarkable traits, marked exceptional abilities connect disparate topically-diverse clusters Further, publications exert variations on scale significantly alters betweenness centrality distributions existing intellectual space. Overall, SVA not only provides set leading indicators describing future papers, but also broadens our understanding similar prize-winning properties may have been overlooked among other regular publications.