For research-based EB-1A cases, it is well known that citations are important. But how important are they? How many citations do you need? What about the quality? Today, I will discuss a recent decision by the Administrative Appeals Office of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (“AAO”) so you have a better understanding of these important questions. (1)
Background Facts
The Petitioner, who was a developer of semiconductors and related technology, wanted to permanently employ a senior staff engineer. Based on the engineer’s extraordinary abilities in electronics packaging and semiconductor thermal management, the employer filed an EB-1A petition on his behalf.
The Director of the Nebraska Service Center denied the petition claiming that only two of the ten criteria were met. Please note, to qualify for an EB-1A, if you have not won a major, internationally recognized award, you must meet at least three of ten specified criteria and, after a final merits determination, it must be determined that you qualify for this classification by a preponderance of the evidence. The “preponderance of the evidence” standard means that it is “probably true” or “more likely than not” that you qualify for a benefit. (2)
The petitioning company appealed stating that the Director misapplied the law and facts. The AAO dismissed the appeal. What did they conclude? For the purpose of this article, we will focus only on what they said about the Beneficiary’s citations.
Original Contributions of Major Significance
The Beneficiary submitted information about his citations in order to claim the criterion of original contributions of major significance in the field. This analysis involves answering two questions:
- Has the Beneficiary made an original contribution in the field?
- If so, have these contributions made a major significance in the field?
What about for research-based petitions? To determine significance, USCIS will ask the following regarding the published research:
- Has it provoked widespread commentary?
- Has this commentary noted the importance of the research?
- Has this commentary been provided by others working in the field?
- Has the beneficiary’s work significantly affected their field?
To determine the significance of citations, the question that USCIS will ask is “Has the Beneficiary’s work been highly cited relative to others’ work in that field?”
How well did the Beneficiary meet these standards?
The AAO’s Reasoning
The petitioning employer submitted evidence that the Beneficiary authored or co-authored 14 published articles in the fields since 2019. Further, a printout from a scholarly literature website showed that the Beneficiary’s work had produced 170 citations.
However, the Beneficiary fell way short when compared to others in his field because the same “website showed that others in the electronic packaging field had each written more than 450 published articles generating more than 11,000 citations.” (3) Even worse, it was noted in a footnote that one of the experts who provided a letter of support for the Beneficiary’s petition authored more than 300 articles in the field. In short, the Beneficiary’s 14 articles did not come close to others in his field who have written more than 450 articles.
Isn’t It Possible for a Researcher to Have Few Citations Yet Have a Major Significance in the Field?
This was the Petitioner’s counterargument. When appealing, evidence was submitted of other researchers who have had a major significance on the field even though they had less citations than the Beneficiary. Therefore, according to this argument, it should not matter that the Beneficiary does not have many citations so long as the citations he has are of major significance. After all, the Director when denying the petition noted that Beneficiary’s articles show that original contributions to the field have been made.
Why Wasn’t This Argument Considered?
The problem with this counterargument was that the petitioning employer submitted this information on appeal and not during the initial filing or when the RFE was issued even though the Petitioner did not claim or show that the new evidence was not available.
The AAO’s point of view was essentially this (this is not a direct quote):
Look, you are appealing the decision because of an error we allegedly made. We made our decision based on the information that you provided. Further, we asked for additional information when we sent the Request for Evidence but you did not provide it nor did you say that the additional information was unavailable. Therefore, you can’t submit new information after the fact because the point of an appeal is saying that we made a wrong decision based on the evidence you already submitted. We are not going to consider evidence that you did not submit but could have.
Therefore, the AAO ultimately agreed with the Director that the Petitioner’s evidence did “not show that the Beneficiary is highly cited relative to other researchers in his field” and concluded that he did not make original contributions of major significance in his field. (4)
What Are the Lessons to Be Learned?
If you plan on using citations for your researched based petition, keep the following in mind:
- Properly gather all the documentation that you could use to establish that you have a high citation count and that your work is original and significant in your field. You may not know what will be important in the future so collect it anyway. The Beneficiary in this case hurt his case by not gathering certain information and submitting it with his Request for Evidence response. As a result, when he appealed his case, he could not use it and it might have made a difference.
- Make sure your research has provoked widespread commentary.
- Who has provided the commentary regarding your research? Make sure that this commentary has been provided by others working in the field. The more prominent the individuals, the better.
- Evaluate the kind of commentary your research has produced. Has this commentary noted the importance of your research?
- Has your research significantly affected your field? If so, provide evidence such as commentary from other experts in your field, newspaper and journal articles or support letters written by experts.
- Make sure that your work has been highly cited relative to others’ work in your field.
- While it might be possible to have less citations and have them be highly influential, you can expect to have some push back. Moreover, it is fighting an uphill battle. The AAO did not address the issue in this case so we do not know what they would have decided. However, the safer route is to have highly cited relative to others’ work in your field so it makes your application stronger.
This is not legal advice, just legal information. However, if you need advice specific to your case, please send an email to ejedwards@edwardslegalservices.com.
(1) In re 37223991, at * (AAO Feb. 28, 2025) (non-precedent decision), https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/err/B2%20-%20Aliens%20with%20Extraordinary%20Ability/Decisions_Issued_in_2025/FEB282025_01B2203.pdf
(2) U.S. Citizenship & Immigr. Servs., Policy Manual, vol. 1, pt. E, ch. 4, https://www.uscis.gov/policy-manual/volume-1-part-e-chapter-4 (last visited May 22, 2025).
(3) In re 37223991, at 3 (AAO Feb. 28, 2025) (non-precedent decision), https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/err/B2%20-%20Aliens%20with%20Extraordinary%20Ability/Decisions_Issued_in_2025/FEB282025_01B2203.pdf.
(4) Id. at 4
Last Updated on September 30, 2025 by Ernest J. Edwards
