Published online Jul 6, 2020. doi: 10.12998/wjcc.v8.i13.2817
Peer-review started: April 7, 2020
First decision: April 28, 2020
Revised: May 5, 2020
Accepted: May 30, 2020
Article in press: May 30, 2020
Published online: July 6, 2020
Processing time: 90 Days and 17.5 Hours
Gut microbiota is an emerging field of research, and related research has shown breakthrough development in the past 15 years. Bibliometric analysis can be applied to analyze the evolutionary trends and emerging hotspots in this field.
As the potential clinical application of gut microbiota is understood more and more deeply, the number of studies on gut microbiota has increased rapidly. The study of gut microbiota is an emerging research field, and our findings will offer guidance to scholars in this field.
To study the subject trends and knowledge structures of gut microbiota related research fields from 2004 to 2018.
Through the biclustering analysis, strategic diagram, and social network analysis diagram, main trends and knowledge structure of research fields concerning gut microbiota were analyzed to obtain and compare the research hotspots in each period.
According to the strategic coordinates and social relationship network map, Clostridium Infections/microbiology, Clostridium Infections/therapy, RNA, Ribosomal, 16S/genetics, Microbiota/genetics, Microbiota/immunology, Dysbiosis/immunology, Inflammation/immunology, Fecal Microbiota Transplantation/methods, and Fecal Microbiota Transplantation were emerging research hotspot in the past 5 years (2014-2018).
Using strategic coordinates, our results identified which subjects have not been not fully studied yet, and the emerging hotspots in the social network map provide a direction for future research.
This study is the first comprehensive bibliometric analysis of gut microbiota. Research on microbiota is still at the developing stage, and it will continue to be studied more deeply in the future. In our view, the abovementioned emerging hotspot problems can offer the basis for future research and can guide scientific researchers, clinicians, and medical educators to initiate new projects.