Research trends on the relationship between Microbiota and Gastric Cancer: A Bibliometric Analysis from 2000 to 2019

Abstract

Background: Hundreds of studies have found that the microbiota contributes to the development of gastric cancer in the past two decades. This study aimed to access the research trends of microbiota and gastric cancer. Materials and Methods: Publications from January 1, 2000 to December 31, 2019 were retrieved from the Web of Science Core Collection database and screened according to inclusion criteria. Different kinds of software, SPSS21.0, HistCite, VOSviewer, CiteSpace, and the online bibliometric analysis platform were used to evaluate and visualize the results. Results: A total of 196 publications were finally identified, and the annual number of publications showed an increasing trend. These publications were from 44 countries and the USA showed its dominant position in publication outputs, H-index, total citations, and international collaborations. The journal of Helicobacter was the most productive journal. Correa P and Peek RM published the most papers, and the most productive institution was Vanderbilt University. The keyword of "Helicobacter pylori" ranked first in research frontiers and appeared earlier, and the keyword of "microbiota" began to appear in the past 3 to 5 years. Conclusion: The annual number of publications would continue to grow. Besides the traditional Helicobacter pylori related researches, future research hotspots will focus on microbiota and its mechanism of action.

Keywords: Bibliometric Analysis; Gastric Cancer; Microbiota; Research trend.

Figure 1

Flowchart of including and excluding publications.

Figure 2

Global number of publications, number of citations, and H-index of publications in the field of microbiota and gastric cancer from 2000 to 2019. (A) Annual number of the published publications and its percentage; (B) Number and percentage of the annual cumulative published publications; (C) Annual citation number of the publications; (D) Annual H-index of the publications.

Figure 3

Top 10 productive countries related to microbiota and gastric cancer research from 2000 to 2019. (A) Number of publications and H-index; (B) Total number of citations and average citations of per publication; (C) Number of the cumulative publications in various countries; (D) International collaboration between countries. The countries were labeled using different colors and the links represented international collaborations.

Figure 4

Article distribution among institutions and authors in the field of microbiota and gastric cancer from 2000 to 2019. (A) Publication number, total citation number, average citations of per publication, and H-index of the top 8 reproductive institutions; (B) Co-authorship among 15 reproductive authors. Dots represented authors and larger dot indicated higher number of publications, the clusters were labeled using different colors and the links represented author collaborations.

Figure 5

Keywords visualization related to microbiota and gastric cancer research from 2000 to 2019. (A) Network visualization of the keywords; (B) Time-based visualization of keywords variation. Dots represented keywords and larger dot indicated higher occurrence frequency of keywords, the clusters were labeled using different colors and the links represented the co-occurrence of keywords.