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. 2023 Jan 5:12:1039882.
doi: 10.3389/fonc.2022.1039882. eCollection 2022.

Knowledge atlas of antibody-drug conjugates on CiteSpace and clinical trial visualization analysis

Peizhuo Yao  1 , Yinbin Zhang  2 , Shuqun Zhang  1 , Xinyu Wei  1 , Yanbin Liu  1 , Chong Du  1 , Mingyou Hu  2 , Cong Feng  1 , Jia Li  1 , Fang Zhao  1 , Chaofan Li  1 , Zhen Li  1 , Lisha Du  1
Affiliations

Knowledge atlas of antibody-drug conjugates on CiteSpace and clinical trial visualization analysis

Peizhuo Yao et al. Front Oncol. .

Abstract

Objective: Antibody-drugs conjugates (ADCs) are novel drugs with highly targeted and tumor-killing abilities and developing rapidly. This study aimed to evaluate drug discovery and clinical trials of and explore the hotspots and frontiers from 2012 to 2022 using bibliometric methods.

Methods: Publications on ADCs were retrieved between 2012 and 2022 from Web of Science (WoS) and analyzed with CiteSpace 6.1.R2 software for the time, region, journals, institutions, etc. Clinical trials were downloaded from clinical trial.org and visualized with Excel software.

Results: A total of 696 publications were obtained and 187 drug trials were retrieved. Since 2012, research on ADCs has increased year by year. Since 2020, ADC-related research has increased dramatically, with the number of relevant annual publications exceeding 100 for the first time. The United States is the most authoritative and superior country and region in the field of ADCs. The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center is the most authoritative institution in this field. Research on ADCs includes two clinical trials and one review, which are the most influential references. Clinical trials of ADCs are currently focused on phase I and phase II. Comprehensive statistics and analysis of the published literature and clinical trials in the field of ADCs, have shown that the most studied drug is brentuximab vedotin (BV), the most popular target is human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2), and breast cancer may become the main trend and hotspot for ADCs indications in recent years.

Conclusion: Antibody-drug conjugates have become the focus of targeted therapies in the field of oncology. The innovation of technology and combination application strategy will become the main trend and hotspots in the future.

Keywords: CiteSpace; Web of Science; antibody-drug conjugates; clinical trials; research trends.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Annual growth trends and geographical distribution of ADCs. (A) The number of ADCs-related papers (as of the end of March 2022). (B) The co-occurrence map of countries/regions in ADCs research. (C) National map of clinical trials in ADCs research. (D) National ranking of clinical trials in ADCs research (https://www.clinicaltrials.gov/).
Figure 2
Figure 2
Visual analysis of institutions, co-cited references, and keywords in ADCs research. (A) The co-occurrence map of institutions in ADCs research. (B) Co-cited network map of references in ADCs research. (C) Co-occurrence of keywords related to ADCs by centrality. (D) Clustering map of keywords related to ADCs.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Clinical registration trials of ADCs ranked by representative drugs, common target, and clinical stages. (A) Ranking of clinical trials of representative ADCs research. (B) Histogram of common targets of ADCs. (C) Distribution of clinical trial registration stages in ADCs research.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Major clinical indications for ADCs. (A) Clustering timeline of references related to ADCs research. (B) Bar chart of the clinical trials and disease type ranking of ADCs.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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