The 100 most-cited articles in hypothermic brain protection journals: a bibliometric and visualized analysis

Abstract

Introduction: A bibliometric analysis is used to assess the impact of research in a particular field. However, a specialized bibliometric analysis focused on hypothermic brain protection has not yet been conducted. This study aimed to identify the 100 most-cited articles published in the field of hypothermic brain protection and analyze their bibliometric characteristics.

Methods: After screening articles from the Web of Science citation database, complete bibliographic records were imported into Python for data extraction. The following parameters were analyzed: title, author's name and affiliation, country, publication year, publication date, first author, corresponding author, study design, language, number of citations, journal impact factors, keywords, Keywords Plus^®, and research topic.

Results: The 100 articles were published between 1990 and 2016. The citation frequency for each publication ranged from 86 to 470. Among the 100 articles, 73 were original articles, 18 were review articles, 8 were clinical articles, and 1 was editorial material. These papers were published in 37 journals, with the Journal of Cerebral Blood Flow and Metabolism being the most prolific with 15 papers. Eighteen countries contributed to the 100 publications, 51 of which were from United States institutions. In addition, the keywords in the Sankey plot indicated that research in the field of hypothermic brain protection is growing deeper and overlapping with other disciplines.

Discussion: The results provide an overview of research on hypothermic brain protection, which may help researchers better understand classical research, historical developments, and new discoveries, as well as providing ideas for future research.

Keywords: bibliometric analysis; brain protection; citations highlights; hypothermia; surgery.

Figure 1

Study flow diagram created using ProcessOn.com. The Web of Science (WOS) (1980–present) citation database was used to identify articles in the field of hypothermic brain protection. The search strategy yielded 1,847 records, with the final selection of 100 articles made by the researchers. Data were then standardized and imported into Excel, VOSviewer, Python, and R Studio for bibliometric and visual analyses.

Figure 2

Citation of documents in hypothermic brain protection journals created using VOSviewer. Labels and circles were used to represent articles, representing authors’ name and year of publication indicated. The size of each label and circle was based on the weight of the article.

Figure 3

The 100 most-cited articles by publication year. The radar chart depicts the publication years of articles, spanning from 1990 to 2016. Each colored line represents a different type of article, with the outermost purple line representing the total number of publications per year.

Figure 4

The author network visualized using VOSviewer software. The minimum number of documents by any one author is ≥2. Author citation (A) and the bibliometric coupling (B) are shown using labels and circles, showcasing each author’s name. The size of the label and circle varied according to the author’s weight.

Figure 5

Countries cited in the 100 most-cited articles on hypothermic brain protection created by VOSviewer. The minimum number of documents from any one country is ≥1. Countries are represented by labels and circles, with the size of each country’s label and circle determined by its weight.

Figure 6

Citation of institutions in the 100 most-cited articles in hypothermic brain protection journals created by VOSviewer. The minimum number of documents from any one country is ≥2. Institutions are represented by labels and circles, with the size of each institution’s label and circle determined by its weight.

Figure 7

Sankey plot showing the relationships among authors, countries, and research keywords of the 20 most-cited articles. The left column represents the authors’ name, the middle column represents the authors’ country, and the right column represents the articles’ keywords. These columns are connected with corresponding lines on a one-to-one basis.